electrosoft

3 hours ago, win32asmguy said:

 

It's a MSI pro z690-a wifi with a 2x16gb 6400 cl32 kit. The 12900ks has also been delidded and has the rockitcool copper ihs.

 

I know that the other sapphire rapids users hit a wall with their chips too. Even the refresh chips are only reaching 5.2 on the starred cores, maybe 5.3 with hyper threading disabled. I guess those cores do have 2mb l2 just like raptor cove. I think I have mentioned before that cppc seems to be broken on the w790-sage so process lasso to keep those threads on the higher clocked cores is very helpful. I wonder if using the third and fourth gen5x16 slots for my GPU and SSD makes it need a couple extra mesh hops from the preferred cores compared to the top two Gen5 slots. The preferred cores are definitely the best ones though as they need under 100mv less at the same clock compared to the non preferred cores.

 

Then you're good to go for testing. Might need something like a dirt cheap Arctic Cooling 280mm ($86) or 360mm ($101) to really keep it in check for testing vs the air cooler at 5.5 all core but let 'er rip. I know the 14900KS in the wife's system at 59/45/45 is still a monster on tuned DDR4 4000 CL15.

 

Just hit those test spots and see if you get 99% cap on your 5090 with your current setup at least with much lower CPU overhead/usage first:

 

5090 @ 99% utill  stock 4k Ultra RT high/max:

 

5090 @ 99% util +300/+3000 OC 4k Ultra RT high/max:

 

 

If you cap out on those spots, then you know it is your CPU severely dragging you down even moreso in CPU intensive areas.

 

If you can't even hit 99% utilization in those spots at 4k, then you really know it is your CPU holding you back as that Oribos spot is as CPU light as it gets.

 

1 hour ago, johnksss said:

2919.99 Gigabyte 5090

https://www.microcenter.com/product/690449/gigabyte-nvidia-geforce-rtx-5090-gaming-overclocked-triple-fan-32gb-gddr7-pcie-50-graphics-card

 

Yeah, we had 10 in stock this afternoon at ours and now all gone, but they're getting easier to grab especially since the trucks are showing up during the early morning/afternoon.

 

1 hour ago, Papusan said:

What you get for close to $1000 USD. Despite Team Red's assurances of delivering MSRP stock to consumers, it appears nowhere to be found at the proposed $599 price tag. Instead, retailers have bumped up prices massively since launch.

AMD Fails To Deliver MSRP Pricing With The Radeon RX 9070 XT; Retailers Now Selling SKUs Up To a Whopping $1,000 Price Mark

Looking at the US markets, we see retailers like Amazon offering the Radeon RX 9070 XT at around $960, which marks around a 50% difference from the MSRP, which is shocking.

 

Not much AMD can do. They are charging more now to AIBs, sure, but then the AIBs are just AIB'ing like on Nvidia and pricing up.

 

You also have a lot of tariff (pre, during, post) adjustments in play. With the way the US market is projected to unfurl over the next 3-4 months in reaction to the tariffs, I expect prices to go up. As I said before, you will have AIBs in an odd spot as even if they price back down, tariffs will only allow those prices to go so low as they will not suffer losses. Instead, they will redirect to other markets to sell and the US will either have no stock or small quantities of stock priced accordingly in reaction to the tariff costs.

 

"There are several factors attributed to the constant price increase with AMD's RDNA 4 GPUs, with a significant part being played by the US tariffs, along with the high demand, even after months of launch."

 

This will impact both Nvidia and AMD....

 

You will know a true wall has been hit when Nvidia prices their Founder Edition cards upwards in response to market conditions. One thing they never did during the 3000/4000 series was ever change their MSRP pricing. If they do with the 5000 series, that will let you know costs and tariffs have finally dug deep enough into their profit margins to cause a price adjustment.

 

 

Looks like 5090 pricing really is starting to find that supply/demand price point as 5090s are staying in stock everywhere now much longer including Amazon with the $3400 shipped and sold from Amazon Epic-X ARGB.

 

My local MC has 9 Gigabyte 5090 OC's in stock for $2919. They would have been gone by 10am before.

 

Newegg has a slew of Gigabyte and MSI "minimal" combos in stock (IE, w/ a PSU OR MB only).

 

Pre-builts everywhere.

 

Pricing is basically back to MSRP now which is pretty high.

 

Now comes phase 2, the slow trickle of 5090s because they can't get any cheaper in the US and might get even pricier with the full effects of the tariffs not even being felt yet. AIBs will ship 5090s to other countries where it is cost effective and makes better sense to sell there than here.

 

5080's on down are priced low enough (relatively speaking even with AIB pricing), that they will continue to flow in along with 9070xt's and that is where we will see the real pricing war if applicable.

 

 

9 hours ago, tps3443 said:

Yeah, I’ve made an offer on a few things on eBay on a whim. And it always makes you attach payment method first. Wake up next day and the money is gone lol. Anyways, you keeping the Astral? I’d be tempted to keep both 5080FE and Astral if it were me. The 5080FE is amazing for the price. 

 

Yeah, I haven't bid on items in quite some time just outright purchased them so it was new to me. As a seller who just turned their store back on last night to unload some more hardware, it was a pleasant surprise. Nothing worse than leaving things up for bidding then have a winner take forever to pay or request a cancellation or accepting an offer and the buyer then goes awol.

 

I was tempted to keep both, but I have to be realistic with my tech budget constraints. As I slowly start to list stuff on my eBay store, I'll probably put it up for $1500-$1600. I'll also list my NH55 here and eBay and other small stuff.

 

I am going to start monitoring drops again. VPA has picked back up and BB has had two drops now of 5090 FEs.  If a 5090 FE drops on BB or VPA, I'll probably pick it up for comparison. I did the same with watching the 4090 FE and snagged one when it dropped many moons later with my 4090 Liquid for comparison. Liquid ran roughshod over it badly, so I returned the 4090 FE but with such a large pricing gap, I can settle for not so great silicon/cooling/D2D OC as long as it doesn't have coil whine.

 

Pricing differentials are in play, so if I snag a 5090FE that has no coil whine for that price, I would sell the Astral or if it happens before early June, just return it.

 

 

3 hours ago, win32asmguy said:

 

I am tempted to try and move my 5090 into my Intel 12900ks + z690 system this weekend and see if it does better with wow than the HEDT setup. I could even potentially try a 14900k or ks if it's supported via a bios update. That 12900ks seemed like it was pretty leaky in the raptor x15 but it might do perfectly fine even with good air cooling.

 

What z690 board and memory is it? I would suspect a decently tuned 12900ks system (5.5 all core, turn off e-cores if needed to achieve) and some halfway tuned DDR4 or DDR5 will outperform your HEDT. Even pure stock it might too.

 

As a baseline, do the Oribos and Hallowfall tests I posted at stock 5090 settings to see where they go with GPU utilization. Oribos might cap out even on HEDT at 4k Ultra max settings across the board RT high. Hallowfall will not but let's see how high it goes.

 

I know with my 9800X3D rig, flying around even had my 9070xt and 5080fe capping out routinely at 99% over Dornogal too. Oribos caps out at 99% ~186fps stock, ~210fps OC'd. Hallowfall would sit at ~92% stock, ~76% OC'd on the 5090 (capped out on everything else including 4090 OC'd).

 

27 minutes ago, jaybee83 said:

Aight boiz, heres the jist of my vBios testing.

 

Testing conditions: Alan Wake 2 Chapter "Summoning" Savegame 4K maxed out with all RT / PT maxed +HDR.

Driver: 576.28 (XtremeG Mod)

Duration: 60 min.

