1
00:00:00,080 --> 00:00:06,799
obviously over the next couple of years we're going to be building a ton of sick

2
00:00:04,000 --> 00:00:12,480
water cooled gaming rigs using rtx 3000 series graphics cards like this one

3
00:00:09,840 --> 00:00:19,279
but while in the past we were able to use the old rule of thumb which is about

4
00:00:15,679 --> 00:00:21,840
one 120 millimeter worth of radiator per

5
00:00:19,279 --> 00:00:28,160
heat generating component in the system i don't necessarily think that the rules

6
00:00:24,720 --> 00:00:31,840
of it should work necessarily apply to

7
00:00:28,160 --> 00:00:35,280
the rtx 3000s particularly the power

8
00:00:31,840 --> 00:00:37,440
hungry and enormous rtx 3090. so today's

9
00:00:35,280 --> 00:00:42,000
video is going to be us taking you along for the journey of some work that we

10
00:00:39,360 --> 00:00:48,640
would have had to do anyway figuring out exactly how much radiator we need for a

11
00:00:45,520 --> 00:00:51,840
water cooled rtx 3090 we're going to

12
00:00:48,640 --> 00:00:53,600
start with a slim single which probably

13
00:00:51,840 --> 00:00:58,960
ain't going to work and work our way all the way up to well realistically

14
00:00:56,079 --> 00:01:02,160
whatever it takes just like i'll do whatever it takes to transition to our

15
00:01:01,120 --> 00:01:06,240
sponsor ridge wallet wants to redefine the

16
00:01:04,239 --> 00:01:09,760
wallet with its compact frame and rfid blocking plates check out how they can

17
00:01:08,000 --> 00:01:16,400
keep your wallet bulge down and use offer code Linus to save 10 and get free

18
00:01:12,320 --> 00:01:16,400
worldwide shipping at the link below

19
00:01:23,920 --> 00:01:30,320
before we can water cool it though we need to figure out how well the system performs when it's just air cooled so

20
00:01:29,200 --> 00:01:34,960
for the testing we're going to be using this ASUS strix rtx 3090 you might

21
00:01:32,720 --> 00:01:38,799
remember it from our is sli actually dead video it

22
00:01:36,479 --> 00:01:43,040
basically is so yeah let's just chuck it in here and find out how well she goes

23
00:01:40,640 --> 00:01:47,280
our fan config in this case is a bit overkill if i'm honest uh we have three

24
00:01:45,600 --> 00:01:50,560
fans in the base that are just blowing straight up into it and three fans up

25
00:01:48,799 --> 00:01:55,280
here and three they're blowing up there nine in total it's a bit ridiculous

26
00:01:53,840 --> 00:01:59,200
the same time like you know you want best case scenario for your card so

27
00:01:57,200 --> 00:02:03,600
we've got our test set up here just a very simple time spy extreme we're going

28
00:02:01,360 --> 00:02:09,200
to enable looping and let it go for 30 minutes

29
00:02:06,079 --> 00:02:10,250
it's been 30 minutes just 32 at this

30
00:02:09,200 --> 00:02:15,120
point and what oh my god you piece of crap why is

31
00:02:13,520 --> 00:02:20,160
there no monitoring data yeah i have to do it again well see you tomorrow

32
00:02:18,160 --> 00:02:24,160
okay testing's done it looks like we don't have any issues with thermal

33
00:02:22,000 --> 00:02:29,120
throttling whatsoever so hovering right around 1800 megahertz and

34
00:02:27,520 --> 00:02:31,520
let's see here but come on

35
00:02:31,680 --> 00:02:37,040
what a beautiful card i haven't been this excited to take something apart for

36
00:02:34,959 --> 00:02:40,480
a really long time this is my first look at the inside of an ampere card and what

37
00:02:39,360 --> 00:02:45,920
a beauty i'm going to be using the ek quantum

38
00:02:42,959 --> 00:02:49,720
vector today to water cool it here's the back plate

39
00:02:51,760 --> 00:02:58,480
oh that's actually really nice damn look at that

