GPU thermal pads on back?

[AMKKAM]

Applying thermal pads to the v-ram and mosfet on the front is normal, but can I also put them on the back of the v-ram and mosfet? Instead of a backplate, can I put a heat sink (the same size or a little bigger than the front heat sink) that covers all the thermal pads? 92 mm, 1500 rpm fan instead of the GPU fan.
Will this help? What can I do with the GPU core's backside?

[tkitch]

you can, but you'll have a hard time securing anything to the back, as there are no mounting holes.

 

And a thermal pad with no real pressure is pretty trash at transferring heat. 

[SquintyG33Rs]

it'll make a small difference. there is heat leaking there but you're going through so many layers you won't see much improvement so it's rarely worth the effort (for all of them, core, mem, vrm).

[Mick Naughty]

You can do anything you want if you can manage it. Good airflow can get the job done most likely. 

[AMKKAM]

19 hours ago, SquintyG33Rs said:

it'll make a small difference. there is heat leaking there but you're going through so many layers you won't see much improvement so it's rarely worth the effort (for all of them, core, mem, vrm).

u mean mem, vrm heat more in front than the back?
 

[AMKKAM]

11 hours ago, Mick Naughty said:

You can do anything you want if you can manage it. Good airflow can get the job done most likely. 

front nzxt 3x120, 2000rpm intake, back corsair ml 140 exhaust and top corsair 3x120, 1800rpm pull from 360 rad.
cooler master H500 mesh version case.
so i think i am having good enough airflow.
 

[Mick Naughty]

21 minutes ago, AMKKAM said:

front nzxt 3x120, 2000rpm intake, back corsair ml 140 exhaust and top corsair 3x120, 1800rpm pull from 360 rad.
cooler master H500 mesh version case.
so i think i am having good enough airflow.
 

So you’re gonna run the fans at max rpm?

[AMKKAM]

16 minutes ago, Mick Naughty said:

So you’re gonna run the fans at max rpm?

not always.

[SquintyG33Rs]

9 hours ago, AMKKAM said:

u mean mem, vrm heat more in front than the back?

no well the heat is somewhere inside the black plastic square you can see. it's much closer to the bottom of that black plastic.
but the thickness of that plastic on top is usually thinner than the thickness of the PCB and there's more or less a gap bellow for the thickness of the solder.

somebody will think but metal is more conductive so the copper traces will conduct heat better....
yeah but it's obviously not 100% copper in a PCB and fiber glass doesn't conduct heat well. and a PCB is a sandwich of layers.

all these things add up to the result that you don't get a significant effect from adding cooling to the backside. the 3090 needed it because it literally had ram on the back.
some gigabyte specifically engineered the PCB of some of their cards at one point so that the back of the GPU die was as much just exposed copper and copper content through the thickness as possible... they stopped doing it... it wasn't worth the extra work, it didn't sell more cards because the performance difference doesn't exist.

but like you can do it if it makes you happy. it won't hurt anything at all. there's no reason to tell you it's a bad idea. just don't set your expectations too high.