 

Flashing / Setup Procedure:

1) Flash vBios via NVFlash 5.867.0

2) Uninstall Drivers via DDU

3) First Reboot

4) Blackscreen upon Boot, switch to iGPU

5) Only mouse cursor visible, blindly type in password to login

6) Desktop appear, but no icons - switch to dGPU, all good

7) Install Drivers

😎 Second Reboot for Nvidia Overlay functionality

9) Set 100% fan speed via MSI Afterburner, check HWInfo for readout

10) Check V/F curve offset vs. stock Suprim vBios, adjust core offset to reach 3240 Mhz at 33-34C (D2D OC profile for my card)

11) Run AW2 as detailed above, record via HWInfo in background. After 60 min. minimize game while still letting it run and do quick screengrab of dGPU section in HWInfo.

 

I attached the screengrabs to this post, together with the PNY Epic-X vBios ive ended up choosing, for anyone interested.

 

How did I choose which vBios to pick on TPU? Welp since most creation dates of the uploaded vbios files are the same, i just went by the most recently uploaded for highest chance to get the latest version for each card. Manually checking if its indeed the performance profile for cards that sport two vBios versions.

 

 

Quick conclusions:

 

- Asus Astral LC/OC and Gigabyte Xtreme Waterforce were disqualified pretty quickly due to lack of proper fan control (Asus) and very low max rpm (Gigabyte), respectively

 

- Stock Suprim SOC and Zotac Amp Extreme vBioses demonstrated the overall lowest average and peak wattage numbers, resulting in lower core clocks. So they dropped out of the race, as well

 

- Gigabyte Master and Master ICE vBios versions are basically identical, only difference here being the impact of differing ambient temps (+2C on the ICE), thus some impact on the clocks.

 

- In the end it was a neck-and-neck race between the GIgabyte Master and PNY Epic-X vbios. I ended up choosing PNY due to the following:

1) Highest avg. and peak wattage numbers

2) Highers core clocks for avg. and effective

3) Highest max. RPM for the fans (+200 above stock and the other fan functional vbioses)

4) Highest average voltage, even when accounting for differing ambient temps.

 

There u go guys, enjoy! Any questions or comments, lettem rip 🙂 

 

MSI RTX 5090 Suprim SOC vBios Testing.zip 2.89 MB · 0 downloads

PNY Epic-X OC 10-Apr-2025 (275445).rom 1.87 MB · 0 downloads

 

All roads lead to Rome with the PNY doing it while giving you the best overall clocks. In a game of inches it seems, it wins. One inch more is one inch more (insert joke here).

 

Nice work and write up!

 

Did you try for an overall higher OC as you were testing the vBIOS's or did it come down to your card's silicon wall so trying to find the best vBIOS that ran within it to produce the best results?

I returned the 9070xt to BB today. Not gonna lie and say it didn't hurt to let it go, but I can't keep them all.

 

And then there were two.... (5080 FE, Astral 5090)

 

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

 

I like the buyer changes eBay has implemented to avoid non paying bidders. I went to go bid on some motherboards and now you:

 

A> Have to have an attached, verified form of payment (also helps cut down on fraud)

B> Authorize eBay to charge that form of payment if you are the winning bidder

 

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

 

4 hours ago, tps3443 said:

Go check overclock.net FS thread of 3090KP by Jor3b. He’s legit, texted me and even made a video, and I don’t think anyone believes him. Heck they may even think my account is compromised at this point 🥴

 

Ahhh, ok I saw it. WoW......

 

I mean it makes sense considering the breadth of the hack on EVGA's forums and how people tier their passwords based on priority. A lot of people get lax with their own personal security when it is just forums and such and share the same Q&D login credentials versus let's say banking and credit card to store front sites.

 

 

3 minutes ago, tps3443 said:

Overclock.net don’t trust nobody selling anymore 🤣 I can’t blame them though, 

 

Context helps.....

 

🤣

On 4/28/2025 at 7:26 PM, esotericvoid said:

Hi anyone

 

I need a nh55jnn bios update and the means to install it to stop my bios from randomly sending fans to high then shutting down from overtemping on bootup, sometimes it does it 3 times in a row and it doesn't get to windows, then the 4th time its fine. I can leave my laptop on for months without a crash but if I turn it off it sometimes does this. Please note I have already cleaned my fans and put new thermal paste on, didn't help.

 

Can anyone help? I am asking for official bios please.

 

Thanks

 

What bios are you running now?

 

 

B&H sent me an update on a launch day PNY 5090 I had queued up for $2199.99. Still unavailable, but the price is now $3399.99.

 

This is the official MSRP now on this card as of last week.

 

Sheesh.

 

-----

 

3 hours ago, Mr. Fox said:

Yes it's at 100% in just about any game. In addition to that X3D thing I do not use PBO. 

 

 

Yeah, for this run I'm not using CO just a +200 boost and tuned SOC. I haven't gone back in to recheck my offsets since testing out 1203 which is proving to be worse than 1104 (I think I mention it in the video). I did see 1303 just dropped and in the notes it says, "improves system performance," which is sometimes Asus speak for, "our last version regressed."

 

-----

 

2 hours ago, jaybee83 said:

 

are u using a fan on the connector? ive also added putty on the connector backside and the cable is exposed to the 140mm fan im using to cool the RAM, so those two factor surely helped with the 4090 and will help with the 5090 now 🙂

 

btw, were back in business! just reflashed and Astral OC vbios and successfully installed drivers. Plan is to test the following:

 

Asus Astral LC (already tested, gonna skip now due to limited fan support on Suprim)

Asus Astral OC

Gigabyte Master

GIgabyte Master ICE (likely no diff to Master, but why not)

Gigabyte Xtreme Waterforce

PNY Epic-X OC

Zotac Amp Extreme Infinity

 

all the other vbios files currently available on TPU arent worth the hassle imo since theyre from reference boards / basic models. i didnt include any MSI vbios since i figured that the Suprim will likely have the best anyways across the MSI stack.

 

will post results once done 🙂 

 

Everyone is hooked on the Gigabyte vroom vroom right now over on the OC forums, but it will be nice to see testing them all on your Suprim what emerges as top dog.

 

 

2 hours ago, Mr. Fox said:

Hopefully there will be a waterblock for this GPU. I've tried PTM pad, KPx and MX-6 and changed from putty to thermal pads and the temperatures are the same regardless. Memory junction temps are either too high or the sensors are off. 90°C memory temps reminds me of the 3090 when cryptomining and the 6900 XT (which hit 90°C on air or on water). The GPU is boosting to like 3400 on core with -100mV core voltage offset, no core clock offset and default (100%) power limit. Still impressive 4K results for a $700 GPU.

 

 

Edit: so, I got the memory temps down 10°C but hotspot went up a few degrees. I used a thicker pad on the memory chips with higher w/mK rating. The others were making contact, but not being pressed enough to smash the thermal pad hard between the heatsink and chip. I used 0.5mm pads on everything. VRMs and inductors were getting pressed very hard but not the memory, so I replaced the memory thermal pads with 1.0mm 13w/mK pads.

 

So, I am guessing the contact pressure on the die is not as great with the thicker pads on the memory and the pressure on the memory chips is much higher. I may try replacing the screws with springs with regular screws without springs to increase pressure on the die. Definitely an improvement even though hotspot temps increased slightly.

