electrosoft

No rush brother. It gets done when it gets done. Real life trumps fun time always. Wow, so just the chiller now? I can't stomach $1700 for a 4090 at this juncture. I see you already got a response over on the forums about the 870e Apex. 🙂 "This is like pee in the water. Won't help much." - LOL I'm not sure what the problem is, but I do feel like AIBs are holding back and/or redirecting cards elsewhere like discussed earlier. But as you noted too, MSRP cards still sell out pretty quickly. The problem is scalped cards but at least those are languishing now a bit not moving like before. Any decently priced MSRP card from the 5070 on up continue to sell out in the US pretty quickly. I was sadden to see another $6k bundle on NE for the Astral slowly, but surely, sell out again. The pro are everything in it is MSRP. The con obviously is everything an Asus fan boi could love is required to get it. Yeah, I don't think I've ever seen a 5090 that can't do +3000 lol but I'm sure there are a few lame ducks out there. Clocks wise, I am finding 576.02 is not allowing me to clock up as high with 572.83. Which drivers are you running? I know a lot of 5090 owners are sticking with .47 as the "best" I might either go back to .83 or .47 for benching but for D2D I tend to stick with Nvidia updates as they flow in. I did do a sloppy upgrade install though so keep that in mind. I'm do for my once a month clean install anyhow (Something I've done for 25+ years....don't ask me why) so I may go back to .83. 5090 FE cards are just meant to be UV'd due to design. You just don't have the headroom to do much more I found out really sitting on FT with my bud who wanted to swap his 5090 FE for my Astral. It just doesn't have the headroom like the Suprim, Astral and just about any other decent 5090 heatsink and especially LC models. But a 5090 FE UV nicely in a truly portable (not these pseudo SFF builds I see that aren't really portable) SFF and with a tuned 9800X3D? Mmmmm, that would rip. Yeah, me and eBay are about to get re-acquainted as I turn my store back on to list some hardware along with locally too. That BB bill isn't gonna pay itself and it now has currently the 5090 Astral, 5070 FE and Gigabyte 9070xt on it. This. Overclocked on mem and core, my noise level is the same which is sub 50% on fans on auto gaming. Even running TS, fans went to 55% max to keep temps at ~66c when OC'd with transient spikes up to 615w in the newest version of GPU-Z (albeit following it on screen I never saw anything near that). To not run it with an OC would be a waste of the monster cooling capacity on some of these 5090s. If I'm going to UV it then I'm going to just wait for an FE if I'm in that boat. This. I did the same "whoa!" when testing in WoW and seeing the 5090 at stock blow past the 4090 OC'd with ~34%+ uplift and more in the tank but couldn't hit full utilization. OC just dropped the utilization even further. I'm not saying the 5090 is a bargain or worth it by any stretch of the imagination, but having spent a few hours on Facetime with my clan/guildie bud of 20yrs+ and his 5090 FE, what I have found out that if you want to push your 5090, you're going to need an AIB model and if you want to push it D2D with lower fan noise, you're going to need a beefier model or you're going to just have to block it speaking of the 5090 FE.... ----- @tps3443 I had a chance to really push my guildie's 5090 FE and that thing just does not respond well (as it shouldn't) to any real OC/D2D/low noise profiles. Heat and pull had it sitting sub 3.1ghz and routinely under 3ghz even gaming making it more of a UV king than an OC card. We ended up with a curve of .0925 and about 2875mhz +3000 when finished on his FE that, in his words, "wow, I didn't realize it could run this much quieter when gaming." Temps were still hitting about 72c but the noise had dropped dramatically. Of course less fan noise means any coil whine really will present itself front and center... Astral will sit at +3000 3150-3250 all day gaming, fans at sub 50% temps at sub 66 all day everyday.... ....This is the way. Oh and as I had to tell him after a few runs/tests and a few protests from him, "No my good sir, THAT is coil whine and a healthy amount of it too!" His 5090 FE has that seesaw coil whine that is immediate return/resell levels. When it squealed on GT2 I had him pull up up Deus Ex MD benchmark to run and it sounded like someone was trying to mug it in an alleyway. He isn't phased by the coil whine at all though. Him "So I take it you don't want to trade +1400?" Me "I think we both know the answer to that" Him "I don't really think the coil whine is bad. I don't really hear it." Me "Well, we're both not spring chickens so maybe your hearing is going" Him "Eh? What did you say?" (Mockingly holding hand up to ear) (Followed by about 2 minutes of continuous laughter)

