5080 & 5090 Coil Whine Thread

[SinisterUK]

MSI Gaming Trio 5090 here. Quiet 99% of the time, really REALLY loud coil whine during some game options menus (pre game load, which makes no sense) and during a specific 3dmark test for raytracing (Solar Bay). It's probably worth mentioning that I've never heard a peep out of the fans on the thing, even under load (the toggle switch is on gaming, not silent) so this probably exacerbates it a little. I'm grabbing some other ray tracing benchmarks to see if there's a relation there or not.

 

[DizzyZ]

Bagged an Astral today from a competitor, I basically could have gotten the Suprim AIO, all I had to do was press the buy button but I just couldn't bring myself to do it considering AIOs and how it would look funky in my case with my CPU AIO, and the Astral just looks sooo good and will fit my case/aesthetic well. I know it's probably gonna have coil whine guaranteed since it's Asus but let's see how loud it's gonna be, hopefully not as loud as the TUF I returned.

 

[GoRedwings19]

MSI Gaming Trio 5090 here. Quiet 99% of the time, really REALLY loud coil whine during some game options menus (pre game load, which makes no sense) and during a specific 3dmark test for raytracing (Solar Bay). It's probably worth mentioning that I've never heard a peep out of the fans on the thing, even under load (the toggle switch is on gaming, not silent) so this probably exacerbates it a little. I'm grabbing some other ray tracing benchmarks to see if there's a relation there or not.

The reason the coil whine gets typically louder on the menu screens is because it will be outputting a silly amount of FPS. Also certain benchmarks/games brings out coil whine more than others.

Having said that. I play league which even the most basic of cards can run but usually I am between anywhere between 500-900 fps depends what's happening on screen. But on Avg it's usually hovers around 550-600 fps. Funnily enough I don't hear any hint of coil whine. Not even when I had the suprim liquid X which had more coil whine than the rest of my 5xxx series cards.

@DizzyZ When I had the suprim liquid X I didn't notice pump noise. And congrats on getting the Astral. Just for reference sake how loud was the TUf coil whine wise. I know it difficult to quantify using words and I don't know what prior cards you have had with really excessive coil whine. I have tons of cards with coil whine. Strangely enough for some reason I don't know why it is my fave cards are the ones that just happen to have coil whine. Besides the Chonky 4090 FE that had no coil whine but I loved it. Ran a bit hotter than AIBS and louder but that the only 4090 card I miss. Hmmmm might pick one up later on if the 4090 prices drop.

 

[Flows33]

I cancelled the aorus 5080 because I managed to get a 5090 msi vanguard, I will keep you informed about its coil whine or not

it's not my favorite model I don't really like the aesthetics but if there is 0 coil whine...

 

[DizzyZ]

So plugged in the Astral and... it's much better, it's far less than the TUF, and I can't notice it unless I really try to listen to it, and it only happens during very high framerate overclocked gaming, when undervolted, it's even quieter, so all in all, I did end up spending close to £3k but I'm happy with the card. It's a beast and feel much more premium than the TUF did.

 

[stfn]

My INNO3D 5090 X3 is pretty noisy on the fans, has some hardly audible coil whine. I am not upset cause I got it at MSRP of 2369EUR. I would have liked a flagship but that is not a guarantee for anything either and the price difference was too much to not take this deal on the INNO3D.

 

[appletree]

I have a suggestion for OP to keep summary of all the opinions i.e. at the start of the thread. To illustrate how it could look I used LLM to read the entire thread
to output the table below in CSV format (Grok3 with thinking seemed to be quite capable at it - at least better than others I tried) and then opened it in excel and copy pasted here.
I didn't validate the output, so I can't guarantee its correctness, however it's a start. Please let me know if you wish to copy the table at the start of the thread
and I shall then delete my post or whatever other action you would prefer. Also others can maybe provide feedback if there is interest for such a summary.

