Founder's Edition vs Custom cards

[DaHotFuzz]

I always hear how blower style cards ie Founder's edition cards are only ever recommended in small form factor builds because of how they are designed to expel heat from the back of the card, not inside the case where it can add excess heat to cramped components, however, does it really make any difference if you decided to use a blower style card in a mid-tower case that has ample air flow?

As much as I love and want my pc to remain cool while in use, I can't get over the fact that I'm not crazy about the custom designs from makers like MSI, Asus, Gigabyte, Zotac.. they just do not look aesthetically pleasing. The only one i'd consider getting is EVGA but my last two cards have been EVGA and I'd like something new. And from what I can tell, the founder's edition cards are super sexy. Their color and design can literally match any possible build. In fact, I've never seen a founder's edition card look bad in any build. Besides, the performance difference usually isn't THAT much more.

What are your thoughts on this guys?

[Mossy Snake]

The FE cards tend to be clocked lower and do run much hotter and louder.

Avoid them if you can.

Go with the EVGA card.

[Dr.Shadowds 🐉]

Blower type cards: louder, produce more heat, lack of variety for ports.

All heat is passed through the back of card, good for small/tiny builds.

Non-reference with open air cooler: quieter, reduse heat, more variety of ports.

Heat dissipate through the sides, and front of the fans, blowing around your case, good for mid towers, and bigger. Able to dissipate heat from the card quicker, than the blower type cards.

[[☥] - CJ -]

Blower coolers suck
No ifs ands or buts about it.

Easier to clean, but they still suck.

[ハムスター]

I have a Founder's Edition GTX1080 and have found it to be pretty good, it's really not that loud until the fan speed hits a certain %. But like it has been said they do get quite hot at times, the problem with that is that the 1080 then starts lowering itself slightly in speed, not by a great amount, but it still does it.

The thing is though the default fan curve that they use for things like a Founders Edition GTX1080 is actually kinda bad, the fan does not really speed up as much as it should which I assume was done to keep the system operating silently, if you ever do get a Founder’s Edition card be it because it’s a cheap option then you should make use of a custom fan curve that is a lot more aggressive and will keep your GPU from lowering down its speed because it reaches the temp target, the more aggressive fan curve will make things get loud though, I find that above 50% fan speed things become quite loud.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Just get a quality 3rd party one.

Like EVGA FTW3 ICX, EVGA HYBRID, or ASUS STRIX

[Big Boom Boom]

Galax HoF looks nice.

[Andrius227]

Depends on the cooling of the case.

If you have only 1 fan, then blower gpu is much better. If you have 3+ fans, then open air gpu is better.

[Bad 💀 Motha]

Still, if you need a Reference/Blower design, just go with one from ASUS or others that offer them. Why buy the "FE"

Those were just first-run versions of those GPUs is really all there is to those.

[[UFO] rad87gn]

The Reference cards have really good cooling abilities and overclocking abilities. Don't let anyone fool you. The build quality of them are really high. Nivida would do something different on their highest end cards if it sucked which they don't.

I've been buying them the last 2 video cards I've owned because I wanted the heat to go out the back. They run really quiet and cool very well. They overclock like any other card out there that is modded except for the supper overclock custom cards made to break records.

I've overclocked pretty high both the 980 and 1080 Founders I had and both did great for stability, quietness, and great performance. Long as you below max temps (86C or so) you can run them that hot for years no problem and perform well. Most times they are running way below those temps.

With the Founders Editiions I'm able to run my case fans on idle and game fine not even hearing it. Before with in-case big fans I had to run a lot of fan speed on the case to get the heat out of the system. It was very noisy.

[🦜Cloud Boy🦜]

引用自 DaHotFuzz：

I always hear how blower style cards ie Founder's edition cards are only ever recommended in small form factor builds because of how they are designed to expel heat from the back of the card, not inside the case where it can add excess heat to cramped components, however, does it really make any difference if you decided to use a blower style card in a mid-tower case that has ample air flow?

As much as I love and want my pc to remain cool while in use, I can't get over the fact that I'm not crazy about the custom designs from makers like MSI, Asus, Gigabyte, Zotac.. they just do not look aesthetically pleasing. The only one i'd consider getting is EVGA but my last two cards have been EVGA and I'd like something new. And from what I can tell, the founder's edition cards are super sexy. Their color and design can literally match any possible build. In fact, I've never seen a founder's edition card look bad in any build. Besides, the performance difference usually isn't THAT much more.

What are your thoughts on this guys?

If you don't overclock your card, then founders editions are not a bad choice. It is true that it will be more hot. If the Asus /Evga runs at 70-75°, then founder's editions will run at 75-80°. But who cares, that's far inside safe temperature .

[a Hippobottomus]

引用自 rad87gn：

The Reference cards have really good cooling abilities and overclocking abilities. Don't let anyone fool you. The build quality of them are really high. Nivida would do something different on their highest end cards if it sucked which they don't.

I've been buying them the last 2 video cards I've owned because I wanted the heat to go out the back. They run really quiet and cool very well. They overclock like any other card out there that is modded except for the supper overclock custom cards made to break records.

I've overclocked pretty high both the 980 and 1080 Founders I had and both did great for stability, quietness, and great performance. Long as you below max temps (86C or so) you can run them that hot for years no problem and perform well. Most times they are running way below those temps.

With the Founders Editiions I'm able to run my case fans on idle and game fine not even hearing it. Before with in-case big fans I had to run a lot of fan speed on the case to get the heat out of the system. It was very noisy.

I find this hard to believe, my old blower style R9 390X would reach 95c no matter what game i played.

[Omega]

引用自 a Hippobottomus：

I find this hard to believe, my old blower style R9 390X would reach 95c no matter what game i played.

Yes a 390x XD. Even with custom cards these things go up to 75c and higher during gaming. On a warm day mine goes up to 85c and then goes full jet engine.

[a Hippobottomus]

引用自 Omega：

引用自 a Hippobottomus：

I find this hard to believe, my old blower style R9 390X would reach 95c no matter what game i played.

Yes a 390x XD. Even with custom cards these things go up to 75c and higher during gaming. On a warm day mine goes up to 85c and then goes full jet engine.

I played the witcher 3 with a second monitor plugged in not displaying anything, and the card went into turbo mode, it was so loud i couldn’t hear people talking in the same room, got a video of it, too.