Deus Ex MD: Stock: +3000 / +350:

@jaybee83 PX1 can't control the fans but sliders work including +3000. Very much power starved. I will never shunt mod but I will gladly take that XOC BIOS please. 576.02 Drivers. WoW auto fans, +3000, +400 @win32asmguy GPU Utilization 76% vs 99% cap out on all the other cards tested including OC 4090 @ 3135mhz +1500 memory (zero player data) 4k Ultra RT max. The hunt for a new testing spot continues to try to get the 5090 to GPU Util 99% even at stock in WoW...... Timespy auto fans +350 +3000

Tariffs are alive and well and going nowhere here in the states. The war with China is just ramping up along with all the other "minimum but temporary" tariffs on a plethora of other countries. 5090 prices will not be going down. The biggest fear is them going up. Supply is still a problem across the board here for just about all the cards as they sell out immediately. Depending on when the tariffs kick in (or are fully felt), expect prices to rise on a large swath of electronics and other items. Sales tax varies from state to state on purchases from 0% to 7.25%. You then have local sales taxes that can combine to create pockets of even higher sales tax up to almost 10% NJ and my county is 6.625% California is 7.25% but Tustin, CA is 7.75% on last check

Some of these AIBs have massive heatsinks or you block them and they are screaming for more power. You can always shunt mod it to get it where you want to go but I'm hoping the XOC vBIOS eventually makes its way out. 4090 seems to get it pretty quick and it was fun to play around with. Which version did you go with? Stand alone or Steam? I downloaded the latest stand alone version 1.3.7 to give a whirl later tonight or tomorrow. LOL, coil whine will find ya! 🤣 How high can you go for short benches? You seem to take my approach. I find a sane OC for D2D and then push it for benches. My 4090 for sane D2D OC was ~ +180 +1500. For benches it was +225 / +1600. I just went into GPU Tweak III and pressed the default sliders for memory and clocks as is and left TSE 3Dmark on a loop for an hour and that was that but those settings are conservative I think so I'll want to see where it really falls off the proverbial mountain. As for eBay in the US, it is ~13.6% without a store and with a store it is ~7.35% in the US, so even selling a single GPU, it makes sense to set up a basic store for ~$30 for the month if the GPU is >=~$500 Oh damn! Congrats @johnksss!! Blocking it eventually or running it as is? And hey! Will ya look at that, NOT a Zotrash!

The quietest fans I've ever run are still these P14 140mm Arctics. Even their newest 120mm fans I tried still have a slight whine to them. The bottom fans aren't connected as the bottom only supports 120mm fans. I just haven't taken them back out yet. I still have the D5 pump and array of QDCs in the box in the closet. Plenty of places to get dirt cheap soft tubing. I do have a 360mm rad sent to me for free, but I don't want to use 360mm rads only 280/420 and quiet P14's of which I have like 10 of them already. Depending on your sample and how you push it, you can get a 9800X3D pretty toasty to the point air won't work and a AIO can be pushed even with a static OC pushing 5.6ghz+. ------------- Snagged a 5070 FE from BB today to replace my wife's 3080 Strix. I was originally going to potentially move the 9070xt into her system but the performance just wasn't there for WoW especially with RT enabled and WoW is all she plays so everything is centered around her 32" 1440p 165hz display. I may put the 3080 in a system of spare parts I've been building out for my daughter since she's still on the fence now about her reclaimed "man cave" from her ex fiance about whether she wants a dedicated PC or just use her laptop with the 27" 2025 Nitro 1080p 200hz display. I was going to use this spare delidded 12900k that ran for a few years in the wife's system but while testing it out it up and died on me running Y cruncher I do need to source at least a 12th-14th gen CPU for this extra system I'm building out. If someone has a decent (I5 or above) 12th-14th gen chip laying around, inbox me with price.