Model	Brand	Source	Coil Whine Level	Opinion
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	JetSetter1984	TERRIBLE	squealed and buzzed pretty badly
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	Guru3D	HIGH	bad coil whine (8/10)
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	Techtesters	TERRIBLE	very bad coil whine
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	Debauer (video)	MEDIUM	not too bad per Hostile_18
RTX 5090 Suprim	MSI	GoRedwings19	LOW	very very quiet unless over 500 fps or so
RTX 5090 Suprim	MSI	redkrptonite	SILENT	zero coil whine
RTX 5090 Suprim	MSI	Hardware Unboxed	LOW	no coil whine but some small electrical noise
RTX 5090 Gaming Trio	MSI	SinisterUK	MEDIUM to HIGH	quiet 99% of the time, really REALLY loud in specific scenarios
RTX 5090 Gaming Trio	MSI	JetSetter1984	HIGH	buzzing, almost as bad as the FE
RTX 5090 Astral OC	Asus	clone	SILENT	zero coil whine
RTX 5090 Astral OC	Asus	kindai	LOW to MEDIUM	does squeal at uncapped FPS, absolutely silent at 144Hz with VSync
RTX 5090 Astral	Asus	DizzyZ	LOW	far less than the TUF, only noticeable when trying to hear it
RTX 5090 Astral	Asus	Guru3D	LOW to MEDIUM	5/10 coil whine
RTX 5090 Aorus Master	Gigabyte	Cosimo	SILENT	zero coil whine
RTX 5090 X3	INNO3D	stfn	LOW	some hardly audible coil whine
RTX 5080 FE	Nvidia	JetSetter1984	LOW	much quieter, barely audible
RTX 5080 Gaming Trio	MSI	GoRedwings19	SILENT	my gaming trio which has none
RTX 5080 Suprim Liquid	MSI	Flows33	LOW	a little coil whine
RTX 5080 Suprim Liquid	MSI	GoRedwings19	LOW	a little coil whine, not excessive
RTX 5080 Solid OC	Zotac	Rinken	MEDIUM	audible with case closed, more noticeable in person, only heard when volume is low
RTX 5080 GamingPro	Palit	Major774	LOW	no serious coil whine, noise drowned out by fans

 

[Flows33]

Great idea !

 

[Coolasmoo]

Missed my results off

 

[DizzyZ]

I have a suggestion for OP to keep summary of all the opinions i.e. at the start of the thread. To illustrate how it could look I used LLM to read the entire thread
to output the table below in CSV format (Grok3 with thinking seemed to be quite capable at it - at least better than others I tried) and then opened it in excel and copy pasted here.
I didn't validate the output, so I can't guarantee its correctness, however it's a start. Please let me know if you wish to copy the table at the start of the thread
and I shall then delete my post or whatever other action you would prefer. Also others can maybe provide feedback if there is interest for such a summary.

Model	Brand	Source	Coil Whine Level	Opinion
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	JetSetter1984	TERRIBLE	squealed and buzzed pretty badly
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	Guru3D	HIGH	bad coil whine (8/10)
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	Techtesters	TERRIBLE	very bad coil whine
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	Debauer (video)	MEDIUM	not too bad per Hostile_18
RTX 5090 Suprim	MSI	GoRedwings19	LOW	very very quiet unless over 500 fps or so
RTX 5090 Suprim	MSI	redkrptonite	SILENT	zero coil whine
RTX 5090 Suprim	MSI	Hardware Unboxed	LOW	no coil whine but some small electrical noise
RTX 5090 Gaming Trio	MSI	SinisterUK	MEDIUM to HIGH	quiet 99% of the time, really REALLY loud in specific scenarios
RTX 5090 Gaming Trio	MSI	JetSetter1984	HIGH	buzzing, almost as bad as the FE
RTX 5090 Astral OC	Asus	clone	SILENT	zero coil whine
RTX 5090 Astral OC	Asus	kindai	LOW to MEDIUM	does squeal at uncapped FPS, absolutely silent at 144Hz with VSync
RTX 5090 Astral	Asus	DizzyZ	LOW	far less than the TUF, only noticeable when trying to hear it
RTX 5090 Astral	Asus	Guru3D	LOW to MEDIUM	5/10 coil whine
RTX 5090 Aorus Master	Gigabyte	Cosimo	SILENT	zero coil whine
RTX 5090 X3	INNO3D	stfn	LOW	some hardly audible coil whine
RTX 5080 FE	Nvidia	JetSetter1984	LOW	much quieter, barely audible
RTX 5080 Gaming Trio	MSI	GoRedwings19	SILENT	my gaming trio which has none
RTX 5080 Suprim Liquid	MSI	Flows33	LOW	a little coil whine
RTX 5080 Suprim Liquid	MSI	GoRedwings19	LOW	a little coil whine, not excessive
RTX 5080 Solid OC	Zotac	Rinken	MEDIUM	audible with case closed, more noticeable in person, only heard when volume is low
RTX 5080 GamingPro	Palit	Major774	LOW	no serious coil whine, noise drowned out by fans

