Best way to cool r9 290x

[finnigen]

I have a powercolor r9 290x reference design and would like too cool it good.

I am not specially experienced with water cooling, but I have seen this:

http://www.amazon.de/Alphacool-NexXxoS-GPX-Backplate-Schwarz/dp/B00NYROY26/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1415522688&sr=8-5&keywords=Nexxxos+gpx

I would also need a pump, tubes.......

Would you recommend building a custom loop as an beginner?

Is it really worth it and much better than other solutions?

If it is ok to do this as an beginner does anybody know what pipes radiator and pump I should buy?

My budget is in around 150 euro? (Is this enough?)

[XTankSlayerX]

How about a G10 from NZXT And a AIO?

[WoodenMarker]

Although a custom loop would provide excellent cooling, something cheaper like an aio along with a bracket like the Kraken G10 or Corsair HG10 would also cool quite well. 

 

This belongs in the Watercooling section. I'm moving the thread.

Please post in the correct sub-forum in the future.

[TheRunningOtaku]

-snip-

150 euros would be cutting it tight.... maybe you could look at improving case airflow?

What he ^ said is good, too - especially if you have an old AIO that you aren't using.

[Tagiau]

How about a G10 from NZXT And a AIO?

The g10 also isn't the best for cooling. I mean sure it does cool the gpu well enough, but everything else not so well. Well from what I have dealt with. 

[finnigen]

I had also the g10 solution in mind, but this looked better and cram is not cooled well either. VRAM heatsinks are somehow pretty hard to find in Denmark.

I could maybe change my budget to around 190 euro.

Do you guys think I could beat out a gtx 970 with this?

[Godlygamer23]

Liquid helium obviously.

[Faceman]

The g10 also isn't the best for cooling. I mean sure it does cool the gpu well enough, but everything else not so well. Well from what I have dealt with. 

It actually is excellent for cooling, and the VRMs and VRAM are not an issue as long as you don't run a dangerous program like Kombustor or Furmark.

 

@finnigen  The G10 mod is the best solution for your budget.

 

The other two main components are the NZXT Kraken G10($25) and Corsair H55($50).  Before continuing with the GPU WaterCooling, check and make sure that your card is compatible.  As this is one of the more complicated mods out there, it is a good idea to do a lot of research and ask a lot of questions.  The OCN G10 Owner's Club is a fantastic resource for information if you need help with anything.

Here is a list of compatible cards:

Nvidia : GTX 780 Ti, 780*, 770, 760, Titan, 680, 670, 660Ti, 660, 580, 570, 560Ti, 560, 560SE.  Some of the 900 Series GPUs are also compatible, this is on a card by card basis though.  Check to make sure of compatibility.

AMD : R9 290X, 290, 280X*, 280*, 270X, 270 HD7970*, 7950*, 7870, 7850, 6970, 6950, 6870, 6850, 6790, 6770, 5870, 5850, 5830

The compatibility list is based on AMD Radeon and NVIDIA's reference board layout, screw spacing and die height only. Please check the height restriction before purchase.

* Some variations in AMD and Nvidia die height may require the use of a copper shim($3). Ask in OCN if your specific card needs a shim.  I know the EVGA 780 SC w/ ACX Cooler needs a shim.

 

 

   The Kraken G10 gets a lot of bad publicity because people claim that it has insufficient Voltage Regulation Module(VRM) and Video Card RAM(VRAM) Cooling.  For starters, the VRAM never gets hot enough to be worried about, so lets focus on the VRMs.  Does the GPU need additional heat sinks for the VRAM and VRMs?  In short, no.

 

   The whole "insufficient VRAM/VRM cooling" began with a review of the G10 by Puget Systems.  This review is probably the most critical review of the G10 out there.  While it makes an interesting point, I have to explain its critical flaw to a certain extend.  To begin, their Unigine temperature test, which is most closely related to video game performance, their measured temperatures are perfectly fine, they are even lower with the G10 than with the  stock heat sink for both the GTX Titan and Reference R9 290X(Notorious for high heat).  The only time when we see the temperatures higher with the G10 than the stock heat sink are when they run Kombustor.

 

     Kombustor/Furmark is a program that should NEVER be run.  It puts unnecessary load on the GPU that is completely unrealistic.  It is a card killer.  It is uncommon, but happens enough that it needs to be mentioned.  Kombustor can and will brick your card.  It happened to me earlier this year, and it happens to many others.  I like Tiny Tom Logan's analogy of this stress test.  "It is like the Navy Seals, it is incredibly rigorous and has a low pass rate."