I think $999.99 for the 5080 FE is more than reasonable for a few reasons: More performance than 4080 Super More features than the 4080 Super Same price even with inflation In the Nvidia stack, like I keep saying, you're either getting better performance/features, better pricing or both with Nvidia this time around across their entire stack except the 5090 which got hit with a 25% increase in price. It should have been $1699.99 MSRP but it is what it is. Personally, the sweet spot this time around is the 5070ti super @msrp. Cheaper ($750 vs $800) and with an actual noticeable performance boost vs the 5070 vs 4070 Super. Best price:performance @msrp is clearly the 9070xt. ------ I was going to test it on the desktop I was building out on the Z690 but the 12900k died on me so now it is in a holding pattern atm. I have the vial in my thermal paste jar ready for testing though. ------ Swapped the Astral back in for ~13 more days of eval on keeping it. Rerouted the wires from the top like I used to keep it with my MSI 4090 Suprim Liquid and replaced the white sag bracket with a black one I had. That white one was nails on a chalkboard.

Deus Ex Mankind divided bone stock GPU benchmark runs. Seriously, the 9070xt? SMH 9800X3D @ 5450 2x24GB tuned 2200/6400 W11 24H2 normal bloated D2D OS no tweaks Gigabyte Gaming OC 9070xt Nvidia 5080 FE Asus Astral 5090 Nvidia Drivers 576.02 AMD Adrenalin 25.3.2 4k everything on ultra/max settings. 5090 is ~58% faster than the 5080 FE in this test which is pretty massive overall. 9070xt is performing absolutely abysmal in this test to the point I don't know if it is a driver issue or not. @Mr. Fox could you run this on your 9070xt completely stock to let me know if my results are suspect and maybe needs investigating along with your 4090 completely stock for comparison. I can't find my 4090/3090 Dx:MD results. If your results are much higher, I will need to set up another test volume for the 9070xt. I know the 9070xt on WoW is right where I expected it to be compared to the results on three different 7900xtx cards across three different CPUs and two different platforms and the 9070xt is actually scoring slightly higher than many stock 9070xt's in Timespy but again you never know. Gigabyte Gaming OC 9070XT (Adrenalin 25.3.2): Nvidia 5080 FE (576.02): Astral 5090 (576.02):

When you convince yourself a $2k consumer game/fun GPU is value.... 🤣 I prefer the term, "the least rip off" 🤑 or "the lesser evil" Take your pick. 🙂 It reminds me when car shopping. After a certain price point, it all blurs because NOTHING is a good deal and it becomes just getting what you want. What's more insulting? The prices or they are 5080s? 🤔