40
00:02:56,080 --> 00:03:03,519
oh that's just so nicely machined the real star of the show here yes water

41
00:03:01,040 --> 00:03:07,920
blocks 175 that's enough to buy yourself

42
00:03:05,280 --> 00:03:12,159
a pretty decent GPU but you know you've already got 30 90. so who cares

43
00:03:10,080 --> 00:03:15,920
everything should be cnc machined i was hoping that we'd get a see-through one

44
00:03:13,760 --> 00:03:19,120
this is kind of a pre-production block so we don't have you know

45
00:03:17,599 --> 00:03:23,760
the things you might expect it to include like instructions

46
00:03:21,599 --> 00:03:28,800
this is all that i've got it's a little pdf that includes where the thermal pads

47
00:03:26,640 --> 00:03:33,840
go and that's it that's all we get probably

48
00:03:30,720 --> 00:03:33,840
going to be fine

49
00:03:34,000 --> 00:03:39,040
all right all the thermal pads are on

50
00:03:37,040 --> 00:03:46,519
finally get to just apply some thermal paste

51
00:03:41,440 --> 00:03:46,519
get it all over here oh wow

52
00:03:52,640 --> 00:03:59,519
huh all of these mounting holes don't quite line up on the block because of

53
00:03:57,120 --> 00:04:05,120
these two capacitors right here yeah this is bad so should we

54
00:04:02,879 --> 00:04:07,439
yes oh

55
00:04:09,120 --> 00:04:15,280
oh garlic okay we should

56
00:04:13,519 --> 00:04:19,280
we should have the clearance now but hopefully by the time you know actual

57
00:04:17,359 --> 00:04:23,919
real people get this they don't have to do that even with a

58
00:04:21,600 --> 00:04:28,400
water block on it the thing is still huge yeah massive shout out to ek by the

59
00:04:26,880 --> 00:04:34,320
way for sending us over one of their first vector strix blocks for the rtx

60
00:04:31,199 --> 00:04:37,280
3090 from ASUS um

61
00:04:34,320 --> 00:04:40,639
it did come with some growing pains in terms of installation

62
00:04:39,199 --> 00:04:45,600
they actually hadn't accounted for a couple capacitors here so we had to make

63
00:04:43,520 --> 00:04:50,080
our own clearance for them but now that it's on theoretically i think we should

64
00:04:47,360 --> 00:04:54,400
be okay so this is as simple as let's fire it up and get going yeah power this

65
00:04:52,000 --> 00:04:56,639
puppy up we're gonna need not one not two

66
00:04:55,280 --> 00:05:00,400
but three eight pin pci express connectors

67
00:04:59,199 --> 00:05:04,479
and then i've gone ahead and installed the plugs down here and we're gonna throw some fittings on here and build

68
00:05:03,280 --> 00:05:08,320
ourselves the dirtiest water cooling loop that you

69
00:05:07,120 --> 00:05:14,160
ever did see i mean not literally dirty it's going to have clean water in it but just

70
00:05:12,560 --> 00:05:18,400
kind of guts spilling all over the table style obviously NVIDIA's last few

71
00:05:16,560 --> 00:05:23,520
generations of graphics cards have thermal throttle that about 80 degrees

72
00:05:20,800 --> 00:05:28,320
so effectively that you can't really use temperatures to determine if a cooling

73
00:05:25,840 --> 00:05:32,560
solution is adequate nowadays you have to just monitor the boost clocks that

74
00:05:30,240 --> 00:05:38,000
the card runs at to see if it's reaching its full potential so this air cooled

75
00:05:35,520 --> 00:05:42,560
rtx 3090 from ASUS represents the numbers that we actually already ran on

76
00:05:40,720 --> 00:05:46,960
this exact card because there are variances from one to the other and

77
00:05:44,400 --> 00:05:51,680
that'll tell us how much radiator reaches the threshold of the air cooler

78
00:05:49,120 --> 00:05:55,440
and then how much radiator we need to if there is any more headroom exceed it

79
00:05:53,759 --> 00:05:59,919
for convenience we're using one of these pump reservoir combo units these really

