Skinnee Labs - GTX480 Block Round-Up (working thread)

[JoeBar]

A for the effort and time...


It's great to have guys willing to sacrifice their resources for others...

[mk-ultra]

keep up the good work skinnee!!!!

[SuperchargedZ06]

Patiently awaiting results as well - kudos to you skinnee for all the work you are pouring into this!

One quick question, in addition to all the performance metrics you are going to collect, could you also expose each block to a woman (preferably married) to get their acceptance reaction/scowl factor? (This may help influence my purchase decision...)

[Conumdrum]

Patiently awaiting results as well - kudos to you skinnee for all the work you are pouring into this!

One quick question, in addition to all the performance metrics you are going to collect, could you also expose each block to a woman (preferably married) to get their acceptance reaction/scowl factor? (This may help influence my purchase decision...)

Rose colored water with rose smell. We have discussed it before here.

"Honey, I got .375C lower load temps, I just need to buy xxx for a whole 1.0C."

"Thats nice dear it smells pretty and looks like the rose garden you promised me 3 years ago, go ahead, buy more stuff."

$37 a pint, interested?

[blinkin2000]

Wow this will be great. I'm really looking forward to the results. Thank for doing this research. The type of data on this forum, I feel, is way more reliable than one-off reviews floating on the web.

[luke997]

This thread is the reason I got the backplates so here it is on

[-TYPHOON-]

looks like its bent.

[luke997]

looks like its bent.

It's not, just not fully screwed in the middle and not at all on both edges as the attached screws were too short.
Good screws are on the way though.

[gabe]

They are as close as they can get and still maintain clearance of the chokes. Sensors are reading 30C+ at idle as I get the system changed over the R2E.

This is a debate I had in dreams between a nameless Hard core XS member and Skinnee:

XS (Authoritative): Ideally Skinnee, you'd want to epoxy 28 type T thermo-couples to the side of each one of the mosfets

Skinnee (mildly amused): $%^%^&you or what? grmbl grmbl

XS (accomodating): ok, I understand, .. how about 14 then ? You could run spreadsheets with temp variations between each of the mosfet with the different blocks, with nice standard deviation curvs.. that would look great!

Skinnee (loosing patience): *(& (^&*

XS (giving up): fine, let's settle for 7 then ? really that's the least you could do for a mildly accurate performance analysis.

Skinnee: (%^&% ^%&*(&

[-Fluffy-]

These results can't come soon enough!

Does the EK backplate do anything functional, besides looking awesome?

[Boulard83]

Whats wrong gabe ?

Your afraid that skinnee could discover anything wrong about the Swiftech block ?

Im 100% satisfied with my komodo ... i dont see why the GTX one would fail ...

[luke997]

Does the EK backplate do anything functional, besides looking awesome?

I might be wrong but I don't think so - at least not until you put the thermal pads in a few places where there are chips on the PCB.
Perhaps also prevents the card to bend but to be honest I did not notice PCB to bend with EK block.

[gmat]

Progressing along here, since nVidia did not give us VRM sensors we had to come up with our own.

And yes, I need to clean up those hot glue whiskers yet.

HA you found a creative way to use those holes on the PCB

I might be wrong but I don't think so - at least not until you put the thermal pads in a few places where there are chips on the PCB.
Perhaps also prevents the card to bend but to be honest I did not notice PCB to bend with EK block.

Well on the photo above, it's already bent ?

[luke997]

Well on the photo above, it's already bent ?

See my post above - it's not bent it's just not fully mounted due to incorrect size screws attached.
When mounted with random screws I've had just to try out all fits well.

[Lancelot]

results please.......ahhhhhhhhh

[Vapor]

results please.......ahhhhhhhhh

Patience

He's only got the BP 100% done (Koolance should be done soon I'd think).

IIRC, he saw over 100C on his VRM probes on the run that tripped his PSU's OCP. Guess the VRMs weren't getting cooled well enough and saw runaway drops in efficiency (leading to runaway increases in power consumed at the wall and power dissipated at the VRMs). So yeah, definitely has some viable data off the VRM temp setup he has going right now

And even at stock, there were major differences in GPU temp and VRM temp between the Koolance and the BP, so it looks like the test setup is done and now it's just to data collection

[ForceFed_B16A]

Patience

He's only got the BP 100% done... he saw over 100C on his VRM probes on the run that tripped his PSU's OCP...

Anyone want to buy my Bitspower GTX 480 waterblock?

[Vapor]

I'm not sure how many of the blocks could handle those test settings, if any

Fortunately his finalized test settings for the review are lower...reviewers of blocks need three main things from their GPU/CPU/board/whatever: heat, repeatability, and stability. He's got all covered right now

[skinnee]

Yup, BP block thermals are complete and Koolance block is 2/3rds complete but should be done tonight. Danger Den block is next since it was the second block to arrive. I should have the BP install video done tonight as well, I want the Koolance video rendering tonight but that might be high expectations of myself.

The voltage testing on the card was insane, VRM temps were well beyond 100C and watt consumption of the card just kept climbing. I can't wait to see the non-reference designs come out, as the power delivery has a lot of room for improvement. But what came out of all that white knuckle experiementation was as much heat as I could generate, remain stable and my own comfort level that the card would survive the torture of testing 8+ blocks.

But yes, we've now reached the 'grind' portion... Mount Video, Test, Test, unmount/remount, Test, Test, unmount/remount, Test, Test, Mount Video, rinse/repeat. I'm going to get a few more blocks done this weekend and might just provide a sneak peak at some performance data.

[punx223]

nice lookin review skinee.

cant wait to see the results. The Swiftech/EVGA block looks very interesting with the hybrid VRM cooling.

[Wryknow]

I'm going to get a few more blocks done this weekend and might just provide a sneak peak at some performance data.

Exxxxxcellent

[zeroibis]

Thanks for your hard work on bringing us these numbers

[Russ_64]

Is it only the Aqua block that has a backplate?

My money is on the EK (I have always used them and already purchased one for my new GTX470)......... I also have my doubts about the XSPC VRM cooling.

Can't wait to see the finished charts

[snoro]

If i remember well, only the aqua have a backplate as standard with the block but Ek have one in option. Best choice for me would be the ek backplate and aqua gtx 470 block with the stainless black painted and the copper nickel plated. That would be very nice.

[JoeChuo]

Skinnee fast! fast! I need juice here. JK ... can do the EK block first ... the rest later.