electrosoft

In regards to voltages and 5090s, in the same vein as I was asking awhile ago here about subjecting naturally lower voltage cards to forced, higher voltages via EVC2 or now with the XOC. There is a reason cards are coming off the fab binned at various voltages and qualities: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 9800X3D vs 265k at all thee resolutions (1080p, 1440p, 2160p) Pay particular attention to the 1% and .1% across all the results: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Is there a review out on this stuff comparing it to other pastes along with other LMs and PTM?

That's fair 🤣 Hopefully it isn't a problematic issue with the PSU design itself but just a faulty model. I wouldn't put it past MSI to issue a newer revision addressing an older problem and replacing them as reported. Intel is actually doing very well on the mobile front. Much more efficient than AMD and quieter. Four AMD laptops I've had pass my way from an iGPU only model to the Raider 7955HX3D variant just had insane fan noise overall because of how the chips operated in laptop form. Desktop continues to get a bad rap and unfairly so at this point IMHO. Until Intel solves their thermal issues, e-cores are here to say. On the upside, each iteration of e-cores get more and more powerful. The jump from Raptor to Arrow was pretty decent. I wouldn't be adverse to the 5090 remaining top dog till 2027. Really get that ROI before we eventually sell them off hopefully like last time and recoup every cent and even make a little on the top. I can see staying put as is at the moment. You put a lot of work into that rig and it is big and beautiful. If it is gaming like a monster at 4k (ditto), keep riding it! Next fall Panther should be a monster along with AM6. One reason I'm trying (emphasize the word "trying") to keep Arrowlake cheap but I know me sooo...... I'll obviously hold onto the 9600 sticks to carry over to whatever drops next.... Did you hold onto any of your DDR5 kits from before or did you sell off everything?

Re: Crocs..... NO. 😆 (Mic Drop!) The fact Micron is shelving an entire brand to focus on the AI market is frightening....the market is truly going to be horrific for consumers next year. AI everywhere is consuming everything at a voracious rate. On the other hand, I can't wait to see it become sentient......again (We all know this has had to have happened before somewhere in the great cosmos) One thing I did with the 4090 and will do with the 5090 is just leave my pigtails attached at all times. Even when I moved the 4090 between systems for testing, I left it connected and just connected up the 4x PCIE cables. One of the benefits of the pigtails....I guess? Yep, looks like 4090 cycle all over again but a 2.5yr+ life cycle is a long time. Imagine no new cards till Fall 2027 except for a Super refresh.....*yawn* We will see, but I wanted to also have some G4 fun and see how far that will go. I basically wanted the best of both worlds to eventually push 9200+ G4 for funsies as I will end up binning some samples along the way over the next several months as time allows. I want to remove RAM as a potential bottleneck in that equation and also be settled in for Panther Lake potentially next year. I will eventually probably end up switching motherboards down the road too depending on how this all goes. Those V-color 9600 sticks will effectively remove a bit of this noise for now and remove a variable right out of the gate letting me focus on motherboards and cpus. I also need those extra KingBank sticks for my daughter's AM5 system buildout in progress. Yeah, I'm definitely going to hold onto the 16 Pro Max as long as possible till a member needs an upgrade. Sheesh, 2TB model? Really? That's crazy storage! You should come back and run Ultra or AM5 bro! Something new and different. 🙂 Come down the rabbit hole with us! 🤑 With no new hardware on the horizon, it's time to play and tweak either AM5 or Ultra which will undoubtedly be faster than your current setup for gaming as a bonus and harness that 5090 even more. Yep, G4 is just for bandwidth testing/funsies. The idea is to push 8600+ tuned to the bones in G2 and play with G4 at 9000+. With the 9600 sticks you have the potential ability to do both and remove any binning issues from the equation pushing lower spec'd DDR5 modules on the hopes they can push higher. It really lets you focus on the MB/CPU combo. For your setup already having been pre-tested by @Talon, luckily you know exactly at a minimum what it can do no problem so you should be able to come right out of the gate initially tuned on the CPU and memory pushing 8600 tuned right out of the block and go from there. It really is coming to you ready to rock and roll in the best way. On my end, I get to FAFO with lower tier hardware (Z890 Strix-A + 265k) right out of the gate and a bunch of unknowns. On my end atm, it is the KingBank sticks holding me back as they passed 8000 and 8200 no problem but borked out at 8400 in less than 3 minutes on TestMem5 at 1.5v. I pushed them to 1.55v as an IMC test and they lasted almost an hour in TM5 before borking instead. I put a fan on them to cool them down while running and they made it through the 90 min run at 1.55v. With or without the fan, 1.50v and they borked out in less than 5 minutes at 8400. My TG 8200 sticks only require 1.45v so hopefully they have a little more room to play with and slightly better heatsinks (KingBank for the price then have exceptionally nice Heatsinks on them). My hope is the 9600 sticks will remove a lot of this redlining potential or need of a fan or better heatsinks and simply run as is tuned at 8600+ G2 and get some benching fun in at G4 9000+ if not with the 265k now then some other chips to bin over the next few months.