80
00:05:57,520 --> 00:06:03,680
are the fastest way to fill up a loop and get all the bubbles out of it

81
00:06:01,280 --> 00:06:07,680
because the water goes directly into the inlet of the pump and you've got this

82
00:06:05,440 --> 00:06:12,160
little anti-vortex thing down here in the bottom that helps the bubbles make

83
00:06:10,160 --> 00:06:17,360
their way out of the liquid one thing to watch out for is modern GPU blocks like

84
00:06:15,039 --> 00:06:21,840
CPU blocks can be directional so this particular one has the inlet on the left

85
00:06:19,440 --> 00:06:25,600
here so the water flows down into the cold plate and then it actually splits

86
00:06:23,919 --> 00:06:29,919
and flows along two different paths to help with flow restriction boy when we

87
00:06:27,360 --> 00:06:35,120
build an ugly loop we build an ugly loop that's not that bad Linus this sag is

88
00:06:32,160 --> 00:06:38,880
something else that's pretty bad card looks curved

89
00:06:36,880 --> 00:06:43,440
that's okay though because you know you can make yourself feel better with a

90
00:06:41,039 --> 00:06:46,960
refreshing drink from lttstore.com hey there it is all right to keep our

91
00:06:45,039 --> 00:06:50,960
results consistent the pump is going to be run at full speed all the time and

92
00:06:49,039 --> 00:06:55,280
then our fan for the radiator or radiators is going to go to the system

93
00:06:53,840 --> 00:06:58,720
fan header and we're going to configure it in the BIOS so that they're all

94
00:06:56,960 --> 00:07:03,199
running at about i don't know what's reasonable like 1200 RPM i think is a

95
00:07:00,800 --> 00:07:06,400
good balance between noise and cooling so we'll go with that look at all those

96
00:07:04,639 --> 00:07:11,360
bubbles in there you got to get them out see now it's grabbing that water oh this is

97
00:07:09,599 --> 00:07:16,639
great we were fighting with smart fan mode with all these different temperatures which by the way is very

98
00:07:14,160 --> 00:07:20,880
cool and you know different fan rpms but you can just turn it off that's not a

99
00:07:18,639 --> 00:07:26,240
drop down it's a check mark and you can just set it 50 which gives

100
00:07:23,120 --> 00:07:29,199
us around 1100 RPM on this fan which is

101
00:07:26,240 --> 00:07:33,440
pretty quiet like but then the main reason that you go water cooling these

102
00:07:30,880 --> 00:07:37,120
days is of course a for looks and b for quieter operation if you don't want it

103
00:07:34,880 --> 00:07:40,000
quiet don't water cool i mean it's gotta where is it look at the cooler on this

104
00:07:39,120 --> 00:07:45,680
thing like so yeah that's what we're gonna settle

105
00:07:42,960 --> 00:07:51,440
on it's pretty crazy to see an rtx 39d even at idle running at 32 degrees

106
00:07:48,560 --> 00:07:54,400
celsius damn dang and that's even with room temperature

107
00:07:53,120 --> 00:08:00,319
water that we put in here because we didn't want to wait forever for it to heat up and reach equilibrium

108
00:07:57,759 --> 00:08:03,840
good luck little radiator okay i'm rooting for you buddy i'm gonna take

109
00:08:02,319 --> 00:08:09,680
lunch we returned from lunch to find our system black screened and unresponsive

110
00:08:07,840 --> 00:08:14,400
thankfully our data logging still worked and we discovered that our GPU shot up

111
00:08:11,599 --> 00:08:18,800
to 87 degrees immediately after the test started which is obviously not right

112
00:08:16,639 --> 00:08:23,520
even with an inadequate radiator the water would still need time to heat up

113
00:08:22,720 --> 00:08:29,039
so upon further investigation we discovered

114
00:08:26,080 --> 00:08:34,240
that in ek's mad rush presumably to get us one of these blocks ahead of retail