Definitely going to have to give PX1 a try. I have found AB and the 5090 buggy even now especially in WoW. With the 572 drivers and newest beta AB, it still suffers from the same glitches as I found before here with the 5080 and WoW a few months ago with Rivatuner and some problems trying to push sliders or clocks dropping or getting locked. It's just being more problematic than it has ever been before with the 5000 series. Don't mind my voice. I was in the throes of Covid.... That is why my most recent results are from GPU Tweak III, but I'll definitely give PX1 a try again especially if full memory sliders work on launch. I also like GPU Tweak III obviously because of the added Astral functionality. I haven't even tested my GPU range yet lol (5080 FE still in the system atm but switching back to the Astral today). I just pushed the sliders to their max on GPU Tweak III on default settings (No OC settings) and left the PL and voltage alone for some initial Q&D testing. Did you adjust PL/Voltage levels or doing initial testing stock? Another pro for GT3 is Asus also makes 9000 series Radeon cards so you get full support there too if you don't want to use AMD's tools. Yeah, they've sampled me I think about 5 laptops so far over the past 6 years. First 4 were good after testing and tear down. Last one was not good on many levels and I let them know in detail why. I think overall, Acer is coming on strong wanting to be a known and respected gaming brand. Based on previous variants I've tested/disassembled, I'm not expecting much BIOS control, but I could be surprised! 🙂 @jaybee83 With eBay, I make sure to document the GPU before (Timespy run, plenty of pics with my name in it), during (I make sure to note in my listing the buyer will receive a picture of his just purchased GPU with his invoice in the picture along with a follow up QA Timespy run with the score and his invoice/eBay purchase on the same screen and while it is running I record the entire run and can provide a copy of that) and after (I take several pictures of the boxing up of their GPU at each stage with their eBay invoice in each picture) and a final picture of their package so they know what to expect). I also make sure to put in the post all items are shipped via USPS (strictest mail fraud laws) insured and adult signature required. Buyers have left me only positive feedback and love being kept in the loop for what can be a pricey purchase. It also has established a long selling record for pricey items with a documented chain of events just in case someone wants to try some shenanigans.... I've been selling on eBay for 28 years now. A few hiccups? Absolutely, but overall it will net you top dollar for your items considering they go for ~$2400USD on eBay = $~2100-$2200 after ebay fees (You should obviously set up an eBay store for the discounts even if for one month, as the discounts will cover the store fee AND put an extra $50-75 in your pocket). If you list your GPU on the forums for $2100, you will get the normal "ZOMG!! OVERPRICED BRO!!" brigade chiming in who can't or won't understand current market conditions. ------ I just went, "that is crazy" when I read it earlier over on the forums. I have zero problems with people reselling their items and getting top dollar for them (call it scalping if you want), but buying specifically for reselling especially among the hardware community? For someone who is a firm proponent of "let the market ride as is," that just sits wrong with me a bit.

I prefer QHD+ displays. That was one of my major gripes about this year because of the weakness of the mobile GPUs. I actually prefer QHD+ on 17.3+ and 1080p on 15.6" and smaller. I wish MSI had went with a QHD+ OLED or MiniLED on the Raider. Acer is sending me a 275hx equipped 5070ti laptop to check out, so I'll be able to not only get some hands on with it but more importantly compare it to the NH55 w/ the 12900k and 3070ti to see how much it has improved over a few generations. A proper 285k desktop with the 5090 is intriguing me more and more each day. I know @Talon basically has nothing but good things to say about it for gaming after being properly tuned. If it can achieve more stable frame rates and doesn't tank as hard that trumps those highs IMHO. One thing I will give the 12th-14th gen for WoW is an overall smooth and consistent game play especially if the memory is tuned. Since it is only a 5070ti, I won't get the same punch at QHD as you with the 5090 unfortunately. 😞 The pros of the Clevos and Tongfangs of the world is the ho hum aesthetics and lack of flaire but better pricing packing state of the art hardware and I've always liked that. If I DO give a 285k a whirl and want to go at it with a 5090 and keep the 9800X3D setup, I will need to sell off the NH55, at least one Vivobook Ultra 7 + 3050 OLED, Acer AMD + 4050 laptop and most likely the 5080 FE but I really want to keep it AND the 5090. 🙂

