Gigabyte has announced the GeForce GTX 980 WATERFORCE water-cooled graphics card, and this one is ready to go out of the box thanks to an integrated closed-loop liquid cooler.
In addition to full liquid cooling, the card – model GV-N980WAOC-4GD – also features "GPU Gauntlet Sorting", meaning that each card has a binned GTX 980 core for better overclocking performance.
"The GTX 980 WATERFORCE is fitted with only the top-performing GPU core through the very own GPU Gauntlet Sorting technology that guarantees superior overclocking capabilities in terms of excellent power switching and thermal efficiency. Only the strongest processors survived can be qualified for the GTX 980 WATERFORCE, which can fulfill both gaming enthusiasts’ and overclockers’ expectations with greater overclocking headroom, and higher, stable boost clocks under heavy load."
The cooling system for the GTX 980 WATERFORCE begins with a full-coverage block that cools the GPU, RAM, power delivery, without the need for any additional fan for board components. The tubes carrying liquid to the radiator are 45 cm SFP, which Gigabyte says "effectively prevent…leak(s) and fare a lower coolant evaporation rate", and the system is connected to a 120 mm radiator.
Gigabyte says both the fan and the pump offer low noise output, and claim that this cooling system allows the GTX 980 WATERFORCE to "perform up to 38.8% cooler than the reference cooling" for cool and quiet gaming.
The WATERFORCE card also features two DVI outputs (reference is one dual-link output) in addition to the standard three DisplayPort 1.2 and single HDMI 2.0 outputs of a GTX 980.
Pricing and availability have not been announced.
As long as it really has
As long as it really has totally complete coverage thats a good system since it avoids the problems of both blower and fan heatsink coolers on GPUs and puts all the heat directly out of the case.
My only concern would be incomplete coverage of some small part of the board that would get insanely hot.
I’m more concerned of
I’m more concerned of integrating a cooler that has the cons of AIO.
I’ve always wondered why
I’ve always wondered why other companies who make hybrid cards haven’t gone this full cover block route before.
I’m curious about why they went with a 980 instead of 980 Ti, would a full cover block for the latter produce too much heat for the 120mm radiator to handle?
It might have to do with
It might have to do with moving more stock of existing 980s.
Fugly garbage.
Fugly garbage.
This setup takes a HUGE
This setup takes a HUGE amount of space in the case. Full size card + separate rad. Also not convinced everything is covered properly.
The problem is the COST when
The problem is the COST when adding the liquid cooler will probably push it dangerously cost to that of a basic GTX980Ti which will perform better and has more VRAM.
(The EVGA Hybrid 980Ti has a similar 12cm cooling setup and the GPU runs at about 50degC at 1480MHz so cooling is not an issue at all.)
Having said that the EVGA Hybrid cools the GPU with the liquid cooling and the rest (VRAM, VRM etc) is exhausted by the blower fan. The above 980 solution cools everything with the liquid cooler which may or may not work better.
I like the concept of everything being cooled by the liquid cooling however I would think adding the water block to cool all the components rather than the simple solution of cooling the GPU only plus an added fan would make the liquid cooler ONLY solution more expensive needlessly (though they could reduce the VOLUME of the card theoretically which would be a pro but this one is still large so again not sure if there’s a point to it considering the likely total cost vs basic air-cooled 980Ti).