 

 

Are you sitting at 100% utilization during the run? Stock, my Gigabut 9070xt Gaming OC is hitting a bit higher...might be the 9800X3D flexing a bit... I know I uploaded that video of it running through the benchmark:

 

 

 

Those memory temps are about right out of the box. My memory was hitting 90 peak under load too. Hotspot around 85 again out of the box stock:

 

 

1 hour ago, tps3443 said:

I let me son use my OEM 5090FE dongle with his 3090FE. He’s got a new 2x6 plugged in to 4x8 individual 8 pins lol. (No issues for him of course it’s a 3090FE) Me, I’m running a single Gen 5.1 cable Lian Li cable with the blue safety color, it’s a replica to the Seasonic OEM stuff. This thing doesn’t even get warm. I’ve bought an amp clamp and checked my per wire amperage and they were all really good idle or load. I want to make a video of this process. It’s very cool, but before the amp clamp I a little worried about individual wire amperage spiking way up maybe, I was running blind, don’t have any monitoring like your Astral. So I feel better after checking at least. But a quality DC amp clamp is like $140 dollars man. It’s crazy we gotta do this. I might return it now actually. 🤣

 

Yeah, just like the 4090 I'm not going to fret over it. I plug it in, do some OC'ing, benchmarking, play my games and if she blows she blows. GPU Tweak III lets me know as I've switched to its OSD. We both know the odds of it blowing are slim to none.

 

(Tonight on the 5090 in Fallout 76):

 

 

https://imgur.com/gzuWJmTo show how poor the 9070xt fairs in this game (but still plays nicely), this same encounter area it was clocking in at 62fps.....

 

But when you find those games and titles that let it stretch its legs, it's got some chops.

 

56 minutes ago, Mr. Fox said:

I sure do like having the tried and true 8-pin x 3 PCIe power cables instead of the chintzy 12VHPWR (aka 2x6 fire-starter) cables. I definitely got the memory temps down to an acceptable level with that last change. Hotspot temps are status quo for Radeon video cards. 

 

This game sucks, but the benchmark sure does use a lot more system memory and CPU resources than most. Right on the heels of 4090 performance in this title. Very acceptable price to performance at half the cost and even decent at 4K. GPU boost clock constantly between 3200 and 3300 MHz with no core offset.

 

 

 

https://imgur.com/gzuWJmT

Seriously, MSRP vs MSRP, 9070xt is an absolute stud. There's a reason AMD can't keep them in stock while AIBs pump them out like crazy while you see 5070s and soon enough 5060ti's start to lag in sales. That's also why you suddenly see Nvidia talking about a 16GB 5070.....

 

And yeah, I did like having those 3x 8-pin cables running.... 😞

 

 

 

 

1 hour ago, Papusan said:

 

Nice. MSI offer worse quality than Nvidia. Yet they want higher prices. Maybe they should lower the price to match the quality?

MSI's 12V-2x6 adapter for RTXs isn't as high-quality as the original power supply cable, so what's the point?

The case of this MSI RTX 5090 SUPRIM takes on a new shape when we now know that in terms of materials and assembly, the adapter that was sold as the solution to the 12V-2x6 problems by MSI does not even have the quality of the NVIDIA one.

 

1 hour ago, jaybee83 said:

 

 

 

welp, glad im not using any of the standard included adapters 😄 F that

 

I just run GPU Tweak III w/ its default OC +300/+3000 no voltage adjustments and that's about it w/ the ugly tentacles and pin monitoring. low fan noise, no coil whine just purring away.  It just runs perfectly for me, but as we've seen with MSI, how the hell do you cut corners with the most dangerous part?

 

Like I remind everyone, including myself, "it works perfect!!!" till it doesn't.....

 

 

 

2 hours ago, jaybee83 said:

 

ultimate gaming PC you say....? 🤔 specs sound somehow familiar 😏

 

 

Hey! I didn't make the video! I'm just linking it for educational purposes! 🤣

 

3 hours ago, jaybee83 said:

 

soooo the tuned 7400 RAM profile from my previous CPU also works on this once. havent tested if i can tighten up the timings some more tho, jury still out on that.

 

however, i must say the CPU side of things are quite positive. did another baseline run with 1h CB2024 and the new CPU beats the old one in every way!

 

Temps: -4C cooler in Delta T

Fan Speed: -20%(!!!) in rpm for AIO fans / -5% in rpm for case fans (this is at +2C ambient temp vs. old CPU baseline!)

Clocks: +65 Mhz on average across all cores

VCore: -16 mV on avg.

Performance: +1.5% in CB points

 

aight boiz, time to switch to the GPU side of things. need another Alan Wake 2 baseline for the thermal pad mod i did beneath the backplate, then its off to testing various different vBios versions 🙂 

 

btw, my 4090 buyer in Italy just received the card today and did his initial testing: hes a happy camper! 

 

At least some good news after the dead CPU. Makes me wonder how it would do on a 1DPC board though but everything else looks good!

 

Congrats on the happy buyer too in Italy!

 

 

6 minutes ago, Mr. Fox said:

That's where I get stuck. The gap in performance is much smaller than the gap in price. If it is not 4.5 times more powerful it should not be 4.5 times more expensive. If it is I feel like the joke is on me and I'm their little money-making whore.

 

5 minutes ago, tps3443 said:

Wow! I’m surprised to hear that. I figured you’d be keeping the Astral for the long haul. 

 

2 minutes ago, jaybee83 said:

 

just wait for it, as of yet he still got it his hands on it 😉 

 

 

Yeah, this is all the day before D day (1st) which was always my set return day since the bill is due a few days after that. 🤣

 

I played WoW for 3hrs last night on the 5090 and noticing all the areas even when flying around that cap out on the 5080 FE and 9070xt vs the 5090 always ready for more or running a few tier 11 solo delves and sitting at frame cap (238fps) most of the time and just ultra silky smooth.

 

Ran some raids in my fixed D2D OC profile with GPU Tweak III and just smooth.....even when fps dipped into the 70s still smooth.....The problem with the WoW engine will always be when all that player data hits in certain moments, your 5090 will perform like a 4070 Super or 9070xt. Same with the 5080FE. There's just nothing you can do about it. The engine CPU physics need to be overhauled badly.

 

Tonight is 3hrs of Fallout76 where the 9070xt is just not good just like the 7900xtx was poor too versus Nvidia. Nothing worse than outdoor bosses and the frames just chunking into the 50s and 40s on AMD vs always 100+ on Nvidia. This will be my first serious session with the 5090 tonight versus running around and benchmarking.....

 

Did I mention how absolutely gorgeous and smooth Deus Ex MD looks on the 5090?

 

Final Analysis:

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

9070xt is going back either way as it has strengths in other games but WoW and especially Fallout 76 is not it. Decent 1440p and to an extent 4k WoW card but I can't trust it with AMD/Blizzard history of breaking drivers plus the fact it still crashes on the regular in Classic WoW. Final nail in the coffin is the poor FO76 performance overall versus even a 4070 Super let alone the 5080 FE or 5090. I'm still impressed overall with the price:performance at MSRP. For $600 it is an absolute banger albeit I paid $$771 after tax so back it goes.

 

So then it now comes down to the 5080FE vs the 5090. I know I can sell the 5080FE and make $400 on it so mentally it becomes a $1500 card for resale. I can use that to put an almost 50% dent into the 5090. I know for a fact I can ride the 5090 for a few years and then sell it off and make back the bulk of what I paid and maybe a touch more depending on how this market goes.

 

Therein lies the blessing and the curse with Nvidia cards, especially their halo cards the last few cycles and even AMD and their 5700xt and my 1080ti. I sold ALL of them after a year or two at worse for a tiny profit and some with a hefty one.

 

So either I'm walking into BB tomorrow with ONE card to return or BOTH and I would just continue to rock the 5080FE.