     I like to give my components 2 weeks of break in time before overclocking to make sure everything is working properly.  This is what I did with my brand new, MSi GTX 770 Lightning.  I had used the card for 2 weeks, no problems, everything going fine.  As you know with a Lightning, this is a card built specifically for overclocking.  Without knowing what I know now, I ran Kombustor at stock settings to get a baseline for my overclocks.  It took all of 3 minutes running Kombustor on a brand new, factory settings card for it to die.  I am not the only one this has happened to, so I always tell my story whenever I get a chance because Kombustor is a dangerous program, and should not be used.  If you want to run some benchmarks for your GPU, use Unigine, 3DMark, and In-game benchmark utilities.  Not Furmark/Kombustor.

 

     Back to the Puget review.  They ran Kombustor during their test, which as a reviewer, they should do in order to review the G10 in all scenarios to give the reader an idea of what to expect.  My problem with the review and the negative perception it has created is that it is an unrealistic scenario, one which I would not recommend anyone do at home, and you are unlikely to encounter that type of load during regular use.  I'm not aware of any real world applications where your GPU would be put under that much stress.  So lets look at the part of the review that pertains to real world scenarios, their Unigine portion of the test.  The VRM temperatures are perfectly fine, even lower with the G10 than the stock heat sink.  This is with "naked" cards.  A lot of non-reference cards which a lot of people own come with mid-plates that passively cool the VRAM and VRMs. 

 

     To give you an idea of what VRM temperatures are like for those of us at home, we asked members of the OCN G10 Owner's Club, who have cards that can monitor the VRM temperatures to run some tests.  Simple before and after tests. There are two reviews that I will point to. The Asus DCUII GTX 780Ti, Post #1147 and a reference R9 290 Post #1486 & Post #1500

   You will see that the guy with the Asus GTX 780Ti was getting DCUII temperatures of 86C on the Core and 104C on the VRMs, his card was overclocked.  You can look at the link to see specifics of his OC, nothing major, very average.  Once he did the G10 modification without extra heat sinks, he was able to further overclock his card, and temperatures dropped to 49C on the Core, and 81C on the VRMs.  This tells us two things.  #1, the VRMs can withstand a lot of heat, #2 the G10's Fan does an excellent job of cooling the VRMs on its own. 

     There was another test done with an R9 290.  They went as far as to do a before and after test with heat sinks on their G10. that they went from something like 90C on the core with the reference cooler all the way down to 55C with G10 + H55. VRMs went from 110C down to 75C.  Most importantly, when they added heat sinks the VRM temperatures dropped from 75C to 60C.  So adding heat sinks does help out if you are concerned about VRM temperatures. This was with a reference R9 290, so it was a naked card without mid-plate to passively help cool VRAM and VRMs.  These are just two examples, if you read through that thread, there are many more.

      In summation,VRM temperatures are not a concern as long as you don't run a dangerous program like Kombustor/Furmark.  For awhile now people have been thinking that its a hardware problem, when in reality, its a software problem.  You will be perfectly fine buying just a Kraken G10 + AIO of your choice without extra heat sinks.  Any extras you decide to buy are optional.  Here is a list of my optional extras you might want to buy to go along with your G10:

 

1 Pack of Cosmos mini Aluminum VGA Heatsinks(20pc) - $6 You can place these on your VRMs for peace of mind if you like.  It is what I did, even with a card that has a mid-plate.  My VRMs have never exceeded 54C according to my NZXT Sentry 3 Fan Controller.

 

1 Pack of Sekisui Double-Sided Adhesive Thermal Heatsink Tape(2pc) - $3 The heat sinks come with thermal tape pre-applied, but it is not very good quality and people report them falling off.  Buy this high end thermal tape to get better heat transfer, and to make sure your heat sinks stay on.  You will have to remove the old pre-applied tape before using the good tape.

 

Aftermarket Thermal Compound, it comes with the AIO Cooler, but if you want to buy some performance stuff to shave off an additional 1-4C buy your own.  Can also be used on your CPU.  It is also nice to have just in case you need to remount anything.  The Cooler Master Seidon 240M actually comes with a tube that you can apply yourself, so you will have some extra.  This TIM is good, but definitely not "performance" stuff.  I recommend Gelid GC-Extreme - $11

 

 VGA to PWM Fan Adapter - $5  This Fan Adapter is very nice because it allows you to plug the G10's 92mm fan directly into the GPU instead of into the valuable motherboard fan headers.  Once plugged into the video card, you can control the fan speed in MSI Afterburner.  Set it to a constant speed, not a fan curve.  The reason being is that the temperature is derived from the core.  The fan is for the VRMs.  Set it to a constant value of close to 100%.

