GTX 1080 - Seeking Advice

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Roger Wilco Jr
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GTX 1080 - Seeking Advice

Postby Roger Wilco Jr » Mon Aug 01, 2016 12:26 pm

I'll be going VR, hopefully very soon, and I'll need a new gfx card. I've pretty much settled on getting a GTX 1080. I thought they were supposed to be $600, but I haven't found any that "cheap". I have found a few around, but there seem to be two design approaches. There is the one fan version that exhausts the hot air out of the case. I kind of like that idea, but with four case fans, I don't have much of a problem with internal temperatures, and I'm pretty sure the GTX 1080 will run cooler than my dual GTX 970s. The other design uses multiple fans that just blow the air inside the case. I'll buy an overclocked or superclocked stock unit, but I generally don't mess around with over clocking myself. I tried it with my 4790K, using low settings with the motherboard app, and my system became unstable.

My plans are to use this for both Gen 1 VR and a 2560x1440 monitor at 60hz. I may get a 4K monitor as well. I expect this card will last me 2-3 years, at which point I may require an entire system upgrade depending on what happens with Gen 2 VR.

So I'm basically wondering if there is a reason to avoid the single fan versions, or if the multiple fan versions are significantly better?

-Thanks
Last edited by Roger Wilco Jr on Mon Aug 01, 2016 2:22 pm, edited 1 time in total.
It's time to give this another go.

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Re: GTX 1080 - Seeking Advice

Postby TorTorden » Mon Aug 01, 2016 1:00 pm

Those single "blower" fans unless they have completely turned things around are horrible, I have had some before and never again.

Super loud, and quite ineffective at cooling from what I remember, those multi fan rigs runs at least 10c if not 15c cooler than their "blower" compatriots.

The more and the bigger the fans there is is better imo.
Unless you go for a water block.
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Re: RE: Re: GTX 1080 - Seeking Advice

Postby hdpwipmonkey » Mon Aug 01, 2016 1:11 pm

TorTorden wrote:Those single "blower" fans unless they have completely turned things around are horrible, I have had some before and never again.

Super loud, and quite ineffective at cooling from what I remember, those multi fan rigs runs at least 10c if not 15c cooler than their "blower" compatriots.

The more and the bigger the fans there is is better imo.
Unless you go for a water block.

I agree. The single fan cards have to spin quite fast to remove the heat from a loaded video card where as the multi fan cards can move the same or more amount of air with less speed hence making them quieter and they usually keep the cards cooler then the reference cards.

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Re: GTX 1080 - Seeking Advice

Postby AJH » Mon Aug 01, 2016 1:40 pm

Personally, I'm waiting for either EVGA or MSI's water cooled unit. If you need to get it now, one nice thing about the reference designs for EVGA is that they typically come out with an officially supported water cooling unit you can retrofit. That's what I did to my GTX980, though I'm just waiting this time around.

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Re: GTX 1080 - Seeking Advice

Postby smartroad » Mon Aug 01, 2016 1:55 pm

I got this one:

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/gigabyte ... 84-gi.html

At 1080 I am getting 120FPS minimum everywhere at Ultra. In VR I have been slowly upping the settings and have a consistent 90FPS at all times :) It isn't a cheap card (but not the most expensive) but it works like a charm!
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Re: GTX 1080 - Seeking Advice

Postby Roger Wilco Jr » Mon Aug 01, 2016 2:21 pm

Yeah, I didn't think about how a single fan would probably need to run really fast and noisy. That's probably why they are $100-$200 cheaper. I think I'll be looking for an in-stock 3-fan model. Hopefully I can catch a price drop in the next week or two. Thanks.

AJH wrote:Personally, I'm waiting for either EVGA or MSI's water cooled unit. If you need to get it now, one nice thing about the reference designs for EVGA is that they typically come out with an officially supported water cooling unit you can retrofit. That's what I did to my GTX980, though I'm just waiting this time around.

Isn't MSI already selling the Sea Hawks now? Or are you waiting for the price to come down.
It's time to give this another go.