Microcenter 9070xt return story and some nice information on GPU checking and return procedures: ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- So all is well that ends well. Made the trip back up to MC St Davids to return that 9070xt and found out a few things. I had asked how a defective / non working card had slipped out for sale and how two more open box Challengers showed up for sale the next day. The rockin' tech assist associate let me know exactly how everything works. The one I bought had been shipped to their main return hub in Ohio from another store as a return then redistributed to the St David's store which means they do send out refurbs/returns that are supposed to work and seed them to stores to resell. You can tell if it is a main hub open box/refurb item (any item) with the green sticker on the side along with a marking. Sales associate pointed it out to me. If the card is returned as defective/not working and verified as such, the card gets marked down as defective and sent to ohio. Ohio then contacts the main companies for replacements/repairs. If they get back a new card in return, it goes back in new stock. If they get a refurb, it goes in as a refurb. Either way, they are then seeded back out to the various MC branches. What this means is you will never return an open box item that won't eventually be sent back to Ohio main returns and then reseeded to various MC stores. As such, there is near zero chance for you to return an item in the hopes of repurchasing it as an open box status. The problem with mine is it wasn't marked "defective" when returned (original new buyer probably just thought it was incompatible) but even then the main hub is supposed to check all cards for working status before shipping out open box / refurbs. Probably Amazon Renewed/warehouse magic where it is assumed it is working and just a return and they didn't check it at all. The receiving MC does not check the working status of open box / refurb items received since they are supposed to have been checked by Ohio main. On the other hand, the original store that took the return was SUPPOSED to check it before sending it to Ohio either way and they failed to do that. St. Davids immediately checked it even when I said, "it is dead. Get ready to see your VGA diagnostic light fire up white" A few seconds later after plugging it in I heard the tech chuckle and go, "yup, there's the VGA fail light in all its glory." 🤣 Refund immediately issued. It wasn't St David's fault but the original store who took the return and failed to plug it in and check it and Ohio mains for not checking it too. I did ask if for open box purchases can the customer request a quick check to make sure it at least posts and he said sure. I will keep that in mind next time. Thanks for attending my Ted Talk.....