 

Cooler Master Blade Master 120mm PWM Fan - $12  A 2nd 120mm fan for your H55 will go a long way in cooling performance, and noise.  Having two fans allows you to run them at lower speeds, keeping the noise down, while maintaining the same awesomely low temperatures as a single fan at high speed, or crank them both up for even better performance.

[finnigen]

It actually is excellent for cooling, and the VRMs and VRAM are not an issue as long as you don't run a dangerous program like Kombustor or Furmark.

@finnigen The G10 mod is the best solution for your budget.

The other two main components are the NZXT Kraken G10($25) and Corsair H55($50). Before continuing with the GPU WaterCooling, check and make sure that your card is compatible. As this is one of the more complicated mods out there, it is a good idea to do a lot of research and ask a lot of questions. The OCN G10 Owner's Club is a fantastic resource for information if you need help with anything.

Here is a list of compatible cards:

Nvidia : GTX 780 Ti, 780*, 770, 760, Titan, 680, 670, 660Ti, 660, 580, 570, 560Ti, 560, 560SE. Some of the 900 Series GPUs are also compatible, this is on a card by card basis though. Check to make sure of compatibility.

AMD : R9 290X, 290, 280X*, 280*, 270X, 270 HD7970*, 7950*, 7870, 7850, 6970, 6950, 6870, 6850, 6790, 6770, 5870, 5850, 5830

The compatibility list is based on AMD Radeon and NVIDIA's reference board layout, screw spacing and die height only. Please check the height restriction before purchase.

* Some variations in AMD and Nvidia die height may require the use of a copper shim($3). Ask in OCN if your specific card needs a shim. I know the EVGA 780 SC w/ ACX Cooler needs a shim.

The Kraken G10 gets a lot of bad publicity because people claim that it has insufficient Voltage Regulation Module(VRM) and Video Card RAM(VRAM) Cooling. For starters, the VRAM never gets hot enough to be worried about, so lets focus on the VRMs. Does the GPU need additional heat sinks for the VRAM and VRMs? In short, no.

The whole "insufficient VRAM/VRM cooling" began with a review of the G10 by Puget Systems. This review is probably the most critical review of the G10 out there. While it makes an interesting point, I have to explain its critical flaw to a certain extend. To begin, their Unigine temperature test, which is most closely related to video game performance, their measured temperatures are perfectly fine, they are even lower with the G10 than with the stock heat sink for both the GTX Titan and Reference R9 290X(Notorious for high heat). The only time when we see the temperatures higher with the G10 than the stock heat sink are when they run Kombustor.

Kombustor/Furmark is a program that should NEVER be run. It puts unnecessary load on the GPU that is completely unrealistic. It is a card killer. It is uncommon, but happens enough that it needs to be mentioned. Kombustor can and will brick your card. It happened to me earlier this year, and it happens to many others. I like Tiny Tom Logan's analogy of this stress test. "It is like the Navy Seals, it is incredibly rigorous and has a low pass rate."

I like to give my components 2 weeks of break in time before overclocking to make sure everything is working properly. This is what I did with my brand new, MSi GTX 770 Lightning. I had used the card for 2 weeks, no problems, everything going fine. As you know with a Lightning, this is a card built specifically for overclocking. Without knowing what I know now, I ran Kombustor at stock settings to get a baseline for my overclocks. It took all of 3 minutes running Kombustor on a brand new, factory settings card for it to die. I am not the only one this has happened to, so I always tell my story whenever I get a chance because Kombustor is a dangerous program, and should not be used. If you want to run some benchmarks for your GPU, use Unigine, 3DMark, and In-game benchmark utilities. Not Furmark/Kombustor.

Back to the Puget review. They ran Kombustor during their test, which as a reviewer, they should do in order to review the G10 in all scenarios to give the reader an idea of what to expect. My problem with the review and the negative perception it has created is that it is an unrealistic scenario, one which I would not recommend anyone do at home, and you are unlikely to encounter that type of load during regular use. I'm not aware of any real world applications where your GPU would be put under that much stress. So lets look at the part of the review that pertains to real world scenarios, their Unigine portion of the test. The VRM temperatures are perfectly fine, even lower with the G10 than the stock heat sink. This is with "naked" cards. A lot of non-reference cards which a lot of people own come with mid-plates that passively cool the VRAM and VRMs.