Awesome. I'm in the mind that if you can get a Gigabyte, there's a good chance you don't have coil whine. In the past 10 years of owning purely gigabyte cards I didn't come across a single one with coil whine, curious to get more data on gigabyte cards

 

[cliffy]

Bagged an Astral today from a competitor, I basically could have gotten the Suprim AIO, all I had to do was press the buy button but I just couldn't bring myself to do it considering AIOs and how it would look funky in my case with my CPU AIO, and the Astral just looks sooo good and will fit my case/aesthetic well. I know it's probably gonna have coil whine guaranteed since it's Asus but let's see how loud it's gonna be, hopefully not as loud as the TUF I returned.

Mine arrived today, limited ttime playing so far but i have not heard any coil whine, got my brother in to see if he could hear anything but so far the card runs very quiet and cool

 

[DizzyZ]

Mine arrived today, limited ttime playing so far but i have not heard any coil whine, got my brother in to see if he could hear anything but so far the card runs very quiet and cool

Yup, good on coil whine too. Caveat though is the card only runs quiet if you handle the 4th fan properly (quiet mode/new bios/fan curve), otherwise that **** gets insanely loud lol.

 

[SeeNoWeevil]

I have a suggestion for OP to keep summary of all the opinions i.e. at the start of the thread. To illustrate how it could look I used LLM to read the entire thread
to output the table below in CSV format (Grok3 with thinking seemed to be quite capable at it - at least better than others I tried) and then opened it in excel and copy pasted here.
I didn't validate the output, so I can't guarantee its correctness, however it's a start. Please let me know if you wish to copy the table at the start of the thread
and I shall then delete my post or whatever other action you would prefer. Also others can maybe provide feedback if there is interest for such a summary.

Model	Brand	Source	Coil Whine Level	Opinion
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	JetSetter1984	TERRIBLE	squealed and buzzed pretty badly
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	Guru3D	HIGH	bad coil whine (8/10)
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	Techtesters	TERRIBLE	very bad coil whine
RTX 5090 FE	Nvidia	Debauer (video)	MEDIUM	not too bad per Hostile_18
RTX 5090 Suprim	MSI	GoRedwings19	LOW	very very quiet unless over 500 fps or so
RTX 5090 Suprim	MSI	redkrptonite	SILENT	zero coil whine
RTX 5090 Suprim	MSI	Hardware Unboxed	LOW	no coil whine but some small electrical noise
RTX 5090 Gaming Trio	MSI	SinisterUK	MEDIUM to HIGH	quiet 99% of the time, really REALLY loud in specific scenarios
RTX 5090 Gaming Trio	MSI	JetSetter1984	HIGH	buzzing, almost as bad as the FE
RTX 5090 Astral OC	Asus	clone	SILENT	zero coil whine
RTX 5090 Astral OC	Asus	kindai	LOW to MEDIUM	does squeal at uncapped FPS, absolutely silent at 144Hz with VSync
RTX 5090 Astral	Asus	DizzyZ	LOW	far less than the TUF, only noticeable when trying to hear it
RTX 5090 Astral	Asus	Guru3D	LOW to MEDIUM	5/10 coil whine
RTX 5090 Aorus Master	Gigabyte	Cosimo	SILENT	zero coil whine
RTX 5090 X3	INNO3D	stfn	LOW	some hardly audible coil whine
RTX 5080 FE	Nvidia	JetSetter1984	LOW	much quieter, barely audible
RTX 5080 Gaming Trio	MSI	GoRedwings19	SILENT	my gaming trio which has none
RTX 5080 Suprim Liquid	MSI	Flows33	LOW	a little coil whine
RTX 5080 Suprim Liquid	MSI	GoRedwings19	LOW	a little coil whine, not excessive
RTX 5080 Solid OC	Zotac	Rinken	MEDIUM	audible with case closed, more noticeable in person, only heard when volume is low
RTX 5080 GamingPro	Palit	Major774	LOW	no serious coil whine, noise drowned out by fans