I even convinced myself, "Just keep it budget!" and literally the first memory wall I ran up against I just went, "Nope, have to make sure memory is never the issue," and went memory hunting all morning local (+150 miles) and online still I found those somewhat decently priced 9600 sticks to rule out memory being the issue. That is my final form objective to finely tuned G2 8600 or 8800 while testing upper limits even in G4 (gross) just for testing purposes. This is how the rabbit hole starts....everytime....for me. 🤣 I haven't checked yet. I usually shoot right to IMC/memory checking and since the Strix-A is rated up to 9066, that and the 9600 sticks will let me comfortably focus on memory but after this initial dial in period (Right now, 8200 is coming down the home stretch comfortable so I'm thinking it is the sticks at this point but I'll be adjusting IMC/VCCSA next), I'll move to CPU OC. It is a 265k, so I'm not holding my breath.... Do you think you'll be able to dial it in for D2D use or will it be relegated to benching only and just use the stock Astral LC vbios? At least fans work so that's a plus! Nice snag! I think we've all wrecked hardware over the years. I know I have in this crazy pursuit. Yeah, picking up used 13th/14th gen CPUs is a crapshoot especially if they have been run before newer bios that add in voltage protections. See if he can get Intel to replace it first. lol, no I'm sticking with my 16 pro max for at least another year. I tend to only upgrade when someone on the family plan ages out of iOS updates and the phones trickle down. Last year my wife finally aged out with her X, so she got my 14 pro max and I picked up a 16 pro max. My kids are on 11 pro and 11 pro max and I'm not sure if they'll make the cut next year so I might be upgrading to a 18 pro max but we'll see.....I'm sure my duaghter won't tolerate not being able to upgrade her iOS so that would be at least one. What are you running now? It will remove memory sticks from the equation basically especially with that Apex and 285k and knowing how high @Talon was able to run it with his 9600 sticks in G2. Tuned 8600 is a massive uplift over 6400. That doesn't bode well (on top of already bad market conditions at least in the US) for 5090 prices and availability. Plus with the market going bonkers, 2026 will be an interesting year. At this rate, new 6000 GPUs from Nvidia definitely aren't launching till 2027 along with AMD. Might as well settle in for another year+ of 5090 dominance...... Are there similar reports on the Phantom 1600w? Newegg has the Phantom for $199.99. I have the MSI AI1300 but never had designs on using that with the 5090 but instead the Nitro+ for my daughter's buildout 2.0. I also have a spare EVGA P2 850w I could use. I was thinking of replacing my EVGA P2 1600w w/ the Asrock 1600w Phantom for the native 12v2x6 connectors when my Wireview Pro 2 arrives and it seems to holding it down over on the OCN forums for some serious benching.

So I ended up snagging a pair of V-Color 9600 2x24GB DDR5 off of eBay new from a seller I've dealt with before In today's market conditions, couldn't beat the price of $489.99 plus I had two coupons for eBay (basically, "you haven't shopped us in a long time!" coupons) for $15 off and $10 off respectively. I was able to use both of them knocking it down to $464.99 for a total of $495.80 shipped and with ebay rewards, that knocks another $15 off of it making it $480.92 to my door. Am I doing backflips? No, but much better than those G.Skill sticks that would have been $650.40 to my door.....still..... This is *exactly* why I try to avoid new platforms because once I start it gets ugly real fast. 🤣 Remember 11th gen? I was just going to pick up a 11700k and the cheapest Z590 board and use my dirt cheap DDR4 sticks to "give it a whirl." Within 4 months, it is several 11900k's binned, Asus Z590 board and EVGA Z590 along with multiple kits of DDR4.... I'd like to say I won't end up binning some 285k/290k chips, but that would be most likely a big ole fib....🤣

Yeah, I knew it had to happen sooner than later. My streak of open box "wins" was was over a year. Last bad one was the Crosshair x670e with bad fan ports that went back to Amazon. The 2+ hrs drive there and back and annoyance of not being able to just drop it off for shipping is always the bummer. I didn't even know you had a 14900KS just gathering dust! Definitely set that back up in the here and now. The memory prices are just bonkers atm. I entertained the thought of maybe getting some 8800 or 9000 CUDIMMS and saw the price and went back to tuning these 8400 sticks.... DDR4 prices also are on the rise so you can definitely recoup some money but overall it is definitely not a builders market atm... So he was using a cable mod 4->1 adapter that was originally certified for the 4000 series and it burned at the PSU end of the equation.....CM strikes again? Either way, seeing that fast turn around time with EVGA just makes me miss them more and more each day. For a hot second, I thought MSI was going to step up but they didn't. Asus regressed a bit, and rumors of KP going to PNY had us all excited too but that seems to have fizzled out and now he's all wrapped up in e-bikes. Outside of the dips, X3D still brings the heat overall but again BBT is reiterating the point of Ultra at 4k being the best: Since our vacation plans went up in smoke due to health reasons, I haven't really had a chance to stretch the legs on my Alienware 18. I'll have to just settle in one night and meaningfully play and see how it feels for raids, Dorongal and PvP. Looks like the Precursor to Panther Lake desktop coming next year with their own X3D cache they're calling BLLC. You also have AMD finally vastly improving their fabric latency / connectivity issues on their next gen chips and rumors of slapping X3D on both CCDs. 9850X3D is all but confirmed to launch soon and it's basically a binned 9800X3D running at 5.6 right out of the box vs 5.2. AMD is entering Intel KS territory with that one... ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- So far, I'm initially tuned at 8000 on the Ultra. Errors out at 8400 on these KingBank 8400 sticks. I notice their default voltage is 1.50v vs TG 8200 1.45v Checking 8200 now. on the Kingbanks... I'll end up swapping in the TG sticks to double check if 8200 fails before I then start to hunker down to tighten things up..... Actually had to fight the urge to pick up these 9600 sticks for $609 from Newegg to remove memory from the equation since the board is rated up to 9066 and see where this budget rig would go but paying over 50% more than I paid for them together? o.O Stupid itch....