Fallout76 5080 FE. As previously discussed, Fallout76 loves X3D and the engine is old enough that the assets fit in the cache pretty easily and runs like greased lightning. 14900KS vs 9800X3D Tuned vs Tuned: I think a little bit of performance uplift is being experienced too with the drivers since 566 were near launch vs 572.83 which are the latest but still.... ---- It's on Steam for $4.49USD since it is older lol. I run a completely open case and I have to have the room silent, but I can get my Astral and 5080 FE to wake up a smidge so if I look for it, I can hear a little coil whine on both but I find just about any game if you put your ear up against any GPU and look hard enough you can hear *something* 9070xt has some but so much quieter than any of the 7900xtx's I tested except maybe the MSI. I'll have to investigate Titanfall 2. Did it wake up your 5090 a little? 🤣 I like a small splash of RGB on the motherboard and GPU. I am indifferent on memory. I really have started to not like RGB on fans at all but when I build out systems for others, they all want as much RGB as possible. I'm like @Mr. Fox and go for industrial looks so a black/white theme broken up by cold colors (white, pale blue or a properly placed red) speak to me now. MSI used to offer premium at a lower price but their recent price hikes on their GPUs and laptops have me striking a somber note as of late: $3229 for the Suprim = $130 less than the Astral. Lowest priced 5090 Ventus for $2949.99? $4900 for the 285k 5090 Raider? $5100 for the 9950HX3D 5090 Raider? I guess at least the Liquid 5090 is "only" $50 more than the Suprim = $3280 = ~$450 less than the Liquid Astral.....huzzah? As for Intel, I always prefer all big cores and if I can get it, a monolithic design on top of that.

I so badly want to support you AMD, but my god your 9070xt, just like the 7900xtx, sucks for WoW and FO76..... EDIT: Looks like AMD still sucks for WoW, just not as badly as before but same performance issues especially with RT enabled. So it's back to Nvidia because AMD can't get right. Now it's just a matter of the 5090 or 5080...... This makes my 5080 FE look like an A tier card and obviously my 5090 a Super Duper S tier card. It's better than the 7900xtx in FO76 (4k Ultra settings): But Nvidia yet again smokes it badly: Even the 4070 Super beats it on a 14900ks no less: It's scoring right where it should on Timespy stock out of the box run as a checksum for performance: ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I went to my favorite check spot in WoW and proportionately speaking from testing the 7900xtx vs the 4090 a year and a half ago, it is right around the same spot except RT performance is better and doesn't take as much of a hit as the 7900xtx did. RT enabled is also much smoother but this could also be AMD finally sorting out their drivers. 4090 vs 7900xtx was a blood bath so this is in the same vein. 73fps on average in 4k Ultra 10 RT max: 82fps on average in 4k Ultra 10 RT off: 5080 FE (4k ultra 10, RT max): 9070xt for WoW is meant for 1440p or especially 1080p. I can't say I'm surprised with the 4k results. It really isn't designed for that in many games. -------------------- I'm collecting some Deux Ex MD benchmark runs and I'll run some other tests and play around with it for a few days but for my use case this is a hard return......just like the previous 3x 7900xtx's I tested (XFX, MSI, Powercolor) that were returned or sold. It's last chance of hanging around is I will test it in the wife's system since she plays at 1440p with the 3080 Strix, but I remember the 7900xtx with RT on performing just about the same as a 3080 or even a hair less. With RT off, it was ~20% faster. Gonna swap my 5080 FE to collect some FO76 data. I only have runs when it was on the 14900KS before switching over to the 9800X3D.