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

 

I know, I know, first world problems to have all three laying around and having to decide which one(s) to keep.... 🤣

 

1 hour ago, tps3443 said:

For years high end PC hardware, in the old days had dimensioning returns. A lot more expensive, for very little gain. I mean, look at the RTX 3080 for $699.99 compared to the RTX 3090 $1,499. Everyone bought a 3090 and it was barely faster stock. The 3080 for less than half the cost was churning out 80-85% the performance. 
 

But lately, the performance gap between 5080 and 5090 is absolutely MASSIVE. It’s like 85% faster sometimes. So on paper the RTX 5090 is double the specs for double the price. If only the 5090 had double the power limit it probably would be double the performance almost all the time. So with the 5080 costing $999, and 5090 costing $1,999, we are getting more value than ever before. Double VRAM, double cuda cores, and nearly double performance in the super heavy loads.
 

I just think the main problem is AIB greed. We can only compare the 5090 Astral MSRP to the 5080 Astral MSRP. So it’s still a similar story there. For double the price of a 5080 Astral, you get double the specs with a 5090 Astral lol. 

 

Nvidia is purposely holding back raw performance in the lower tiers and trying to push AI solutions as an overall "performance package" and that is BS. When Jensen said a 5070 had the performance of a 4090, that was all you needed to hear how they plan to shape the future of gaming advancements as a major piece of their strategy. The fact they and AIBs are trying to "encourage" reviewers to discuss talking points involving upscaling and frame generation. Even trying to discourage some reviewers from discussing comparing the 5000 series mid and lower tier cards vs the 4000 variants but instead focus on 2-3 generation older cards.

 

In the end, Nvidia needs AMD or Intel to drastically step up their game or like @jaybee83 said, we're going to eventually be stuck with marginal cycle upgrades because there's no competition like we had with Skylake++++ until AMD started to wreck them and forced their hand to move quicker which they couldn't and here we are.

 

We need another 6000 AMD series surprise where Nvidia was legitimately caught off guard with the performance of the 6900xtx and it was basically matching the 3090 up to 1440p and only at 4k did the 3090 manage to gain a very small amount of breathing room. Nvidia's only saving grace was their RT performance.

 

I will say as time and drivers move on, the 5090 is widening its lead over the 5080 and 4090 and in some titles it is pretty substantial. I know I didn't expect the 5090 to be that much faster than the 4090 in WoW.

 

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

 

Remember early reports were AIBs weren't making much of a profit because of Nvidia charging so much. You also have to calculate in tariffs as these cards are being made real time versus other companies selling pre-existing stock so the tariffs haven't really "hit" yet but will as levels are depleted and either stock dries up or prices go up (or both).

 

I do know there are now plenty of sane priced combos on Newegg that are languishing since yesterday including some flat out solo cards from Gigabyte and MSI now ready for purchase.

 

What continues to sell out though are Astrals including those $6k combos again.....insane.

 

Speaking of Astrals, nice no holds bar build out with an Astral air and LC unit and comparing performance and temps.

 

Air model performs just as well and better on memory temps overall. To get the same temps (+/- 1c), Rad had to be mounted on the front and used as intake which makes sense. Speaks volumes for the chonker heatsink on this thing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 hours ago, Mr. Fox said:

We would probably see the reason why nobody has that except for the chosen ones. Just the thought of some of them owning a stock 5090 it's kind of scary. But not as scary as the thought that a desirable non-FE 5090 model costs more than what I paid for the car I've been driving for the last 5 years and will continue driving for at least a couple more.

 

Most approach computers as a tool to be used like a dishwasher and treat it as such. Fine for a dell office computer. Not so much for a 5-6k rig running top of the line hardware including a 5090.

 

I swapped my Astral 5090 back in with a clean install to compare against the 9070xt for D2D gaming at 4k. The 9070xt lulled me into a false sense of "this is good!"

 

5090 is obviously superior in every way, but is it $729 vs $3359 superior? Is it $999 5080FE vs $3359 superior?

 

Or is it having the absolute best gaming/benching experience price be damned good?

 

2 hours ago, Mr. Fox said:

Pretty much, yup. Although mine is a fancy older model (2005 Ford Five Hundred SEL AWD) that I bought with like 50K miles on it. And, I drive everything until there is nothing left worth driving and the parts that are worn out cost more than the car is worth. You can get really nice cars for pennies on the dollar after all of the suckers and chumps have taken their losses. When it is worn out (another 200K miles to go) and not worth fixing I will sell it for what I paid for it. Lather, rinse, repeat.

 

This is my philosophy exactly.

 

I only buy used and I drive it till it falls apart. I am driving a 2016 basic Nissan Rogue that I will drive easily for the next 5-6 years or until something catastrophic happens or not worth fixing.

 

I have no qualms with my friends and family that upgrade their cars every three years though. That is their choice.

 

22 minutes ago, tps3443 said:

New Game ready Nvidia driver is out. Who’s trying it? 

 

I'm currently running 576.26 when I gave my system a clean install to put back the Astral 5090 for more testing compared to a clean install Gigabyte 9070xt for realistic D2D use and further cost analysis. I'm leaning towards returning the 5090. Superior in every way and a good bin but the cost whew..... but we'll see tomorrow which card goes back. 

 

What's the newest version?

 

 

 

52 minutes ago, jaybee83 said:

 

im out when it comes to shunt modding, unfortunately. as for the XOC vbios, thus far it sounds like theyre reaaaally cracking down on anyone even thinking about leaking it. plus that special sauce software that is required to control the XOC vbios, the vbios alone dont cut it anymore. *sigh* 

 

such a shame, considering what immense cooling capabilities the Suprim SOC cooler provides!

 

7 minutes ago, johnksss said:

I would crack down as well. As a bunch of people burnt up their cards then start playing the stupid role of...Well, I didn't do anything but play a game. I never over clock and now i want you to replace it for free. They also start throwing people under the bus when they don't get the same things as other people who are in the know. They start name dropping and crying in forums. Here is a tidbit. I know exactly how the kingpin vbios got out to the masses, but i would never tell who it was. Not my place too. Bottom line is, we can't all be in the same circles as others. These are just the facts. And one has to run with the hand they are dealt, because at the end of the day....If that was you they trusted, I know damn well you are not going to be leaking anything if it meant you losing your access to all the goodies us normal people are looking for. That would be just crazy! (Just my ramblings my friend.) 

 

Couldn't have said it any better myself @johnksss. That has been the point I've been trying to get across for sometime now and you summed it up quite nicely.

 

1 hour ago, tps3443 said:

Big variance on FE’s for sure. Mine sips power and voltage like Tea. In the video it’s in a closed case, but If I open my case it drops a good bit more in temps. 

 

 

 

 

Yeah, the one thing your card is saying to me is, "please put me in an SFF!" Seriously, it with a 9800X3D in a proper case? Like a top mounted variant that exhausts from the top? Magic SFF build bro....

 

In all seriousness, If I had your 5090 FE instead of an Astral, I would build out a top exhaust SFF and probably jettison my MSI 18 and use the SFF w/ 9800X3D for travel with my 18" 144hz USB-C powered display.

 

Then you can come at it like B4BG:

 

 

Push for that max OC inefficiency be damned or UV and let your chips silicon quality shine through.....

 

 

1 hour ago, tps3443 said:

This might seem crazy but I was expecting more from 9070XT. Maybe that 3080 could be squeezed even further!

 

I agree when it comes to WoW and especially FO76 where Nvidia rules the roost.

 

3080 10gb has just been an absolute workhorse beast. It is quickly headed to the 1080ti goated status at its original MSRP.

