AMD Radeon 290X Kuhler mod: Taming Hawaii 'Pic heavy'.

[Boomstick777]

Stock fan must go.. Enter ghetto modding..

Ingredients:

----------------------------------------------------

Antec Kuhler 620: Dual 120mm fan. Push/Pull.

Custom D-Wood Bracket inc fan mount (OCN) or 4 Cable ties will do.

Screwdrivers. (Small ones)

VRM / Ram heatsinks. Thermal glue or tape/pads.

Cup of tea.

----------------------------------------------------




Aim is to reduce temps to allow more overclocking headroom. Reduce noise.

Let's get to work...

Step 1: Remove stock cooler, it comes apart by removing all screws from the back of the PCB, along with 2 smaller screws on the rear GPU I/O plate.






Step 2: Clean stock thermal paste off, will give a mirror shine to the chip.




Step 3: Re-apply some thermal paste, I like to spread the paste across the chip to ensure all areas are covered.. Use a clean plastic like cling film to rub the paste to an even spread with your finger. Then can throw the messy plastic in the bin..



Step 4: Time to apply your new cooling, this should also have been cleaned to a mirror type shine. I'm using an Antec Kuhler 620, with a bracket from D-Wood to fit onto the card. You can also use cable ties for this, there are loads of guides for cable tie method on other GPU's available. Same method applies with the 290X.

Antec 620 wPush/Pull config.




D-Wood bracket.



I find the easiest way to use the bracket method is to put the screws in place through the PCB, ready to slide the bracket down onto the card with the Kuhler in place, then you can tighten up the screws from the top side by hand. Then turn the card on it's side to finish off with Screwdriver. Only tighten the crews until they are firm, do not want to over tighten them.

Fitted some heatsinks to the VRM at the front of the card.




Should have something like this now.



Time to install the card and Kuhler into the case and test the GPU.



Silence... Temps have dropped dramatically...

Temps (Unigine Valley Benchmark loop).

Stock reference cooler,

Idle temp 33c

Load temp 93c

Antec Kuhler mod,

Idle temp 28c

Load temp 55c

-------------------------------------------------------------

Furmark Test. 53c full load.

 

[Boomstick777]

^^ I've never put heatsinks on any modded GPU's vram, just doesn't seem to need it in a decent case.

GTX 480 / 7950 / 7970 / GTX 670 / GTX Titan / GTX 780 and this 290X, all cooled using the exact same method. Works fine for me.

I'm impressed with the 290X so far, I already beat my 780 3D Mark 11 score @ 1150core. I will get to grips with the card over next few days, then start attacking the score boards .

 

[Boomstick777]

So these cards don't require a spacer between the core and the cooler like the last gen (7000 series) did?

No you don't need a shim, it's pretty flush against cooler. So optional.

Looks very effective Boom.

Can't wait to see results.

What cpu are you using?

Thanks

Using a 4770K, this lil 290X seems like a very fast card. Will take a couple days to get used to AMD overclocking again.

Early attempt at 3DMark 11,



http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/7525624

Great mod man if its not to much trouble would you mind posting the VRM temps would be very interesting to know how hot things get.

cheers dude.

No worries, what prog do I need to show the temps?

 

[Boomstick777]

When I scroll down this is what I get?

 

[Boomstick777]

Yeah it can I can see them on mind but I don think it's on by default. Enable htm bad boys

Nice gpu score on 3d mark 11 dude I can't seem to get to > 1170 core sad times what settings you using and thanks again for the info what a legend

Yeah I can't see how to enable vrm temp on GPUZ?

Ty, that 3DMark11 run was at 1200mhz core and something ridiculous on the memory + 4770K @ 4.6Ghz

 

[Boomstick777]

GPU-Z is supposed to show 290X VRMs, maybe wipe any reg entries etc and reinstall (or delete exe and download again)?

How come there's no scrollbar on your screenshot? Do you see one?

Yeah there is a scrollbar, it doesn't show when you take the screenshot.

I've settled on the Powercolor OC bios for now. At stock settings this thing is a monster !

53c in Furmark test. Very happy with this card, it seems to love water.

 

[Boomstick777]

^^ Lol.

The only game I've played so far is BF4, have to say it feels way more fluid and fps are a fair bit higher than GTX 780. I guess Mantle will be lost on this GPU, if already at 60fps?

It's not all good news however as about after 10mins of play I was treated to a nice black screen of death . Not uncommon on 290's from what I've read. Hopefully AMD fix that issue soon.

Gonna have to try a bit of 1440P Crysis, and Far Cry 3 when I get a chance..