Mmmmmm...... Only piece of software I've found that can bring my GPU alive even if only a little bit (and all previous GPUs) is oddly enough the Deus Ex Mankind Divided benchmark. WoW uncapped hitting 300fps+? Nope Timespy, Steel Nomad? Nope Fallout 76 uncapped? Nope Deux Ex MD Benchmark? *whispers* "Hi!" Deus Ex MD Benchmark also made my 3090 FE which was already painfully loud with coil whine an absolutely screeching seesaw monster. I did not know EVGA PX1 worked on the 5000 series. I'll have to give it a whirl. Suprim is a gorgeous card with a nice, beefy heatsink. It ranks right up there with the Astral for me IMHO. If that one had popped available first, I would have grabbed it no questions asked. Congrats bro! I have till ~May 1st to decide if I want to keep the Astral before I return it and I'm back on the fence. I could technically keep it till June 2nd but the bill is due well before then and I have no desire to carry a +~3600USD credit on it for any length of time. 🤣 I've been playing a crap ton of FO76, WoW, Deus Ex MD (now in its full 4k Ultra glory clocking in at a locked 140fps) and some CP2077. Benching is fun but not enough to hold onto it. It is very VERY powerful but I just don't know if I'm getting the proper value out of it. FO76 was effectively capped with a 4090 and X3D so is the 5090 and X3D. Both GPUs were being limited badly with the 5090 severely limited. Doing a lot of testing, the "sweet spot" for FO76 was a hair above a 4070 Super (probably 4070ti levels) where diminishing returns kick in hardcore. WoW engine can't contain the 5090 anywhere I check even with zero player data. With player data, it can get painfully limited down into the low 60's fps range and utlization sub 25% depending on what going on. CP2077 is not a good enough reason to hold onto it. I plan on running the 9070xt in my rig for the next few days. I'll be swapping out the 5090 tonight to gather some comparison data for FO76, WoW and Deus Ex MD. My main problem is I have a $999 5080 FE and it makes it hard to justify anything above that price:performance except a $2k 5090 and even then a $2k 5090 would be spending a lot of time twiddling its thumbs but not at a $3.5k price point. Astral is a total enthusiast card who wants the best and would probably do a lot more with it than I will end up doing. --- @tps3443 Since we game at ~QHD on laptops, this is Jarrod reviewing the Aorus 275hx + 5090 175w power limit. This is in line with just about every review I've seen so far of the 5090 vs 4090 mobile. I am waiting for the 9950HX3D review to see if we get some more separation because as it stands now, upgrading from the 4090 -> 5090 at QHD or less is a total waste. Even at 4k, it isn't much of anything worth the $$$.

For AIB boards, shunt mods are compensating for a lack of XOC BIOS which is nice and gives benchers an option if they want to crack their cards open. It's something @Papusan can readily do if he wants to take his scores to the next level. I can see why the overall design of the FE card is nails on a chalkboard to you, but man they are SFF dream cards. You just have to make sure your SFF case selection is pure pass through because of the sheer amount of heat coming off that thing let alone its physical temp. --- Are you selling the chiller too? I remember us discussing boost algorithms and the slow decline of overclocking headroom across CPU sns GPUs many moons ago on the notebook forums. It all started with the slow death of DTR laptops so you then move to desktops where boosting algorithms really started to come into play with AMD and Intel really had no choice but to respond. On paper, it really makes sense though to give end users the best performance shaped around their power and cooling but it really doesn't help those of us who like to experience those massive swaths of performance bumps. Still, pushing a 9800X3D to 5.6ghz from ~5.2ghz is nothing to sneeze at but the true enthusiast chips still lie with Intel up to 14th gen. Nice! I absolutely agree with the 2 slot vs 3 slot. I would even be ok with a 4 slot on these chonkers and give it full support across the PCB and heatsink. It doesn't make any sense. PNY still seems to go with a full 3 slot support bracket. I am not sure why MSI regressed and went with a bigger heatsink but a 2 slot support bracket. I'm no GPU expert, but I've heard that full ROPs is a good thing....right? 🤣 That's good and some good insight into your current mindset. I do remember you wanting the Aorus Waterforce WB disproportionately vs the other models because it came blocked and ready. After using the 5080 FE and externally it is identical to the 5090 FE, it honestly just upped the street cred of the 5090 FE even more because of the build quality, look, design and temps knowing the 5090 FE is an even beefier design internally. It is a true 2 slot design and trying to shoehorn it into a 9800X3D SFF build (9800X3D so it can be tuned around a low profile air cooler and still work 100%) intrigues me. I could obviously do it with the 5080 FE with much better thermals still though. Funny you mention that about the Astral. In my Fallout76 clan (all of us are also current WoW players. Some of us go back 20yrs, with a few even further into Diablo II and Quake crazy) where we game and talk voice in game, I have an Astral 5090, clan member has a 5090 FE and another has a 5090 Zotrash. One member is playing on an 8700 + 2080 and still getting it done for perspective. I was talking about my top three list and he readily offered to trade up his 5090 FE + cash for my Astral as he wants to run full tilt but thermals are holding him back so I have an offer on the table for his 5090 FE + $1450 for my Astral once he saw how it clocks and runs cool easily but I'm in your position now that the more I use it the more I like it for many reasons. His sample runs about the same as yours it appears which is about average. I told him we can facetime tomorrow (gutting my daughter's office tonight some more) so I can hear that coil whine / EC noise because when I asked he said, "well, it's not quiet, but what GPU is?" 🤣 As for overclocking, with the monster heatsink on the Astral, cooling isn't the issue as Motiv is over on the forums literally shunt modded and pushing 1000w through the Astral and temps don't even hit 70c which is insane but shows the massive over-engineering Asus put into this chonker. I find it chortle worthy from someone who used to run his gear on the edge w/ a chiller to extract every fps possible suddenly has done a 180 and is arguing against it 🤣 Overclocking wise, you're looking at a 6-8% gain in performance overall using a "sane" OC that could be run daily. For me, the big "whoa" moment of course was in WoW where pushing the most basic, limited of OCs pushed my GPU utilization from 92% down to 80% in WoW that was with zero PL/Voltage adjustments. Total overkill for WoW atm till something changes. I like knowing if/when I encounter a GPU hungry game and want to push a bit more oomph through it I have the cooling and headroom to rev that engine as I see fit. With all this being said I *STILL* might return it and go back to 5080 FE or 9070xt.... 🤣 All options are open! ---- @Papusan Timestamped from soneone who owns 5 Astrals and the fan noise being a nothing burger for them across all 5 samples so it could be some cards but not all. I'm telling you, when I put it under load and waited for the proverbial "chainsaw," I just went, "that's it?!" Also showing why the Astral air heatsink (including the rear cover especially) is that next level machining and fine touches here and there. $1500 worth? No, but then again try getting a card at $2k atm..... It is part 1 of a 3 part series where he tears down an Astral, TUF and blocks them both. He was majorly disappointed in the heatsink/shroud build of the TUF being a lot of plastic even though temps (normal usage) was only about 5c cooler on the Astral so it isn't like the TUF isn't delivering. Part 1: (Astral teardown) Part 2: (TUF teardown) Part 3: (Installed and comparison/test)