To give you an idea of what VRM temperatures are like for those of us at home, we asked members of the OCN G10 Owner's Club, who have cards that can monitor the VRM temperatures to run some tests. Simple before and after tests. There are two reviews that I will point to. The Asus DCUII GTX 780Ti, Post #1147 and a reference R9 290 Post #1486 & Post #1500

You will see that the guy with the Asus GTX 780Ti was getting DCUII temperatures of 86C on the Core and 104C on the VRMs, his card was overclocked. You can look at the link to see specifics of his OC, nothing major, very average. Once he did the G10 modification without extra heat sinks, he was able to further overclock his card, and temperatures dropped to 49C on the Core, and 81C on the VRMs. This tells us two things. #1, the VRMs can withstand a lot of heat, #2 the G10's Fan does an excellent job of cooling the VRMs on its own.

There was another test done with an R9 290. They went as far as to do a before and after test with heat sinks on their G10. that they went from something like 90C on the core with the reference cooler all the way down to 55C with G10 + H55. VRMs went from 110C down to 75C. Most importantly, when they added heat sinks the VRM temperatures dropped from 75C to 60C. So adding heat sinks does help out if you are concerned about VRM temperatures. This was with a reference R9 290, so it was a naked card without mid-plate to passively help cool VRAM and VRMs. These are just two examples, if you read through that thread, there are many more.

In summation,VRM temperatures are not a concern as long as you don't run a dangerous program like Kombustor/Furmark. For awhile now people have been thinking that its a hardware problem, when in reality, its a software problem. You will be perfectly fine buying just a Kraken G10 + AIO of your choice without extra heat sinks. Any extras you decide to buy are optional. Here is a list of my optional extras you might want to buy to go along with your G10:

1 Pack of Cosmos mini Aluminum VGA Heatsinks(20pc) - $6 You can place these on your VRMs for peace of mind if you like. It is what I did, even with a card that has a mid-plate. My VRMs have never exceeded 54C according to my NZXT Sentry 3 Fan Controller.

1 Pack of Sekisui Double-Sided Adhesive Thermal Heatsink Tape(2pc) - $3 The heat sinks come with thermal tape pre-applied, but it is not very good quality and people report them falling off. Buy this high end thermal tape to get better heat transfer, and to make sure your heat sinks stay on. You will have to remove the old pre-applied tape before using the good tape.

Aftermarket Thermal Compound, it comes with the AIO Cooler, but if you want to buy some performance stuff to shave off an additional 1-4C buy your own. Can also be used on your CPU. It is also nice to have just in case you need to remount anything. The Cooler Master Seidon 240M actually comes with a tube that you can apply yourself, so you will have some extra. This TIM is good, but definitely not "performance" stuff. I recommend Gelid GC-Extreme - $11

VGA to PWM Fan Adapter - $5 This Fan Adapter is very nice because it allows you to plug the G10's 92mm fan directly into the GPU instead of into the valuable motherboard fan headers. Once plugged into the video card, you can control the fan speed in MSI Afterburner. Set it to a constant speed, not a fan curve. The reason being is that the temperature is derived from the core. The fan is for the VRMs. Set it to a constant value of close to 100%.

Cooler Master Blade Master 120mm PWM Fan - $12 A 2nd 120mm fan for your H55 will go a long way in cooling performance, and noise. Having two fans allows you to run them at lower speeds, keeping the noise down, while maintaining the same awesomely low temperatures as a single fan at high speed, or crank them both up for even better performance.

Ok thank you very very much for the help.

I have one more question, should I rather get the corsair h55, h60 or h75, is there a significant difference?

If I go for the h60 should I the still buy the same fan as you recommended earlier?

http://www.amazon.de/Cooler-Master-Blade-Lüfter-120x120x25/dp/B0030DL37I/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1415524718&sr=8-1&keywords=cooler+master+blade+master

[Faceman]

Ok thank you very very much for the help.

I have one more question, should I rather get the corsair h55, h60 or h75, is there a significant difference?