 

[Boomstick777]

There's a surprise

 

[Boomstick777]

don't you have to disable ulps to get true physics scores with haswell cpu's?

should be mid 13k physics at 4.4/4.5ghz

Ah thanks for that, will try

 

[Boomstick777]

Just to update, AMD launched a fix for the black screen issue. Running perfect now, 28c idle / 55c full load.

Silent and deadly, I know what you're thinking, 'like a fart' but no more like snake

 

[Boomstick777]

Mine is set up as the front intake case fan, with a fan at the rear for push/pull. The whole thing is nice and cool. Ideal budget cooling solution, no need for the those horrible stock air coolers. I'll be doing this mod to every GPU I own forever lol.

 

[Boomstick777]

Nice mod - Andy has a point though - those single 120s are usually rated for ~180 watt heat dissipation and those GPUs can kick out around 300 - you'd really want a 240 or 280 for best results (usually rated ~300).

That scale of 'power to heat' doesn't equate the same with CPU ~ GPU. I.e a 620 will give 50c totally safely on a GPU, a 920 may drop it under 50c. Typically GPU's although like you say are rated at 300W TDP, the coolers are inadequate. Once you go under water, the difference is vast, but the overall difference between a 620 / 920 may not be worth it. Also the rad on the 920's is much thicker, the fans have to work harder to push the air through, can result in more noise. My 4770K is cooled by a 920...

This mod has been going for a long time,

http://www.overclock.net/t/1203528/official-nvidia-gpu-mod-club-aka-the-mod
http://www.overclock.net/t/1203636/official-amd-ati-gpu-mod-club-aka-the-red-mod

I've cooled my past like 8 cards this way. It's very safe, cheap and easy to do.

 

[Boomstick777]

Nice work, Boom.

Thanks bud , the 290X is def a nice card to mess with until 20nm. These new cards 290X / 780ti are so powerful, I'm wandering how much more performance they can get on 20nm? I would probably be happy with just a die shrunk version of this chip tbh. Same performance, less power use..

 

[Boomstick777]

Done a bit more reading on VRM heatsinks, it does seem that a lot of people use them

What I don't get is why my old cards, GTX 480, HD 7950, HD 7970, Nvidia GTX 780, Titan etc all ran fine with this mod and no VRM heatsinks, if it so important, how come they were fine?

Anybody know where I could pick up the heatsinks for VRM's on this 290X?

 

[Boomstick777]

Anybody know where I could pick up the heatsinks for VRM's on this 290X?

 

[Boomstick777]

Somebody linked a kit they had bought in another thread I think, might have been this:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-038-AL

VRMs are rated for 100C+ so I guess if you had any kind of airflow in your case they were kept cool enough from that? I have heard that they may work less efficiently when near their temp limit, perhaps you could've got better OC's this whole time if you cooled em.

Haha very possibly . Thanks for the link, trying to find VRM cooling small enough for the 3 at the back of the card.. Everything seems to come with custom coolers, hard to get separate bits..

 

[Boomstick777]

Idle VRM temps:

Full Load VRM Temps (Furmark stress test):

 

[Boomstick777]

VRM1 temps @97c is that with the VRAM Chip Coolers ? I think if you can get that down you should be able to overclock more or be more stable at least that is high but i think people have been saying they could have a limit of 125c but i dont know if that is 100% correct. lovely mod for sure.

If that is not with the VRAM Chip Coolers get some on it

Yeah that is without any heatsinks on the VRM. Done a lot of reading and it seems that at higher than 100c VRM's could effect overclocking. Bearing in mind that test was done at stock settings, so I'm def gonna take the advice from the peeps here and get some VRM heatsinks. Only problem is I can't find any low profile ones that would fit under the Kuhler fan bracket..

I found that VRM 1 is the front part of the card with multiple VRM's and VRM 2 is the rear 3 part. Cooling likr this in the pic would be ideal, but only seems to ship with retail Artic Accelero 3.

Spoiler

 

[Boomstick777]

You could always buy some normal ones and cut the tops off.

Ty, what can you use to cut them so it's a decent clean cut?

 

[Boomstick777]

I am going to say the reason is cost. This mod cost him nearly nothing as he had most of the parts already i think. If you want to go custom loop you are looking at £400-£500 pounds and for some people its not worth it / too expensive. Plus its fun to mod

^^ This.

I've ordered the heatink set (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-038-AL) from OCUK that teppic and orangey recommended.

If worst comes to it, and it doesn't fit under the fan bracket, I'll try a different bracket without fan mount, probably better to fit heatsinks on memory and VRM with no fan than to have an fan cooler with no heatsinks right?

Will update the thread when it's done.