115
00:08:30,800 --> 00:08:36,399
availability they the block is great but

116
00:08:34,240 --> 00:08:41,120
they appear to have made a small boo-boo and sent us two millimeter rather than

117
00:08:38,880 --> 00:08:46,720
one millimeter thermal pads so here's the one they sent us against a one mil

118
00:08:44,240 --> 00:08:50,959
what that did was actually prevented the GPU from making proper contact you can

119
00:08:49,120 --> 00:08:53,839
see we've done a test fit now and everything's doing great with the one

120
00:08:52,320 --> 00:08:57,519
mils so we just need to remount this and take another crack at it ow

121
00:08:57,839 --> 00:09:00,880
it's really hot

122
00:09:00,959 --> 00:09:08,080
that's not quite as bad but the tanks on the sides of the radiator

123
00:09:05,680 --> 00:09:11,920
i'm surprised we changed our test methodology long story but we're using

124
00:09:10,480 --> 00:09:14,959
fur mark and letting it reach equilibrium then logging for five

125
00:09:13,680 --> 00:09:20,760
minutes and it's like turboing completely to two gigahertz and

126
00:09:19,279 --> 00:09:25,839
maxing out it 66 degrees

127
00:09:23,600 --> 00:09:30,240
in fact what's weird is like the back of the GPU we put some tape on it to deal

128
00:09:27,839 --> 00:09:34,640
with the reflectiveness of the of the back plate there

129
00:09:32,000 --> 00:09:40,480
so the GPU itself is actually running at around the same temperature

130
00:09:36,480 --> 00:09:42,399
as the back of the like back plate crazy

131
00:09:40,480 --> 00:09:46,959
that RAM on the back of the card must get freaking toasty maybe we shouldn't

132
00:09:44,959 --> 00:09:54,000
be that surprised though i mean we've seen a 1080 ti and what an 8600k on a

133
00:09:51,040 --> 00:09:56,560
single 8700k on a single 120 millimeter radiator

134
00:09:55,200 --> 00:10:02,480
that's not to say though that we think this is ideal let's see how much better

135
00:09:59,120 --> 00:10:02,480
we can do with a better rad

136
00:10:03,519 --> 00:10:09,600
to say our results from the thick single were a disappointment would be an

137
00:10:07,120 --> 00:10:14,160
understatement we got basically the exact same temps even though we amped up

138
00:10:12,320 --> 00:10:18,560
the thickness of our radiator although if you think about it it does kind of

139
00:10:16,240 --> 00:10:23,279
make sense because we are adding some more surface area but we're also adding

140
00:10:21,120 --> 00:10:28,000
more restriction to the airflow so you tend to need higher RPM or higher static

141
00:10:26,000 --> 00:10:31,440
pressure fans to get the most out of thicker rads actually here's another

142
00:10:29,760 --> 00:10:35,120
thing i didn't notice until i went to do that b-roll shot showing the relative

143
00:10:33,680 --> 00:10:38,560
thickness the high-performance thicker one

144
00:10:36,959 --> 00:10:42,800
actually has kind of like a built-in shroud so you can see there's more space

145
00:10:40,959 --> 00:10:45,360
between where it screws in where the fin stack is

146
00:10:44,160 --> 00:10:51,040
so the difference in thickness of the actual cooling element is not as much

147
00:10:49,760 --> 00:10:55,040
you can see it also has a much more dense fin arrangement it's possible then

148
00:10:53,120 --> 00:10:59,120
that a more powerful fan could have improved our results with the thicker

149
00:10:56,560 --> 00:11:02,160
radiator but not to the degree that we'd be getting temperatures that i'd be

150
00:11:00,880 --> 00:11:07,279
happy with on water cooling so let's move on to a

151
00:11:04,800 --> 00:11:12,880
dual 120 millimeter radiator this is also of the dense fin thicker variety

152
00:11:10,240 --> 00:11:17,680
come on pump you can do it half an hour into our dual rad i gotta

153
00:11:15,120 --> 00:11:23,440
say i am blown away like i knew it was gonna perform better two fans is