If I go for the h60 should I the still buy the same fan as you recommended earlier?

http://www.amazon.de/Cooler-Master-Blade-Lüfter-120x120x25/dp/B0030DL37I/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1415524718&sr=8-1&keywords=cooler+master+blade+master

The H60 is not compatible.

 

I strongly recommend the H55, unless if the H75 is not much more expensive, like 5-10e.  The H75 also comes with 2 fans, so keep that in mind.  Anything more and you start to experience diminishing returns.  The H55 is inexpensive and will give you the biggest performance leap from stock cooler to water cooled.  Also yes, definitely buy a 2nd fan if you get the H55.  I do recommend the Cooler Master Blade Master 120.  I use them on all the radiators in my case.  Absolutely love them, very underrated fans.

[finnigen]

Ok thank you once again for all the help.

[Faceman]

Ok thank you once again for all the help.

Happy to help!  Reply back here or on OCN if you have any questions.

[finnigen]

Happy to help!  Reply back here or on OCN if you have any questions.

Sorry for coming back so quickly, but I just wanted to know if this setup is comparable to a gtx 970?

[Faceman]

Sorry for coming back so quickly, but I just wanted to know if this setup is comparable to a gtx 970?

Yea, absolutely.  R9 290X is super powerful, it requires more energy, but yes, it is definitely equal to a GTX 970.

 

Another thing about the G10 modification, is that if you decide you want to later upgrade GPUs, you can use the G10!  Plenty of people on the OCN G10 Owner's Club have already transplanted their G10 + AIOs onto their new 970s, and 980s.

[finnigen]

Ok thank you.

[finnigen]

Yea, absolutely.  R9 290X is super powerful, it requires more energy, but yes, it is definitely equal to a GTX 970.

 

Another thing about the G10 modification, is that if you decide you want to later upgrade GPUs, you can use the G10!  Plenty of people on the OCN G10 Owner's Club have already transplanted their G10 + AIOs onto their new 970s, and 980s.

Is this solution actually MUCH better than a arctic accelero xtreme iv or hybrid ii?

[Faceman]

Is this solution actually MUCH better than a arctic accelero xtreme iv or hybrid ii?

Much.

[finnigen]

Much.

After long searching I have finally found all the right parts. But because I live in Denmark the post and packaging costs are really high. So all in all everything would cost around 220 Euro. So I am here to ask if this setup would really beat out a gtx 970, otherwise it would be cheaper to sell my r9 290x and buy a gtx 970. Do you have some concret benchmarks, because I couldn't find any.

Another thing is that I couldn't find those vram heatsinks to ship here.

Are these also good enough?

http://www.amazon.de/Cooltek-VGA-RAM-Kühlkörper-Speicherchips-Grafikkarte/dp/B001D7BDOQ/ref=sr_1_13?ie=UTF8&qid=1415615551&sr=8-13&keywords=kühlkörper

[Faceman]

After long searching I have finally found all the right parts. But because I live in Denmark the post and packaging costs are really high. So all in all everything would cost around 220 Euro. So I am here to ask if this setup would really beat out a gtx 970, otherwise it would be cheaper to sell my r9 290x and buy a gtx 970. Do you have some concret benchmarks, because I couldn't find any.

Another thing is that I couldn't find those vram heatsinks to ship here.

Are these also good enough?

http://www.amazon.de/Cooltek-VGA-RAM-Kühlkörper-Speicherchips-Grafikkarte/dp/B001D7BDOQ/ref=sr_1_13?ie=UTF8&qid=1415615551&sr=8-13&keywords=kühlkörper

Yes, an overclocked R9 290X should beat an overclocked GTX 970.  But... it is not going to be by a large margin.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/8568/the-geforce-gtx-970-review-feat-evga/5

 

That is just one benchmark.  Go on Google and type in GTX 970 benchmarks, do your research thoroughly.  My guess though, is that the difference between the two is going to be very very small, 1-2fps in most games.  Also, it is no secret that some games just run better on Nvidia.  I know it is unfair, but it is the truth. 

 

In all honesty, it makes more sense to sell your R9 290X and buy a GTX 970, especially if it costs less than 220E.  Not only will you spend less money, but you will get better features(DSR), better drivers, and lower power consumption.  Even though your R9 290X will be running nice and cold with a G10, it will still be using almost two times as much power as a 970.

 

Doing the G10 mod is a lot of fun, and its really cool to say that you water cooled your card, but in your situation, it doesn't make sense.  Selling your R9 290X and buying a GTX 970 is going to be a better option in the end.