Well....you live by the open box gamble sword and die by the open box gamble sword and I finally crapped out for the first time in quite a while.... Amazon Asus Z890 Strix-A MB which was listed as "used, acceptable" was basically brand new and still had the original 503 launch BIOS on it but I did see a few thermal smudges, so I know somewhere, somehow someone tried to use it and probably got frustrated and sent it back where it sat on a shelf most likely for the last year+ Microcenter open box 265k is an SP77 and runs crazy cool even benching on an air cooler on top of the Asus box for now using an ID-Cooling Frozn A410 before it ends up in final boss form. Bonus? It qualified for the Intel game giveaway which Microcenter attached to the receipt. I'll spend the next week tuning it up and then give it a whirl with what will initially most likely be that Nitro+ at this point because..... Microcenter Asrock Challenger 9070xt was DOA right out of the box. Wouldn't boot on my Aorus B650i Ultra but it has no diagnostic lights so I used that as a reason to quickly assemble the 265k and popped the sticks out and got it up and running and tried it in there and the VGA bad light lit right up. As a final check, I popped it into the wife's system which has been running a 9070xt already no problems a few minutes ago and yep, VGA led light lit right up too. You would think they would check all their open box items before letting them go out the door. Lord knows they check 5090s but I guess 9070xt's don't get the same treatment. MC is over an hour away gas + $6 bridge toll and now I get to make that wonderful trip back to return it. They sent me a survey and you know I ripped them apart for several reasons on the survey they failed to pass. We were in there for well over an hour. Not one person asked us if we needed help but plenty were standing around. 18 min checkout turned into almost an hour and for some reason they took my license in the back and I don't know why..... That didn't happen before. Before the testing with TG contact frame installed: Wife's system giving me the final third strike "You suck Bro! Back to MC you go!" VGA diagnostic fail on the Challenger 9070xt. 😞 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 12900k was a beast. 14900ks in WoW end game form (59/45/50) on the wife's system is beastly too but even it can't handle the load on Dorongal when heavily populated and fps dip down and utilization drops quick even on her 9070xt at 1440p ultra settings rt high. I'll have to watch her raid next time to see how it's performing comparatively with all the new driver and WoW updates that have drastically increased 9070xt performance in WoW from launch where it didn't work at all meaningfully to working very well to now routinely capping out her fps even in Tazevesh 1440p Ultra/RT 165hz display. Ouch, I'm kicking myself for not picking up a few more of those..... memory wise even your 12900ks probably has more in the tank as my launch 12900k towards the end when tested on some 8000 sticks on an Asrock Z790i Lightning gave up the ghost at 7200. To really get Ultra to shine, you're probably going to need much faster memory at least 8000 but with current pricing? Ugh... How are the temps on your laptops when gaming at those settings? What specs? Some might be Acer is stupidly conservative with their hardware and BIOSes. This has been true for years now. They lock things down well under spec and really limit you in BIOS settings too. It's annoying. Dell and Asus give you a little bit more control and MSI is next followed by Prema enabled laptops. Glad to see you back in the forums bro! Hopefully the break was nice but hardware wise we're in that lull period atm.... I can understand that logic wanting the top dog of a current generation. There's always that irrational fear of Nvidia introducing a 5090ti if the market had a sudden downturn but they have no competition at the top so that most likely will not happen. I think you will be pleased with the 9070xt. Red Devil is one of the top rated models for 9070xt's along with the Nitro+ and Taichi but uses traditional pcie connectors so that's a plus. I know on my wife's system performance at 1440p is excellent for WoW running full tilt and she'll be using that card for years to come (or at least towards the end of its 3yr warranty then maybe move on). I was going to either pick up a 9950X3D or an Epyc like @Mr. Fox, but decided the experimental Ultra adventures first. Luckily, CPU prices are stagnant and within the holiday window you always have the option of returning the 9950X3D if it isn't a good fit. Yeah, no way they're squeezing in that 600w+ fire breather in a laptop! Things are much closer on the lower end but by the time you hit 5070ti laptop vs 5070ti desktop it starts to get brutal and from there it's lights out especially at the 5090 level: 5070ti laptop vs desktop:

Congrats @win32asmguy! Based on 4k gaming results, the 265k and 285k are almost equal tuned properly depending on silicon quality. I was tempted to pick up @Talon's hardware, but I'm just wiggling my toe in the water for sub $400 for the MB and CPU and both with a return window if I don't like what I see till January 26th. It gives me a window to reverse a potential bad purchase or perhaps feel it out and if I like what I see perhaps explore further (aka $$$). I know @win32asmguy is just as much into WoW as I am, so I am really curious to see how much smoother the Ultra can handle WoW and how it stacks up against the 9800X3D and 14900KS (wifey's gonna be mad when I "borrow" her rig a few nights to do some testing with the 5090 🙂 ). I know what the 14900KS already brings in Raids and PvP which is a better handling of the .01% especially. My personal prediction is this combo is going to be a banger once tuned for WoW but I'm equal parts curious about Fallout 76 too as AMD just wrecks the 14900KS at 4k disproportionately so. With how cache sings on AMD and Fallout 76, I think bllc is a potential wrecking ball for Intel and Fallout 76 next gen. But this Ultra itch has been bugging me for quite some time.....and it must be scratched.....within reason. I just got back a bit ago from Microcenter and OMG the ram prices were scary. Just flat out scary. It was a mad house in there and the checkout and pick up lines were insanely long. "18 minute pickup" turned into a 45-60 min pick up to the point the sales associate was walking down the line and getting names and what needed to be picked up so they would be ready when you got to the counter to speed things up. Still, a $495.10 9070xt and a $205 265k was worth the haul coupled with an Amazon $176 Asus Z890 Strix-A Motherboard. All open box......Now let's all hold hands and pray they all work. The stacks of open box motherboards in there was a sight to see. Wifey and I took a look at cases, and now she no longer likes her EVGA case but fell in love with the Corsair 5000 airflow black case so I sense a case upgrade coming her way. It's a win win as it has much better air flow than the DG-77. I was wondering where you disappeared to! Welcome back and you are definitely getting maximum value from that FE! Did you shunt that laptop or just the vbios update only? Imagine a shunt to go along with that sweet sweet bios gains.