154
00:11:20,000 --> 00:11:28,560
definitely better than one but wow we

155
00:11:23,440 --> 00:11:32,320
went from 66 degrees down to 48

156
00:11:28,560 --> 00:11:34,560
degrees that's almost a 20 degree drop

157
00:11:32,320 --> 00:11:39,040
just by adding a little bit more radiator surface area so without testing

158
00:11:36,959 --> 00:11:43,519
the triple i can already say that this is probably going to be the sweet spot

159
00:11:40,959 --> 00:11:46,240
for performance and noise just because i'm not expecting a big

160
00:11:44,880 --> 00:11:52,160
difference in performance this time around though doesn't mean i can skip out on testing the triple what you get

161
00:11:49,839 --> 00:11:56,800
with an overkill-sized radiator in addition to potentially lower coolant

162
00:11:54,000 --> 00:12:00,160
temperatures is more headroom for optimizing your system for example if

163
00:11:59,120 --> 00:12:04,480
you've got restrictive grills on your case a larger

164
00:12:02,640 --> 00:12:08,240
radiator can help compensate for less airflow in the same way you could just

165
00:12:06,480 --> 00:12:12,800
turn your fan speeds down if you wanted your system to operate more quietly

166
00:12:10,240 --> 00:12:16,079
finally of course there's the f word future proofing

167
00:12:14,240 --> 00:12:20,000
if you've got a larger radiator and you do decide to add another component to

168
00:12:18,000 --> 00:12:24,320
your loop down the road it's more likely that you'll be able to do so without

169
00:12:22,079 --> 00:12:28,480
changing out your rad as expected we only dropped about four degrees this

170
00:12:26,000 --> 00:12:33,200
time telling us that our sweet spot really is a double radiator but if we

171
00:12:31,200 --> 00:12:35,839
wanted some room to grow or we knew that we were going to be giving up a bunch of

172
00:12:34,560 --> 00:12:41,120
our airflow to something like a restrictive fan filter then a triple

173
00:12:38,240 --> 00:12:45,360
would be a great bet for an rtx 3090. this is crazy because

174
00:12:43,200 --> 00:12:50,839
that means that doing small form factor machines with a high performance CPU

175
00:12:47,920 --> 00:12:56,639
and an rtx 3090 is basically going to require either a dual and a single or

176
00:12:54,160 --> 00:13:01,120
two triples and remember too that the scenario we're testing here assumes that

177
00:12:59,200 --> 00:13:06,639
our radiators are going to have access to fresh air sometimes they're going to

178
00:13:03,519 --> 00:13:09,680
have a mixture of fresh air and case air

179
00:13:06,639 --> 00:13:11,839
in fact like you see in a case like this

180
00:13:09,680 --> 00:13:16,320
one where there's kind of like a gap between the back panel and the fans

181
00:13:14,000 --> 00:13:20,639
where it can kind of mix what comes in through the grill and what's already

182
00:13:18,399 --> 00:13:23,519
present in the case so

183
00:13:21,600 --> 00:13:26,880
now we know just like we all knew that i was going

184
00:13:25,200 --> 00:13:32,399
to use this opportunity to tell you about our sponsor micro center promises

185
00:13:29,839 --> 00:13:36,560
you the best prices and selection across any of their 25 locations across the

186
00:13:34,800 --> 00:13:40,959
united states you can join the new microcenter community to give and

187
00:13:38,560 --> 00:13:45,279
receive advice on pc part selection and hardware and you can check out their

188
00:13:42,639 --> 00:13:48,720
custom pc builder configurator just check out the link in the video

189
00:13:46,560 --> 00:13:54,639
description for a free 32 gig flash drive and 32 gig micro sd card valid in

190
00:13:51,680 --> 00:13:58,480
store only no purchase necessary if you guys enjoyed this video you might

191
00:13:56,399 --> 00:14:02,320
enjoy other water cooling experiments like oh shoot i don't know if this one's

192
00:14:00,240 --> 00:14:07,199
going to be up yet by the time you guys watch this but uh

193
00:14:04,959 --> 00:14:11,199
what what in the heck is this thing ml360 sub-zero