You can add my Asus TUF OC 5080, very bad coil whine buzzing.

 

[SeeNoWeevil]

In other news, I ordered an Inspire 5080 from the rainforest as I've heard almost unanimously that coil whine is very low. Plus they do free returns.

 

[playtech1]

I have a suggestion for OP to keep summary of all the opinions i.e. at the start of the thread. To illustrate how it could look I used LLM to read the entire thread
to output the table below in CSV format (Grok3 with thinking seemed to be quite capable at it - at least better than others I tried) and then opened it in excel and copy pasted here.
I didn't validate the output, so I can't guarantee its correctness, however it's a start. Please let me know if you wish to copy the table at the start of the thread
and I shall then delete my post or whatever other action you would prefer. Also others can maybe provide feedback if there is interest for such a summary.

Great idea. To repeat my experiences from earlier posts for inclusion:

5080 FE - Low coil whine, drowned out by fans
5080 MSI Gaming Trio - Low coil whine, overall a quiet card
5080 Ventus OC - moderate coil whine, to the point of being unacceptable to me. Generally drowned out by fans, but the fans are quite loud
5080 Aorus Master - Low to no coil whine. I can hear it only in games that are particularly bad for it and only if I strain to do so.

 

[Flows33]

for my to re-specify I was able to test and which is not yet in the table, an rtx 5080 asus prime oc, coil whine medium, rtx 5080 suprim liquid coilwhine medium.

I am waiting to receive a 5090 msi vanguard and a 5090 gigabyte windforce oc!

Edit : I see in the table that for my case it is written rtx 5080 liquid suprim with a low coilwhine, it is an error it is my 5080 suprim which is low in coilwhine, the liquid is average suddenly

 

[no_1_dave]

You can add my 5090FE

Bad, kind of high pitched, coil whine when my PC was on my desk. Worse than my 4090FE was
Much better now it's on the floor and further away from me

It does highlight that PC placement is something to consider here though and will give different results

 

[DizzyZ]

You can add my 5090FE

Bad, kind of high pitched, coil whine when my PC was on my desk. Worse than my 4090FE was
Much better now it's on the floor and further away from me

It does highlight that PC placement is something to consider here though and will give different results

Totally, as well as my right ear being more sensitive to coil whine than my left ear, there's a lot of variables that can skew the results, one person's "quiet" could be another's "loud"

 

[Hostile_18]

I've never had it where placement mattered. If it was making a noise I could hear it even through rooms.

I have potentially got a Trio coming to add to the data (never got a 9070xt for myself in the end). I say potentially because it's a pre order due for this month, but you knew know how accurate it is.

 

[SeeNoWeevil]

There are a lot of variables, I think the user's hearing and the openness of their PC case have the biggest impact. I moved from a Fractal Define Mini (quiet focused case) to a Fractal North, which is all mesh with a pretty open front. My current GPU had quite a bit of coilwhine and I never really heard it until I moved to this new case. Airflow cases drop temps which allow fans to run slower so they can be as quiet as more restrictive cases due to fans running slower HOWEVER, with an open case, you are way more vulnerable to audible coil whine.

I also don't care about coil whine at very high framerates (i.e above 120fps) as I will often cap to slightly above that. Most cards will squeal at hundreds of FPS in my experience e.g on uncapped title screens.