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Re: RE: Re: GTX 1080 - Seeking Advice

Postby thebs » Mon Aug 01, 2016 3:12 pm

hdpwipmonkey wrote:I agree. The single fan cards have to spin quite fast to remove the heat from a loaded video card where as the multi fan cards can move the same or more amount of air with less speed hence making them quieter and they usually keep the cards cooler then the reference cards.

I honestly think the ambient of the case is the bigger issue.
I.e., if you have cool ambient air, then the reference fans work just fine.
E.g., most test beds are open air, removing the case ambient issue.

That's why I became a Mini-ITX (actually Mini-DTX for dual-slot, even if the board is only Mini-ITX) case "bigot" years ago.
The only thing I add is a video card, I no longer do SLI, so I only need that GPU slot ... nothing else.
The fan intake is flush against the side of the case, allowing the ambient air it draws in to be directly from the outside ... not the case.

I have a fairly generic, albeit overclocked, 980 Ti and have no problems whatsoever in a Mini-DTX.
I also like the portability of a SFF, since I have traveled heavily throughout my career.

Front: Drive cooling intake
Left side: GPU cooling intake
Right side: CPU cooling intake
Top: PSU cooling intake

I'm running with a quad-rail +12V 650W PSU that delivers 620W on the +12V now (figured 2 years was enough, did it with the 980 Ti upgrade).
I honestly don't have any issues with heat at all.

This system is a 2 year-old Z97 + i7-4970K, although I did finally replace the stock Intel fansink (which had copper -- but I hate that shallow fan and those stupid cables exposed) with a cheap, US$10 Thermaltake CLP0556 cooler. Yes, it's that cheap, no heat pipes, no copper, fits in just about any SFF, 92mm fan, and it cools 10C cooler. Now I do use a high thermal conductive paste, usually Arctic Silver, and since it's "sitting upright," I don't have to worry about it "dripping off" (since silver is electrically conductive).
- http://www.microcenter.com/product/4174 ... M_Function

It's really all about the ambient air, and if you can get your side panels up against the device, allowing it to pull in cool air instead of using the ambient in the case, you're going to keep it cool.

I've posted about this before ...
- viewtopic.php?f=9&t=5047&p=59136#p59136
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Re: GTX 1080 - Seeking Advice

Postby AJH » Mon Aug 01, 2016 3:30 pm

Roger Wilco Jr wrote:Isn't MSI already selling the Sea Hawks now? Or are you waiting for the price to come down.


They might be. I'm not in a particular hurry so I'm only checking every few weeks. Last time I checked, it was still not released, just announced.

Ok, looks like it is out now, but sold out everywhere.

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Re: GTX 1080 - Seeking Advice

Postby hdpwipmonkey » Mon Aug 01, 2016 3:45 pm

@thebs, yes in that instance with the fan butted up against card that would work great but in general the multi fan cards "usually" perform better then the reference cards.
@ Roger wilco, the 1080 sea hawks aren't out yet (at least not here). They do have the 1070 sea hawks though (I couldn't wait... Thats what I got).

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Re: GTX 1080 - Seeking Advice

Postby Roger Wilco Jr » Mon Aug 01, 2016 4:35 pm

smartroad wrote:I got this one:

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/gigabyte ... 84-gi.html

At 1080 I am getting 120FPS minimum everywhere at Ultra. In VR I have been slowly upping the settings and have a consistent 90FPS at all times :) It isn't a cheap card (but not the most expensive) but it works like a charm!

That GigaByte would probably work well with my GB motherboard, but honestly I'm just looking for the first card I can get for less than $700. It will probably be an EVGA Gaming SC version - if I can catch the price drop. ;)

Have you tried 2x super sampling? That is a huge resource drain, but looks amazing. I'd sacrifice 60FPS for the better image (if I had 120 to start with!). I can only manage 1.5 SS with my SLI setup at 1440 and mostly 60FPS.
It's time to give this another go.


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