 

Some games shine better on AMD than Nvidia. WoW loves Nvidia and always has since the major engine overhaul several years ago when they added in RT support. From that point on, the smart play has always been to get Nvidia for WoW.

 

One thing I will give the 9070xt and I can't put my finger on it yet is its smooth, even play at lower fps vs the 5080 or even 5090 in WoW. Spots where I felt like the 5080 chunked a bit the 9070xt just keeps it moving even in raids or outdoor events.

 

In Testing Games comparison of the 9070xt vs anything, its FT graphs are always much smoother than I've ever seen from AMD cards.

 

I played quite a bit of Fallout 76 earlier (found a new testing spot), and even when fps drops to the low 60s on the 9070xt, it was just so smooth. Having logged hundreds of hours on Nvidia cards on both WoW and FO76 for a few years including the 5080 FE and 5090 since January, the consistency and smoothness of the 9070xt really stands out at the same settings at lower frame rates than Nvidia and it is perplexing.

 

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

Decent video.....

 

Jufus basically saying leave the 5090 FE as is also hitting all the same salient points I made about itx heaven, runs hot not really made/worth blocking...yet I very much want to see it blocked and shunted....

 

"The best overall 5090 for 90% of people is the 5090 FE" - makes total sense.

 

Sad to see Canada also is paying some insane prices for 5090's too along with low to no stock levels but price conversion wise, USA is just getting raked across the coals right now compared to former countries we routinely had lower prices for years. 😞

 

And like he said, 600w will have you having SWAS (Sweaty *ss) in a small computer room sooner than later..... 🤣

 

 

 

3 hours ago, Mr. Fox said:

This  design made it very hard for me to embrace Ryzen and I still really hate the design. It is an idiotic approach to processor design. It adds latency, unnecessary complexity and additional opportunities for failure. Along with the foolish elimination of hyperthreading the tiled design (a conceptually similar display of poor judgment and bad engineering decisions) was also a major factor in my rejection of Core Ultra and movement to Ryzen. The good old days are gone boys. What we're left with is the machinations of fundamentally bad people, educated idiots, greed on steroids and mainstream stupidity. End users get whatever end users get and they expect us all to feel grateful for getting screwed. Just as Big Pharma doesn't care about people getting better as long as they keep taking their lifelong poison meds, Big Tech doesn't care what is best for the people that buyer their crap as long as the money keeps coming. They only pretend to care and listen when it is necessary to recover from a slowdown in revenue generation.

 

"Profits above people" extend to all facets of corporate America.

 

The most egregious of them all is the healthcare industry as profitability is grossly incongruent with offering optimal, financially sane care for American citizens.

 

 

Running some tests comparing the wife's 3080 10gb Strix vs the 9070xt in WoW. She plays at 1440p, but I tested both at 1440p and 4k. I'm thinking of cancelling the 5070 and giving her the 9070xt instead. Problem is in WoW I think the $549.99 5070 will plant itself much closer to the $729.99 9070xt than the 3080 in WoW. I'm also not sure the uplift is worth the disruption at this point.

 

This is at full Ultra 10 w/ RT at max

 

1440p:

 

Hallowfall:

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

3080    - 105fps

9070xt - 142fps

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

 

Oribos:

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

3080   -  116fps

9070xt - 150fps

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

 

4k:

 

Hallowfall:

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

3080    -  70fps

9070xt -  93fps

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

 

Oribos:

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

3080       -  66fps

9070xt     - 101fps

5080FE    - 115fps

5090        - 186fps

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

 

 

1 hour ago, tps3443 said:

Thats a great run. I cannot hit more than 15.3k with mine. Not only is my Founders Edition model in the stock format holding me back, but my current platform is holding me back by about 500 points at least. My stock score is like 13,800. I just cannot get Rebar working. And PCIe Gen 3. I think it's getting about that time to retire the Dominus/3175x soon. 

 

Too many small limitations on the FE this time around. I know I dig in on ya for fun (light hearted ribbing), but the FE will not be setting the world on fire this iteration.  It's strengths lie elsewhere (aesthetics, engineering, compact size, price). You notice the Gigabyte vBIOS coupled with the Astral too. Like @johnksss said and to further I keep pressing is a 5090 FE  is still a 5090 and a monster card out of the box that will lay waste to everything out there and blocked and 1 stage shunted you will extract every bit of performance out of it to let it flex as hard as it can but even in a game of inches it will still fall short due to several factors compared to the top dogs. It's not a knock on it at all and I hope you're not taking it personally bro. 🙂

 

And you are spot on with your rig limitations. It's fun and nostalgic and has its pros and country charm but it just can't keep up with modern hardware from your former 14th gen platform to an AM5 platform. Even a 285k will outpace it to extract as much performance as possible from your 5090.

 

Now you get to think about what you want to move to next. Back to 14th? 285k looks like a lot of fun to tune up. AM5 is a proven winner.

 

12 hours ago, johnksss said:

https://www.3dmark.com/sn/5655620

 

Edit:

For anyone thinking they have no coil whine only needs to run firestrike extreme to find out the truth. I can hear that wine over all 15 fans running in here on full blast. LOL

 

Nice score! I see that GB vBIOS. 🙂

 

I'm afraid, but I'll give it a run later to see if my ear drums explode. 😁

5 hours ago, tps3443 said:

 I just discovered something interesting with my 5090 FE. So my clocks were kinda pathetic.. And I guess they are, but that’s a stock 5090fe after all, however I notice using Rivatuner/MSI AB OSD, and that app shows the external clock speed.  If I use Rivatuner through MSI AB it says my card is running 2,872Mhz “Stock”. The Nvidia app portrays the internal effective clock speed. Right now I’m playing KCDII and Nvidia overlay says “2,670Mhz” that’s a stock 5090fe spec. But GPUz says “2,857Mhz” and even HWInfo says “2,857Mhz” I never knew this before. But just something to consider. 
 

If I go by this number, it’s going to show some seriously inflated clock speeds. I’m actually amazed by this because if I run MSI AB as an overlay it shows some pretty WILD clock speeds of about +200 on everything. So, if I’m running just 3,270 I’m running 3,470 using your monitoring tool.

 

 

Yeah on all my Astral 5090 screenies and benchmarking results reports, ALL I use is Nvidia's monitoring tools.  My last big post with the card comparisons for the 5080 and 5090 was all Nvidia's tools. You gotta figure they know their hardware better than any other external monitoring tool and it works well enough for my needs to a point. Go back and look.  I just customized the screen read out because I like it to the left, vertical and in red w/ a larger font but that's Nvidia's statistics reporting utility (Alt+R baby).

 

I  use AB when I'm doing fps session grabs to get average framerates via Rivatuner and/or usually overclocking, albeit I used PX1 for that last session for both the Astral and FE.

 

For AMD, if you go back and look at some of the first DXMD pics, you will see AB and Adrenalin on screen at the same time.

 

Using Nvidia's OSD, I'm hitting 2745mhz on the 5080 FE stock and  3030mhz OC'd 99% util in WoW so based on your older posts, that is right in the neighborhood of your stock clocks. Both our FE's have subpar voltage caps at stock.

 

3 hours ago, jaybee83 said:

nah not interested in water blocks. i got the air version specifically to stay on air. i just filled up the gap between PCB and backplate.