Just watched this video..... I agree about DDR pricing. Right now, it is through the roof because memory makers don't want to ramp up out of fear of a glut and crash like after the CryptoPandemic. It is a false demand scenario atm. It is in their best interest to not respond to consumer demand but actually AI demand and adjust accordingly with consumer demand playing a small factor in that output calculation. I wouldn't even consider purchasing any kits new right now and if I was building out without some on hand, I would just not buy anything. There is always the specter of the memory OEMs deciding to "ease" demand and simply ramp up their lines at any given time and prices will come down quick. I would not want to fall prey to such control of market conditions and pay these stupid prices for memory. I don't like comparing different class cards based on die sizes. Keep comparisons legit 3070 vs 5070 or 3060 vs 5060 but if he does that, his argument weakens greatly. Using the one off 3060 12gb as a basis doesn't fly. With that being said, is anyone shocked Nvidia still is making a healthy profit even on the low end? They are the Apple of GPUs and their profit margins reign supreme. I shudder at the thought of AMD not offering competitive GPUs sans the top end and what damage Nvidia could do pricing wise with no checks from AMD. He's right in that I do not think (nor should anyone) that the drastic increase in dram prices correlates to drastic increases in GPU prices. My main concern is Nvidia potentially decoupling memory from their GPU package sales because it is no longer lucrative atm and allows them to allocate any and all memory they can get to their much more lucrative AI market at the expense of consumer GPU buyers. I expect Nvidia cards to unevenly trend up 10-15% over MSRP to a new MSRP at the minimum. His analysis of AMD's offerings means even more so if you want a 9070xt, NOW is the time to get it as AMD is running razor thin margins or even potentially taking a small loss on the 9070xt. With VRAM prices going up, a 10% increase in MSRP at a minimum is incoming. AMD is actually priced properly and even with a 10-15% increase in price at MSRP (IE $599-$699) in the future due to memory costs, they are STILL priced properly which speaks volumes. Normal consumers need to understand these companies exist to make a profit not cajole to their whining and damage their own bottom line and run a loss or break even. On the other hand we have the Apple's and Nvidia's of the world too..... Consumers have the ultimate say and can simply say no to what usually ends up being luxury items. Vote with your wallet.

Nice! I'll have to take a looksy and see what I can extract and apply to my humble 9800X3D and Asus X870e Hero. 🤣 This is Asus. I highly doubt they binned anything ala 4090 Matrix...... Even as robust as the PCB and cooler design is, there is still the fragility of the 600w connector even in the face of the BTF connector which while I'm sure on paper can handle a lot of juice, why chance anything over 800w? They need their "limited edition" (Same card I could have pre-ordered on launch day for well over 8hrs) Matrix cards to be problematic free and run perfectly. Personally, if the BTF connector is so good, I'm not sure why they didn't split the load evenly at a minimum 400/400 or at the very least supply a 3-prong lead and cap the 12v2x6 to an official 450w and the BTF to 350w for an extra added layer of protection..... Exact same plan of attack, but the 800w is turning out to be the new Gigachad on steroids. I can see a low voltage card wanting to run the XOC though and getting access to all that 1.15v. If it can be dialed in / reeled back, it has its place but for normal use, I still think the Matrix 800w is the way to go because it seems to be the special sauce on all fronts sans memory OC unless severely voltage capped cards are purposely limited even when running the 800w MatrixMagic. Running XOC on 5090 vs 4090 I rarely approached 500w let alone 600w+ with my 4090 even OC'd in most gaming scenarios whereas OC'd my Vanguard routinely hits 630w and it clearly wants more. At 630w my voltage will hit ~1.090 leaving me a nice voltage chunk on the table that I'm sure the Matrix 800w will gladly slurp up with my 1.125v native cap. I'm not willing to take that leap till I have a nice layer of monitoring, buffer and protection in place. You must be ready and willing to know that 600w connector is going to be severely abused more often than not running either of the bios but especially that XOC, whew..... I can see @Mr. Fox now when 1.15v popped up on his screen and his UPS started to howl going: I'll have to take a look at the video later. I usually like his outlook on market forecasting. This is why I'm waiting for my Wireview Pro 2 before I do anything.... As for Asus, they don't officially condone everyone using their vBIOS files even on their own cards. They are not going legitimize it by compounding the issue and creating a version of the Matrix to run on their other cards. The objective is clear in their response. That is to NOT run ANY of the XOC/Matrix vBIOS files on ANY of their non sanctioned cards..... that's pretty clear. Wow, they are retroactively adding it? I completely get it and blame the sophistication and sheer number of cheaters out there that somehow extract a sense of victory winning matches cheating at all costs but this truly is the only way to completely oversee every aspect of what is going on because some of the cheats were near that level of low level hardware access to circumvent previous measures. This is what forced EA's hand because in the world of competitive real player games, the sanctity of fair play overrides everything. I remember back in the Quake competitive days so many "good" or "great" players would never attend gaming lans or cons and those who did show their faces suddenly weren't anywhere near as good as they were online....imagine that. I remember one dude even trying to play isolated in a closed door room with his clan and the judges were like "no, anybody can observe anybody" and they opted not to play and made up some BS excuse. I don't blame EA. I blame the cheaters basically forcing EA to implement their version of The Final Solution and there is no circumventing this measure....yet. I took great joy in watching players being banned at an unprecedented rate in the history of EA competitive games and running to reddit to cry about it. As long as they don't start adding it to non competitive games, I'm ok with it. If I truly wanted to play, I would just create a Windoze gaming only install stripped to the bone on its own drive and tuned to high heaven and keep it all on there and dual or triple boot to it as needed.