I mean that's a 5080 FE for 5080 Astral trade but the 5080 FE owner will only do a straight trade? LOL, FE isn't that great. It would have to be +$600 for a 5080 FE to Astral trade or +1450 for a 5090 FE to 5090 Astral trade. MSRP for MSRP and the difference. That buyer of the 5080 Astral clearly doesn't want it because he also wants to do SFF builds. But if you're into SFF builds, I can see the FE being the perfect card albeit there are SFF 5080 AIB editions out there and I am sure 5090 AIB editions will be coming too. But sitting here holding this 5080 FE it is dense (not light at all) but the 5080/5090 FE form factor is so slick. Like I said, the strength of the FE editions is price and size and that's it. After that, everything is in the AIBs favor across the board. Having traveled a few times with SFF builds last year, laptops are just so much easier but a lot louder when gaming/under load vs a properly built SFF. My criteria since the jump has been the three models FE, Suprim, Astral and that will never change. 4090 was FE and Suprim Liquid but I've moved on from Liquid models because they are just a pain to swap in and out for testing systems. FE = Size and price Suprim (before price hike) = strikes medium pricing and has good build quality and like MSI Astral = most expensive but best overall design with all the bells and whistles What overrides ALL of this is coil whine and electronics noise. Bad noise/coil whine = immediate return/resell. The fact I can run the Astral at 3100-3200mhz just by pushing the sliders up to max (+328, +2000) with no PL or volt increase and the fans never break 50%, temps never go over 66 in GPU Tweak 3 is just sick for D2D use. I suspect the Suprim will be able to do the same easily. No HOF and the fact you don't like MSI or Gigabutt and no access to FE (dunno if you would want one though) really limits your choices. Did you specifically want the Astral LC over the Air or were you fine with whatever one was available? lol, that is the mentality of most enthusiasts on launch actually. They will take whatever 5090/4090 presented itself. I know you're cheering up your FE, but if given a choice among models, would it have been the FE? I know on launch, I queued up for the FE (both 5080/5090) and at B&H I wait listed myself for the Astral and threw in a Gigabyte because of the launch price at the time ($1999 or $2199 can't recall) and queued up for the Suprim the next week or so when it officially launched and that was it. Every other model I didn't even consider because if it became available I wouldn't buy it. Over the last few months, I had access to PNY and TUF (x2) and passed on them because I flat out didn't want them. I also had access to the 5090 Astral LC (x2) and passed on it because I didn't want it. Yup, for these price points, I know what I want and will pay for. I can't imagine dropping thousands on a model I don't want simply because it was available but I can understand those who do. Ok now! Let's get it crackin'!

