Swiftech Releases Komodo HD5800 F/C Waterblock For ATI

[dejanh]

Im also waiting for this Gabe ... im on thermal tape and the temp are so-so on the VRM ... i wish to switch to Paste but im afraid now ...

Don't do it. My card is now toast too. I'll show tomorrow that this does not work 100%(explanation + pics).

[Philwong]

Don't do it. My card is now toast too. I'll show tomorrow that this does not work 100%(explanation + pics).

Sorry to hear that, but the new 5850 and 5870 are supposed to have built in overheating protection against killer software such as Furmark. Plus honestly speaking you are pushing the card to its limit at such high resolution and AA settings.

One of the workarounds is to file the standoff to improve contact, but then it might warp the card in the long run as well. There's a reason why most full face blocks use thermal pad and that's to buffer for the different height tolerances.

Phil

[dejanh]

Plus honestly speaking you are pushing the card to its limit at such high resolution and AA settings.

What is this, http://www.moderatesystems.org?

I doubt the card has protection in that sense since I doubt VRM would be allowed to hit 110C+. Anyway, what killed the card is the mounting, and remounting, and remounting in hopes to get data for Gabe and to solve this problem. Besides, nothing that is in the installation manual is out of line in terms of proper installation. Unfortunately, I have two Komodo blocks and now a dead card for which I can show that paste method does not work. The uneaven thickness of the block, height of stanoffs, etc., all play a part and when you are dealing with measurements as small as fractions of a millimeter something being off by 0.1mm or 0.2mm or more is significantly off. I will have the pictures up very soon with some data. It's unfortunate I had to sacrifice a card to get this.

[Badfastbusa]

What is this, http://www.moderatesystems.org?

I doubt the card has protection in that sense since I doubt VRM would be allowed to hit 110C+. Anyway, what killed the card is the mounting, and remounting, and remounting in hopes to get data for Gabe and to solve this problem. Besides, nothing that is in the installation manual is out of line in terms of proper installation. Unfortunately, I have two Komodo blocks and now a dead card for which I can show that paste method does not work. The uneaven thickness of the block, height of stanoffs, etc., all play a part and when you are dealing with measurements as small as fractions of a millimeter something being off by 0.1mm or 0.2mm or more is significantly off. I will have the pictures up very soon with some data. It's unfortunate I had to sacrifice a card to get this.

Dude, that freaking sucks to hear man, that is a ton of money wasted, and I am sure you are very unhappy, especially seeing as BFBC2 is out now and is epic and you can't even play it... However, I haven't had any troubles out of mine, and getting absolutely great temps... I followed the instructions to a T and everything has worked flawlessly... I ran furmark with the exact specs you wanted me to run it and my temps didn't ever get out of hand, so I don't know what to tell ya man...

It would be cool if gabe would throw his insight in on this and maybe give you a helping hand.

[Philwong]

What is this, http://www.moderatesystems.org?

Unfortunately, the Komodo is not the most "extreme" block as far as VRM temp is concerned. It's all about expectation and you ought to be looking at EK for the lowest possible temp. Like I mentioned earlier, if Swiftech can bring down the temp by such a huge degree just by using paste, there's no reason why EK will not benefit from this tweak as well.

Phil

[dejanh]

Unfortunately, the Komodo is not the most "extreme" block as far as VRM temp is concerned. It's all about expectation and you ought to be looking at EK for the lowest possible temp. Like I mentioned earlier, if Swiftech can bring down the temp by such a huge degree just by using paste, there's no reason why EK will not benefit from this tweak as well.

Phil

My comment was only intended as a rebuttal to your statement of pushing the card to the extreme. I hardly pushed the card to the extreme, and personally I even stated that I do not think the card died because of VRM temperatures but rather all of the mounting and remounting. Anyway, the main reason I took everything down again last night is so that I can get data for Gabe to show him the problem. I got the data, but unfortunately I also got a dead card now. I had no choice anyway though but to take down the loop again last night since the VRM temperatures were out of control. I was intending to replace the paste with pads again but once everything was done the card would no longer start. I'm loading the images and doing the write up now, they will be up shortly.

Edit: @Philwong, I forgot to mention something. Furmark got nerfed by ATI in their drivers after I reported a problem with it overheating the VRMs at launch of HD 4800 series cards several years ago. I realize that Furmark is not representative of normal load however it is a great test tool and shows problems quickly. After the VRM debacle that happened with the HD 4800 series cards I did not expect a repeat of the problem, and as you can see below I was right. Furmark or not, the block is not making contact as it should be so the VRMs burn, burn, burn

[dejanh]

Ok, I sorted through the photos and my notes and I think this one illustrates the best the lack of contact. I needed to put on a lot of paste to get anything to come across onto the VRM cooling area. The block was compressed as much as it can be to the graphics card.



Notice that the GPU die and the single VRM in the lower right corner have good compression, but the VRMs at the rear of the card barely make contact, and definitely do not have any compression.