Watching the video, 5090 is the only card that actually went up in price since June on average. Every other card has had price reductions especially the 9070xt, 5080 and 5070ti in that order. Overall stock is up except for 5090 Basically, the gpu pricing cratering (which means cards are at or in very small pockets below MSRP) is applicable to just about every model EXCEPT the 5090 and I suspect the 5080 to a degree will also taper off sooner than later and head back up. The repeated warning is with the memory pricing issue only getting worse, expect pricing to go UP not down by the new year on basically ALL cards so if you're going to buy (and you didn't back in early September), now is the best time. Nvidia rumored to be decoupling selling memory with their GPU packages is going to wreak havoc on the market in a big way as GPU makers now have to go negotiate their own prices which we know even Asus won't have the leverage Nvidia has when dealing with the likes of Samsung, Micron or Hynix. GN: "current series GPUs have MSRP listings in stock, except for the 5090. Unfortunately the 5090 was largely unaffected by the marke's improvements and continues to stand out in terms of the most abysmal price hikes over MSRP. We may check back in a few more months specifically to look for any meaningful price reductions to the 5090, but we generally think that these are probably the most stable prices we'll see in the GPU market before the Dram price increases start getting passed along to the consumer here as well." Basically, if he had to predict/guess, GPU prices will trend up not down. TL;DR Buy now not later..... @Rage Set now is most likely the time you want to buy a GPU. 9070xt is best bang:buck right now pricing wise for ~$600. 5080 is a much more feature rich card but ~$1000. If you want to split the difference and get all the Nvidia features and still have a card that overall is a little faster than the 9070xt, look for a 5070ti. It checks all the boxes and will be priced closer to the 9070xt than the 5080 and numerous models are in stock at MSRP ($749.99). --------------------------------------------------------------- As for Black Friday pricing..... Personally, I found black friday pricing to be a major bust on anything meaningful. I didn't find one single thing that stood out. Only benefit was the black friday pricing on the Asus Z890 Strix-A and then picking up an open box that was priced based on that black friday pricing for $176. It arrived a few hours ago and outside of a couple of thermal past fingerprints, it looks brand new including peels on all the SSD heatsinks and all pack ins sealed. I won't know its working status till I slap a CPU in there speaking of which..... Picking up an open box 9070xt for $495 and an open box 265k for $205 from MC tomorrow to complete my "Arrowhead Adventures as cheap as possible" I'm really hoping the Challenger 9070xt is decent enough to send back the Nitro+ sealed but the Nitro+ basically has one of the best builds and heatsinks on it (only bested in tests by the XFX but that one is $740....) then build out and tweak the 265k with these 8400 sticks and see how far they can go. Arrowlake at 4k gaming properly tuned looks to be pretty righteous so this will help scratch that itch I've been having without breaking my wallet.

One take away is watching the voltage scale with more power given to the card.... at 600w, it was topping out at 1.035v at 700w (no OC) it was topping out at 1.070v at 730w+ (OC) it was topping out at 1.085v which is probably its limit Adds weight to cards with higher Vmax potentially scaling better with this Matrix 800w of course you can just install Asus XOC and have your card against its will pushed to 1.15v..... 🤣 That LM application and barrier choice is just atrocious and I would have liked to seen him try a few different 12v2x6 cables to see if they all get equally warm not just the seasonic variant.