I'm not doing backflips over its performance or the fact if you let it run full tilt it will heat up real quick to try to sustain 3.1ghz+ I do love the form factor though. Visions of SFF builds dance through my head. To me, that is its primary strength. It fails everywhere else but that compact, elegant design is awesome IMHO. 🙂

And yet we all bought the overpriced editions to get that little bit of ooomph!!! You too @Papusan...... 🤣 At a certain point, it isn't about cost. It is about getting a model you want based upon your criteria. FE = Suprim = Astral to me in regards to desire regardless of price.

Ditto, I plan on testing it on one of my several laptops to see what it can do along with this desktop I'm building out from spare parts to sell and clear space (12900k, 32GB DDR5, 500GB SSD, 3080) for testing.

Let me rephrase it. 🙂 Are prices now the same across the board with AIBs as they were at launch or did prices go up officially for AIB MSRP pricing too over the last few months like they did in the US?

The power with Nanogrease and laptops is the fact it is so thick and doesn't pump out. It is all I use unless I can correct the pairing pressure enough to use KPx. My vial will arrive tomorrow, so I'll see how thick it is.

Yeah, I ordered the one you linked the non 5 variant:

What testing methodology did you employ? What was it tested against? EDIT: $5.81 and free shipping on Amazon atm (Prime), so I went ahead and snagged a vial to try because....why not?

To give you an idea of drop ratios of 5090 vs 5080/9070xt, this is the recent snap shot from one of the stock trackers I follow for USA: The bulk of these drops are disproportionately skewed Amazon (like 90%) including both 5090 drops which were for a TUF for $2999.99 and an Astral for $3359.99.

Are 5090 prices fully back to MSRP? One thing I will say in the US is pre-built 5090 systems are deeply in stock now at Newegg and the one or two models Microcenter sells also routinely pop up with a few in stock across their stores. No longer lucrative to scalpers to yank the cards for resale.... Pretty much what @Papusan posted. The Tariffs and ever in flux economic status of the US right now has caused many companies to pause pre-orders or not ship stock while they try to figure out where this is going to end. Every country on that tariff list, even with the pause, is still subject to a minimum 10% tariff. China is still fully under the 145% tariff and they are not backing down so the US might as well settle in for a protracted economical war. Someone has to blink. At least China didn't retaliate past 125% basically saying at this point, "this is getting stupid." 🤣 Prices are going to go up because of the tariffs. A few estimates are looking at ~$4k/yr increase in cost per house hold on average (+/- 10%) due to this economic war. $4k isn't much to many of us, but for ~50% of the country that lives paycheck to paycheck? Of course a large chunk of that $4k per household indirectly goes right into the government's till via the tariff tax. For tech, one bright spot (thank you Apple and google) is that smart phones and computers are exempt from the 154% tariff but still subject to the original 20% tariff. For the time being, it makes most sense to just ship Nvidia cards everywhere else that are much more price stable than the US at the moment. I guess this is what it felt like to be in the EU all those years with your high priced tech. 🤣