 

welp, seems like i killed the 9950X3D 💩 delidding went down pretty smooth, but i think something about the TG HPHS install sent it into oblivion. after lots of troubleshooting i swapped the 7950X back into the socket and after many attempts it finally booted up (apparently the mobo asks if the cpu had been switched and one needs to manually confirm that. however that message didnt show up, just blackscreen. found out about this "invisible message" online and just attempted a blind confirmation via kb, it worked 😛).

im relieved that the mobo is still functional and also LUCKY that i still have the 7950X around (its already on sale on ebay but no buyer yet).

sooooo yeah....i guess time to order a new CPU 😄 and the RAM binning will have to wait 😛 ugh, this is so annoying....welp, maybe the new cpu will at least have a better IMC.

 

 

DAMN!!!!! I'm so sorry bro. 😞

 

I've killed a few chips over the years pushing them too hard. Still hurts to see it happen. They aren't cheap!

 

A proper sorting of the universe would have your replacement 9950X3D having a monster IMC and run ice cold.

 

Next question is, do you plan on delidding this one?

 

3 hours ago, johnksss said:

 

In other news I snagged an Astral today at Micro Center!

 

Awesome! Congrats @johnksss!! Which block are you going with?

 

2 hours ago, tps3443 said:

So which one do you go by? You use MSI Afterburner OSD? So if this is the case. my care completely stock runs 2,880Mhz in games. Which I had no idea. 
 

 

Go by your results. You're overthinking a good, solid, average very well priced card. Just enjoy it. I can't imagine stressing this much or coming at it from so many directions to extract water from a rock. I would just focus on the price, aesthetics, potential lack of coil whine and the fact it IS a 5090 and keep it moving.....

 

 

 

 

 

 

6 hours ago, Mr. Fox said:

I really like the 9070 XT. First AMD GPU I have owned that I can say that. Not the world's fastest, but probably the best bang for the buck. I will try the newer driver this weekend and see how it compares.

 

I just got the build with the Gene redone. I like it. The Antec Constellation C8 case is such a nice one, just a bit smaller than I would like it to be. After putting the 9070 XT in it and putting the RAM back on air, the dual 360 loop with only the CPU on water really cleaned things up. 

 

Now I need to redo the build with the triple radiator in the O11D XL EVO, delid the CPU in the Gene, then I think I am done.

 

 

On a personal note, I am so happy I cancelled my Apex order and did not buy a 5090. I really like the AORUS Master mobo. A couple of minor gripes: no BIOS option to disable WiFi/BT M.2 slot and no setting to adjust the POST wait time to enter setup, but the Cabron was also missing the latter for some stupid reason. I will either physically remove the WiFi7/BT card that I have no use for or maybe see if I can mod the BIOS to add the two missing menu options. (Already asked Gigabyte and they just said no and used the excuse that nobody else is complaining about it and suggested I disable it in Device Manager if I don't want it. Losers.)

 

After selling the Gigabyte 4090, white Apex, TG Xtreem 8200 and 14900KS I purchased the second 9950X, second TG Mycro, 5 radiators, 12 fans, my third Sabrent Quad NVMe card, two D5 pump/reservoirs, tubing, fittings, an Alphacool Core block for the 4090 Suprim (replacing the Bykski block primarily for aesthetic reasons favoring the look of the Core) a couple more 2TB NVMe, a 9600X CPU for the B850 build given to my grand daughters, two 800W UPSes and still have $600 sitting in my PayPal account, LOL. I would have needed to add money to buy a non-FE 5090. When I stop and think about this it makes the thought of buying one just seems totally ludicrous to me now. I was very tempted to blow $3K+ on a GPU I didn't need.

 

Agreed, I am really impressed with it. I haven't felt this good about AMD since the 5700xt which was inferior to the 2080ti but I opted to rock that that for a few years till the 3090 dropped. I'm seriously contemplating that again. I was very pleased to see the video and spreadsheet I was using as a reference was incorrect and the Gaming OC provides the same power and performance as the Elite.

 

I just really like either minimalist blackout build or that uniform lighting "industrial borg" look of the system. When I get crushed to the face with an over abundance of rainbow RGB it hurts. Only reason my keyboard is all lit up like a rainbow is because I refuse to run the Steel Series GG software.

 

I think that was a smart move to sell off a lot of hardware, downsize, clean up  and get some clarity financially. My tech fund I built up with the last sell off would be in the negative if I keep the Astral 5090 and MSI Raider 18" along with the Crosshair + 9800X3D combo I picked up. Something has to give. I still do have a nice list of hardware to sell off though I'll get up on Fleabay and the OC forums but with all the hacked accounts over there I'm a bit wary atm.

 

 

1 hour ago, jaybee83 said:

kool, TG putty pro came in today, exactly as hoped / planned 🙂 

 

did two stock baselines for the GPU and CPU before i get to tinkering:

 

5090 OC (+355/+3000) 60min Alan Wake 2 4K maxed out DLSS Qual

Core: 64.0C avg. / 65.2C max.

vRAM: 69.8C avg. / 72.2C max.

Voltage: 0.984V avg. / 1.010V max.

Fans: 1618 RPM avg. (43%) / 1638 RPM max. (44%)

Power: 529.6W avg. / 545.6W max.

Clock: 3027 Mhz avg. / 3172 Mhz max.

Load: 97.8% avg. / 99.0 % max.

vRAM usage approx. 13.3 GB

 

9950X3D (Full Stock, Kryonaut on IHS) 60min. CB2024 looped

Clocks (total): 4901 Mhz avg. / 4756 - 5340 Mhz Range

Vcore: 1.115V avg. / 1.074 - 1.225 V Range

CPU Pkg. Power: 199.6 W avg. / 198.4 - 200.0 W Range

CPU Temps (Tctl/Tdie): 73.1 C avg. / 71.0 - 75.0 C Range

 

To put the 9950X3D temps into perspective I compared the data with my previous stock 7950X:

-19 C cooler based on ambient temp delta

Radiator fans at 43% RPM with the 9950X3D vs. the 7950X (same fan curve)

Case fans at 72% RPM with the 9950X3D vs. the 7950X (same fan curve)

4901 Mhz (9950) vs. 5159 Mhz (7950) avg. Clocks = -5% lower clocks on the 9950X3D

2378CB vs. 2163 CB avg. score = +10% higher score on the 9950X3D

199.6W vs. 228.5W pkg. power = -13% pkg. power on the 9950X3D

 

Now you know how crazy the comparison is between 9950X3D and 7950X. It uses less than half of the RPM at 5% lower clocks and is 19C cooler, while at the same time being 10% faster!

 

aight now for some workout and then off to tinkering 🙂 

 

Nice baseline set of data to publicly set in stone before "The Tinkerage" starts. 🙂

 

Did you block your 4090 Sujprim or run it strictly on air? Do you plan on blocking your 5090?

 

9070xt installed and clean install of Windows 11 Pro for the next few days as my daily driver. Live by the sword, die by the sword.

 

Day 1 and I'm finding a lot of things I like an don't like.

 

Likes:

 

GPU is stupidly quiet with no coil whine

GPU runs crazy cool under load

Boosts to 3ghz+ right out of the box. Highest I've seen so far is 3230

While it was rumored to have the weaker 304w vBIOS, it actually has the 340w variant and has pulled up to 371w

Minimal lighting and is quieter under load than the 5080 FE and Astral 5090 which were both already very quiet

Very stylish looking

 

Dislikes:

 

Terrible issues with flickering with HDR enabled. The 5080 and 5090 have them too but nowhere near like the 9070xt. I just keep HDR off till I want it on for gaming. Same as I did with Nvidia.

 

While lower than many other 9070xt's I've seen, the hot spot in the 80s along with  the memory hitting 90+. Yes, I know that's within range, but I prefer my temps lower.