And another screenshot following maximum compression of block to card, this time with abut 1/2-3/4 of the thermal paste; notice one of the VRMs has no more contact at all. Also notice the scratches around standoffs as a result of trying to tighten them down as much as possible to get the block to make proper contact in vain.



Now, I have measured the PCB height, VRM height, standoff height when fully screwed in and standalone, VRM plateau height, and determined that the VRMs cannot be cooled with the paste method on either of my Komodo blocks with this card. All measurements have a margin of error +/- 0.05mm due to human error and were done with a digital caliper.

PCB, VRM dimensions:

PCB thickness: 1.55mm - 1.6mm
VRM (rear) thickness: 0.85mm
VRM (front, single) thickness: 1.1mm

Block dimensions, around rear VRM area:

Top-left corner + standoff: 15.30mm
Bottom-left corner + standoff: 15.1mm
VRM plateau height (average): 14.15mm
Difference: 0.95mm - 1.15mm

As you can tell from these dimensions it is not possible to make good contact with the VRM using paste only as the difference between the VRM thickness and where the plateau sits once mounted ranges from 0.1mm to as much as 0.3mm.

The second block is more or less the same, having dimensions 15.05mm/14.75mm/13.9mm (avg); net difference 0.85mm - 1.15mm. Furthermore, on the second block even the single VRM would not make proper contact as the net difference in height between the standoff and plateau height is 1.2mm - 1.3mm, larger than 1.1mm height of that VRM.

Furthermore, the screw-in depth for standoffs and standoffs themselves are not equal. They range in height from 3.85mm to 4.1mm in no practical order. The screw in depths appear to do the same and are uneven. I took a 4.1mm standoff and placed it into the center hole by the DRAM cooling pad near the inlet/outlet and the PCB would still warp here because the screw in depth was deeper by about 0.3mm than other areas. This would happen every time but if the fastener was loosened to eliminate the warping insufficient contact with the DRAM would be made. Finally, around the single VRM area the board warps significantly once the card is mounted in the case as the perpendicular forces exerted by the weight of the block pulling down and away from the mounting slots on the PCB.

Two blocks later I would say that using this block without thermal pads and instead using thermal paste is strongly not recommended, at least with MSI R5850. I will test things out on the Asus EAH5850 as well once it is here in a few more days. The MSI R5850 is now off for an RMA and I really, really hope I actually get the replacement.

[jaredpace]

Hello,

The indention you have marked, "Bad contact, no compression" with a red line with two arrows on each end, can you remove the pad sitting inside that indention to give your block more height/clearance to successfully cover the components on the pcb marked by the white sticker, "CPL2-3". Then you may have greater compression/pressure on the 5 VT1165 slaves to the left which are not being touched by your cooling block. Also, can you make your cooling block mount tighter to that area of vrm slaves?

Why not use a highly conductive thick thermal pad of good quality to mount on those 5 components. These 5 slaves need *MUCH* more cooling than the parts under the white sticker CPL2-3, which require little cooling, and are not even touching the stock cooler.

[Philwong]

My comment was only intended as a rebuttal to your statement of pushing the card to the extreme. I hardly pushed the card to the extreme, and personally I even stated that I do not think the card died because of VRM temperatures but rather all of the mounting and remounting. Anyway, the main reason I took everything down again last night is so that I can get data for Gabe to show him the problem. I got the data, but unfortunately I also got a dead card now. I had no choice anyway though but to take down the loop again last night since the VRM temperatures were out of control. I was intending to replace the paste with pads again but once everything was done the card would no longer start. I'm loading the images and doing the write up now, they will be up shortly.

Edit: @Philwong, I forgot to mention something. Furmark got nerfed by ATI in their drivers after I reported a problem with it overheating the VRMs at launch of HD 4800 series cards several years ago. I realize that Furmark is not representative of normal load however it is a great test tool and shows problems quickly. After the VRM debacle that happened with the HD 4800 series cards I did not expect a repeat of the problem, and as you can see below I was right. Furmark or not, the block is not making contact as it should be so the VRMs burn, burn, burn

If running Furmark at such extreme settings is not pushing your card to the limit with all the warnings of average VRM temps delivered by the Komodo, I don't know what else to say. I will be pissed too if I zapped my card so I do feel for you. But what else can we Komodo owners do when the coolant is not flowing anywhere close to the VRMs? It's not some rocket science that the Ek shines in this area, while the Swifty aced in the GPU department with its micro pins.

Phil

[jaredpace]

I doubt the card has protection in that sense since I doubt VRM would be allowed to hit 110C+. Anyway, what killed the card is the mounting, and remounting, and remounting

The card does indeed have throttling protection to prevent overheating, overvolting, and overcurrent. The slaves throttle at 150C, however are recommended to run <105C, and should avoid ~120C. The cooler the better. I also read that philwong recommended you to file off the "standoffs" to create a tighter connection to the pcb. This may work, AND, I have another suggestion - could you take two cut sections of the thermal pads, stack them, and firmly mount the cooler to create solid compression? Check your temps then (if your card is still working)