Maybe if you can tame the Asus XOC a bit and dial it in like @Papusan is going to take a whack at that might provide a better vBIOS overall but you are shunted and with an EVC2 so it will be interesting to see you test both against each other in a properly chilled environment and see which one rises to the top especially with the Asus XOC you have access to higher memory settings. If Linux has a program that can actually show hotspots on 5090 series, that would be a slap in the face to Windows users yet again. Watching the human centipede that is all this incestuous investing in each other with Nvidia, AMD, OpenAI, Intel and more just shows the relationships at the top with these companies. Good luck on the job offer @Mr. Fox! Looking forward to your LC adventures with reigning it in @Papusan! And yeah, I agree 100% with the rest of your post. Asus did have that tiny slice of XOC going and it is a strange coincidence it is 10 months on the nose almost since 5090 release that the XOC officially goes wild everywhere. What is Asus's official position on the XOC bios and it now being available everywhere? Is it a "leak" or did they basically give permission to let it go wild? Until BTF can become a standard, it will remain a segmented niche and probably die off sooner than later. 5080 is a banger of a card, but the price:performance is in the 9070xt's favor if you can snag one at MSRP. 5090 is far and away the best that's true. 5080 overall is a better card than the 9070xt except the price. They all definitely go "in line" and the price:performance gets worse as you go from the 9070xt (best) -> 5080 (decent if you can score at MSRP or below) -> 5090 (worst by far but an absolute beast). 2.5 months ago you could have found a 5090 for $1999.99 on the regular, but that low dip is long gone and now prices are rising. After the holidays it's going to slowly but surely get very rough for all video cards. Microcenter has the Challenger and Reaper 9070xt models in stock for $579.99 each. You can't beat that. That's below MSRP on both. If you want to pony up a bit more for a heartier model, Steel Legends are $619 and Hellhounds are $629. If you have a MC credit card, you will lop off 5% right at the counter making them even better buys. Microcenter has Zotac 5080's for $999.99. They are solid and beefy. I picked up a Nitro+ for $699.99 with 7% back = $650.99 but then yesterday I found an Asrock Challenger 9070xt open box on Microcenter's page for $521.95 and using the MCC card = $495.85 so I snagged that ASAP for pickup. I haven't even opened up the Nitro+ yet (Amazon and returns till January 26th 2026). I'm going to pick up the Asrock and run it through its paces and if it is good enough I'll just send back the Nitro+ unopened. I agree on the HOF and that peace of mind of dual connectors. Like I said, I'm not doing anything with mine till I get my Wireview Pro 2 whenever they ship (I think those of us who ordered one all did the launch orders at the end of October). Once that comes in, I'll switch over to a 12v2x6 pure run end to end. I like the unique look and design of the HOF. I always have. It's just the price. Same reason I didn't pick up a Matrix 5090 (along with the BTF nonsense). MSI Vanguard and Suprim coolers are pretty bonkers and the Astral cooler is no joke either. I know when I had the Ventus briefly, it routinely sat in the high 60's low 70's just for daily use. Coming off the Astral, I had forgotten even in normal use the 5090 can run pretty warm. I was used to high 50's and sometimes low 60s.... What PSU do you run with the HOF? Asus Z890 Strix-A is due for delivery tomorrow. Still on the hunt for a CPU, but I might snag one of the dirt cheap 265k deals offered and get BF6 with it for free.

----------------------------------------------------------------- For most of us, it is going to be the 800w Matrix vBIOS we run anyhow. It is superior with more granular control. I don't want my 5090 locked at an unnatural 1.15v at all times or trying to suck down the sun and go nova especially lacking the proper cooling for support which realistically is LN2 or at least a chiller. 800w Matrix vBIOS is going to end up as the perfect one. Matrix vbios = Gigachad+ 800w This. Do you plan on attempting to use it @Papusan since you can't flash the Matrix vbios? Yowza! Looking forward to some chilled results @Mr. Fox! Crazy the Asus XOC bios just comes out full tilt like that and pretty much goes crazy. +4000 memory and basically all the W and V you probably need. You could always push past 1.15 w/ the EVC2 though.... -------- @Talon now that you have a Suprim 5090 with the Matrix goodness, how is it stacking up against your HOF 5090D in just basic air testing so far? With the Asus XOC and Matrix 800w out in the wild, what are the plans now?