 

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

In WoW, it is hitting ~98fps in the new test spot 4k ultra RT max with  99% utilization:

 

 

This puts it at:

 

9070xt        =  98fps

9070xt OC  = TBD

5080 FE      = 115fps  (~18% faster than 9070xt)

4090           = 125fps (~28% faster than the 9070xt)

5080 FE OC= 126fps (~29% faster than 9070xt)

4090 OC     = 135fps (~38% faster than the 9070xt)

Astral 5090 = 186fps (~90% faster than the 9070xt)

Astral 5090 OC = 210fps (~114% faster than the 9070xt)

 

5090 OC vs 4090 OC = ~56% faster (whoa!)

 

I'm actually very impressed with the 9070xt on the newest Adrenalin drivers released a few days ago (25.4.1). It has cleaned up a lot of issues in WoW including the stuttering and chunking with RT on. I spent a few hours playing and zero problems.

 

If things stay the same right now, and I was a WoW player and MSRP was in effect, I would pick a 9070xt over a 5080 FE because the price:performance is just better. If price wasn't too much of a consideration, I would then go with the 5080 FE.

 

If price is NO object, the 5090 is just a wrecking ball. The 9070xt is faster in WoW than the 7900xtx and the 5090 just obliterates it in the scariest fashion.

 

 

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

 

On 4/22/2025 at 12:45 AM, Mr. Fox said:

I finally got around to running this. Stock GPU, 4K and Ultra Preset:

 

 

@Mr. Fox Deus Ex MD problem fixed. After a lot of trial and error what was happening was playing around with MSAA in the pre-launch menu was for some reason sticking even when disabled for some reason dragging performance down once in the actual game. Here is a video giving the 9070xt a proper run with all the options checked in the video menu before benchmark so you can install 25.4.1 and give it another go and double check my work:

 

 

 

And the actual results:

 

 

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

 

Lastly is Fallout 76. I happen to find a few spots that push the 9070xt to ~96% util which is good! I have my bud with the 5090 FE actively trying to find the most graphically demanding spots in the game to see how hard we can push the 5090. I plan on joining the hunt when I switch back. Stay tuned....

 

 

 

20 hours ago, tps3443 said:

I’m not swapping my card. I absolutely love it! I feel like it’s a great example of what an FE is supposed to be. It’s quiet and It’s a low power 5090. I’m very happy with my silicon so far. I feel like Its an excellent sample, clocks can fly without crashing, of course I’m bound by power and temps right now. But I see absolutely no reason to waterblock/Shunt/OC any other GPU. We have what we have. This thing is used for playing games and work, I’m not stressing my self over finding something else.  😃
 

As far as binning goes with 5090’s that is a massive waste of time for me and most. But I know some people who are testing 3+ Astrals or 3+ other models and keeping whichever does best. The reality is, I think any 5090 is going to run 3,200 internally and some models may run 3,400 internally (Once shunted and on water of course) 

 

@electrosoft I thought the 5080FE was overclocked faster than 5090FE by default. But, it isn’t and that’s interesting.. That’s exactly what my 5090 runs at, Your 5080 looks perfectly fine to me though. These cards are not factory overclocked, that boost and voltage is identical to what my 5090 does 2,887 stock. You have essentially added +300 in core and +3000 memory and gained +20 watts more. Your load voltage is even less than stock clocks as the card is still power limited. Notice your voltage went down with the higher overclock even though it’s 1 degree cooler and only 270 watts that card is power limited before even hitting its power limit. This is the case with 50 series unfortunately and our internal clock falls to the floor. Apparently the 5090’s can hit this limit at low 500w sometimes even 450w. You would have to do +473 or maybe +500 and increase power slider to 104% to do a more fair comparison since the Astral has a maxed power slider by default at 100% and a factory OC of +173 It’ll probably drop voltage even more though but I think the silicon can handle it. These cards are so artificially limited man it’s crazy. If you could flash it to the Astral 5080 bios, I think then you’d see it fly just for the extra power head room alone with 5080’s. Or shunt mod it. 😃

 

Well, you're going to deface that 5090 FE anyhow with a block and a shunt so..... I won't lie, it will hurt to see it happen, but I'm looking forward to the results.  🙂

 

I did pick up another 4090 Liquid after my first one but the second one was garbage and went right back to BB.

 

Binning is a valid metric that has been proven over and over again from some members binning multiple cards to the XOC "elite" literally binning individual GPU dies to solder onto boards. The same silicon lottery that is at play for CPUs is also at play for GPUs.  It really isn't up for debate. Some GPUs are trash and some are golden and plenty fall in between. Having looked and collected more data over the last few days, I think your 5090 FE is solidly average but for $2k who cares? If it was average with no coil whine but $2k that is a super solid win in my book. You'll block it, shunt it and get more out of it, but if it was more golden, you'd get even a bit more. You clearly care about performance or you wouldn't be shunting and blocking it. You would UV it and run it as is and be happy but you're not so you ordered shunts and awaiting a block. For $2k, you won the price:performance contest. 🙂 Like I said in my last message, even the worse 5090 is a 5090 and an absolute monster destroying all cards except other better binned, tuned, cooled, shunted, XOC'd 5090's which leads me into my next part....

 

I've said this in the past even back to NBR days and I'll say it again. I know people get hung up on internal/effective clocks. They have for quite some time with CPUs and GPUs. It's nothing new. They always have and I have never, ever cared about that. I mean ever. For me, it is the produced results in benchmarks and games, period. Adjusting temps/power/cooling to lift up those effective clocks is the same as lifting up your benchmarks/fps. When I see the results on screen showing a valid, tangible metric showing my overclocking/tuning has resulted in better performance, that is all I need to proceed.

 

Astral 5090 went from 186fps to 210fps in WoW. That was all I needed to know the modest +300/+3000 "duh" OC gave me a nice 13% boost in performance, case closed.  Now, correlating that to on screen clocks of 3180 vs 2895 = ~9.8% boost so we also know memory OC is in play too since clocks didn't scale as high as the actual results this was with zero voltage adjustments, 99% util.

 

I do agree the 5080 FE is very nice. Aesthetically it is gorgeous and I just love the way it looks in a case and its industrial design.  I'm just bummed I can't flash the Astral or Zotac vBIOS on it. While the clocks are......ok (average at best, even a touch sub average), I'm not worried about it and to be honest the 4% PL did much of nothing meaningful when I pushed it on my bud's 5090 FE with AB because it is starting so low out of the block already by design. I saw your video with Oblivion and that 2677 clock just hurt my feelings. As I was watching it, I was saying "I can't wait to see his FE blocked and shunted, my goodness those clocks are poor"  But with my bud's 5090FE and a trade,  It was already a done dead deal with that thing sounding like Johnny5 was being attacked by the terminator under load but getting a chance to play around with it for a few hours really let me know how limited it is by nature from temps to clocks to voltage to more. It is designed to be what it is ($2k, engineering marvel, SFF fans dream card, aesthetically gorgeous, good, basic 5090 performance which is already fantastic) and that's ok.

 

Right now, I have the 9070xt (which is turning out to be a little banger of a card), 5080 FE which I love for the price and aesthetics and solid performance but the lack of cross flashing is a dagger to the heart and the Astral because it is just a wrecking ball even OC'd on air just laying waste to everything I have or had but at a cost.

 

I have till the 2nd, but two of the three above cards have to go bye bye unfortunately. I can't hold onto all three. 5080FE would go to fleabay. Other two are well within their return window.

 

 

 

 

 

 

PX1 results on my 5080 FE

 

Stock boost lock = 2827 / 1.015v

MaxV slider = 2887 / 1.035v

 

Sub 3ghz across the board = decidedly average (maybe a touch below at sub 2900) but still a beautiful card. 🙂

 

5090 is ~62% faster than my 5080 FE stock for stock (186fps vs 115fps)

5090 is ~~67% faster than my 5080 FE OC vs OC (+300/+3000 on both 210fps vs 126fps)

 

This is the first test with both capped out to 99% on the same drivers (576.02) / install.

 

This Astral 5090 just wrecks it and applying the same OC, the gap just gets wider with the much better silicon in the Astral and cooling.

 

I'm going to install this 9070xt next and give it a proper clean install to give it every chance it has to get where it needs to get to shine as bright as it can.

 

WoW results with the 5080 FE:

 

Stock:

 

 

OC +300 / +3000 (same as Astral 5090):

 

 

 

 

17 hours ago, Mr. Fox said:

Plenty of NVMe storage... GPU still PCIe 5.0 X16. Both Sabrent Quad NVMe cards running at their full Gen3 X4 speeds on both chipset X16 slots. No botched up bifurcation trash. 10 NVMe, 3 SATA.

 

16 hours ago, jaybee83 said:

 

u got enough storage there bud? 😄 (i know i know, look whos talking! 😛 glad im not the only SSD fanatic here hahaha)

 

 

hm you mean to say that manually locking in a higher voltage might help push it up?

where does yours land at full stock vs. locking it in manually?

 

Sheesh,  and here I thought @Rage Set was the resident storage nut!  🤣

6 hours ago, tps3443 said:

I cannot lock that voltage. My card maxes out even with lower temps.

 

 

Where does it land with zero voltage adjustments?

 

 

If I were you, I'd sell/trade it for better silicon and more normal PCB AIB model to block and then have fun vBIOS hopping then crank up the chiller for some weekend outings. You can wrap the 5090FE price around yourself like a warm blanket, but it's going to eat away at you.

 

but then again.....

 

 

5 hours ago, tps3443 said:

Yzonker has a 5090 Astral shunt modded and on water and he cannot lock more than 1075mv. So it really seems to be all over the place card to card. 

 

.....buying a more expensive model doesn't guarantee you anything and it really is all over the place with these cards. I swear it feels like CPU binning a bit.

 

People will start asking for tested/binned variants sooner than later. It happened with the 3090 and 4090. My 3090 bins were....ok. 4090 was a very good GPU bin but just a kinda good memory overclocker topping out at +1600 max for benching. The other identical 4090 liquid was absolute trash and couldn't do over 2900mhz'ish full OC'd and memory conked out at +700 if I remember. The variance is bonkers.

 

Still, in the end, a 5090 is a 5090 and the worst bin is absolutely a monster of a card. No coil whine is a 100% win in my book.

 

4 hours ago, Papusan said:

 

ASUS, GIGABYTE, and MSI will raise the prices of their motherboards without giving any explanation or reason.

 

 

Prices also went up on their low end cards. The $599.99 9070xt's are now ~$659.99. The Gigabyte 5070 SFF I actually had queued up for on launch with B&H for $549.99 is now $604.99 and they emailed me that it was available for buy.

 

Gigabyte gaming OC 9070 not-XT is now $669.99....

Asrock Taichi 9070xt went from $729.99 to $849.99 on NE

 

These are all sold and shipped by BB and NE.

 

 

 

 

1 hour ago, tps3443 said:

 

So I have learned that the GPU voltage is not determined by the bios, so even if we flashed to Astral bios. Some Astrals/Suprim’s cannot hit 1.110v even locked in at 1.100v+ with 100% slider. The voltage is controlled directly by the core.

 

 

Good find!

 

So silicon lottery is in play again as always.... 😞

If someone is dedicated enough I can see binning cores and memory (if we're ever allowed to exceed +3000) to compete. I mean, I'm clearly not sad for my Astral but still.

 

I think we always have to remember all that is promised out of the box is the advertised performance...

 

....we also have to remember most products also come with a 15-30 day return policy or you can sell them off (like CPUs) to friends/family/clients who will never, ever overclock and a 5090 is a 5090 is a 5090 to them.

 

1 hour ago, tps3443 said:

 

I will never see a 1075 in real world either mine is typically 0.990-1.010 and with 100% slider it’ll show a 1.020 So, in order to see the 1075v “At Idle” you need to set 100% voltage slider, and set the 1.110v point on the graph and hit Shift+L to lock it in. This will lock in your highest GPU’s voltage “That it needs” for that set frequency at the 1.1100 voltage graph point. This voltage isn’t controlled by the bios. It’s completely based on the cores needs. 

 

 

What does your FE say boost locked with PX1 w/ and w/o 100% slider?

 

1 hour ago, tps3443 said:

Once I get a block so I can tear my card apart, I’m going to solder on the shunt. This will make a massive difference for all 5090’s in their internal effective clock speed.

 

For me, it comes down to coil whine. I'd have to hear it at >200fps+ and TS GT2 run to see what it's working with coil whine wise. 50% fans on these FEs is definitely audible but then again I'm running an open case.

 

1 hour ago, tps3443 said:

Once I get a block so I can tear my card apart, I’m going to solder on the shunt. This will make a massive difference for all 5090’s in their internal effective clock speed.

 

True, even the most average FE should beat a good sample 5090 if it is blocked and shunted. 🙂

 

Looking forward to before and after results.

3 hours ago, johnksss said:

Can you post some of your benchmarks of before and after showing gains? Shunting has to make sense and actually do something other than show more watts with worse performance. And going by effective clocks. I have yet to be above 3 ghz yet.

 

572.83 had my card not running the same, so on this card i did not use that driver.

Not sure if there are any blocks yet. I need to check. Also I remember flashing an Astral vbios and it did not unlock 1.1 volts for me. Now I wonder if that was really an Astral vbios.

 

I know over on the OC forums and 3Dmark, XOC/Shunt modded cards are dominating. For @tps3443, that block is crucial for shunting considering the, ah, tight margins on the FE cooler.

 

Here is my Astral vBIOS. Give it a whirl everybody....hopefully you all get awesome performance out of it.

 

2 hours ago, jaybee83 said:

wondering though if this difference in max reachable voltage actually gives u guys anything extra? especially with that power limit in place... now, where ddid i put that XOC vbios again....must be somewhere here..... 😛 

 

Oh you dropped it. Here you go... 🤣

Astral5090.rom

4 hours ago, johnksss said:

Without the slider, its 1.085V and with slider, it's 1.110V

And my PCIE slot voltage and 16-Pin voltage go no lower than 12.1. While my other card dipped in the 11.8 to 11.9 range.

Please be a good card.😂

 

Banger of a card @johnksss especially if you block it.

 

My Astral is in the neighborhood but your clocks are the chef's kiss! Mine is clocking very nicely, so I know yours is going to go to that next level especially if you block it and shunt/XOC it.

 

 

(FYI, this is my first time punching either boost lock or voltage slider)

 

Stock boost lock:

 

 

voltage slider in "fun times" mode:

 

 

20 minutes ago, tps3443 said:

I really wanted my whole system to be watercooled when I was building this rig and I had kinda prepped with the 4090. We just don’t have any blocks yet for FE models. So, I had already ordered my Fujipoly fullcover rear thermal pad (Originally for the 4090 never used it) but now I’ve ordered some shunts, but I can’t add any of these items until I get a waterblock. FE blocks are taking a little longer than the other models, but they’re coming. I’m really curious what the Bitspower block will even look like. 

 

Do you plan on getting a block though? Are you going to shunt first and run it on the stock HSF? It's gonna kill me seeing you tear it apart especially as I'm sitting here showing my buddy over FT how quiet a FE CAN be with the 5080 FE.