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EVGA screwed up ACX on the 970.

TaintedSquirrel

TaintedSquirrel

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EVGA'S RESPONSE: www.reddit.com/r/hardware/comments/2h32xb/the_acx_cooler_used_on_the_evga_gtx_970_appears/ckpkbye

Hello everyone,

The way the EVGA GTX 970 ACX heat sink was designed is based on the GTX 970 wattage plus an additional 40% cooling headroom on top of it. There are 3 heat pipes on the heatsink – 2 x 8mm major heat pipes to distribute the majority of the heat from the GPU to the heatsink, and a 3rd 6mm heatpipe is used as a supplement to the design to reduce another 2-3 degrees Celsius. Also we would like to mention that the cooler passed NVIDIA Greenlight specifications.

Due to the GPU small die size, we intended for the GPU to contact two major heat pipes with direct touch to make the best heat dissipation without any other material in between.

We all know the Maxwell GPU is an extremely power efficient GPU, our SC cooler was overbuilt for it and allowed us to provide cards with boost clocks at over 1300MHz. EVGA also has an “FTW” version for those users who want even higher clocks.

http://www.evga.com/images/forum/precision_gtx970sc.png

Regarding fan noise, we understand that some have expressed concerns over the fan noise on the EVGA GTX 970 cards, this is not a fan noise issue but it is more of an aggressive fan curve set by the default BIOS. The fan curve can be easily adjusted in EVGA PrecisionX or any other overclocking software. Regardless, we have heard the concerns and will provide a BIOS update to reduce the fan noise during idle.

Thanks,
EVGA
Click to expand...

TechPowerup: http://i.imgur.com/acvOFnY.jpg
Bit-Tech: http://i.imgur.com/O63MVHx.jpg

Similar to the issue the ASUS 290/290X had, the heatpipes don't seem to be making full contact and as a result is causing temp/noise problems.

Here's hoping for a new revision from EVGA.
 
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Great, just great. Both of mine will be delivered tomorrow. I guess I have to return them now.
 
What am I looking for? Am I missing something. I'm not familiar with their ACX cooler. :confused:
 
It's the same heatsink they used on the GTX 760 which had the same issue (and a smaller die with GK104) -
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/EVGA/GTX_760_SC_ACX_Cooler/5.html
And since the PCB design is the same as well (well layout wise roughly) you get this problem carrying over.

The issue is compounded as well because heatpipes work via temperature differential however one of the contacting heatpipes is shared with the VRMs.

Also if you want to compare with other direct contact heatsinks like Asus 970 the heatpipes are much closer together on those as well - http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/GTX_970_STRIX_OC/images/cooler2.jpg

Lord_Exodia said:
What am I looking for? Am I missing something. I'm not familiar with their ACX cooler. :confused:
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If you look at the thermal paste on the heatsink after lifting it off it's clear that the GPU die is not making contact with all the heatpipes.
 
Really glad I cancelled my order of 2 of these from Amazon. I always swear by EVGA, but they really dropped the ball with this cooler. Now if Amazon would just get some ASUS Strix models back in stock, so they could ship mine out.
 
limitedaccess said:
If you look at the thermal paste on the heatsink after lifting it off it's clear that the GPU die is not making contact with all the heatpipes.
Click to expand...

The GPU isn't even big enough to make contact with 3.

And if you moved the GPU over to the 3rd heatpipe.. It would be making less contact. This is the correct and optimal way.
 
Dion said:
The GPU isn't even big enough to make contact with 3.

And if you moved the GPU over to the 3rd heatpipe.. It would be making less contact. This is the correct and optimal way.
Click to expand...

The optimal way is to either do what Asus does here and by using better sized heatpipes and spacing them closer together - http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/GTX_970_STRIX_OC/images/cooler2.jpg

Or to use a copper plate instead of direct contact which is what the heatsinks from MSI and Gigabyte use (and I assume everyone else). This is also what they did for the ACX on the GTX 770 and higher (http://www.fudzilla.com/images/stories/Reviews/Graphics/Nvidia/Kepler/770/SC_ACX/acx-5.jpg). The ACX on the 980 might use this design as well instead.
 
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Read a few reviews and EVGA uses lower end components which is why they have that annoying electrical buzzing noise so many have complained about.
The only EVGA card I bought was a 660 and it was shit out of the box and messed up my system.

I am leery to ever try them again.

Sadly though I believe they are the only ones that offer a reference blower, all the rest have custom coolers which are a mile long.
 
I assume this applies to both the ACX and the ACX 2.0, since there doesn't seem to have been much of a change to the heatsink between them?
 
Armisael said:
I assume this applies to both the ACX and the ACX 2.0, since there doesn't seem to have been much of a change to the heatsink between them?
Click to expand...

The difference with ACX 1.0 vs 2.0 is the fans.

The reviewed samples all seem to be the ACX 2.0 version so far.

ep0x73 said:
Read a few reviews and EVGA uses lower end components which is why they have that annoying electrical buzzing noise so many have complained about.
The only EVGA card I bought was a 660 and it was shit out of the box and messed up my system.

I am leery to ever try them again.

Sadly though I believe they are the only ones that offer a reference blower, all the rest have custom coolers which are a mile long.
Click to expand...

MSI and PNY have a blower style cooler as well.

To give credit (where due) however one advantage of the ACX (and some of the design choices) is that it is relatively compact compared to the other custom offerings.
 
My lord. I literally just ordered My 970 ACX 2.0 SSC today...

Any ideas on a decent 970 to order anyone? I stay away from Gigabyte because of bad experiences, Zotac cause well....Zotac. MSI gaming 970 is at least $40 more expensive for me...and I just put down $200 on the EVGA

Aw man I just want something that's a great all rounder :(
 
runudownquick said:
My lord. I literally just ordered My 970 ACX 2.0 SSC today...

Any ideas on a decent 970 to order anyone? I stay away from Gigabyte because of bad experiences, Zotac cause well....Zotac. MSI gaming 970 is at least $40 more expensive for me...and I just put down $200 on the EVGA

Aw man I just want something that's a great all rounder :(
Click to expand...

ASUS Strix is probably your best option. Its MSRP is only $339, and has a much better cooler and power delivery thsn the EVGA. The downside is that ASUS customer service isn't exactly well received around these parts (for valid reasons). They make really solid products, so you probably won't ever have to worry about their support. If you get unlucky though, it may not be a great experience.
 
Point taken, but the gpu die doesn't look big enough to actually span all 3.
 
runudownquick said:
My lord. I literally just ordered My 970 ACX 2.0 SSC today...

Any ideas on a decent 970 to order anyone? I stay away from Gigabyte because of bad experiences, Zotac cause well....Zotac. MSI gaming 970 is at least $40 more expensive for me...and I just put down $200 on the EVGA

Aw man I just want something that's a great all rounder :(
Click to expand...

We do need some perspective here though. Yes the competitor products look to be better designed and EVGAs design could be better but it still is acceptable (if you want to use that term) and not flawed in an ineffective way (or critical way).

You're still also getting some tangible service benefits (step up, cross shipping warranty) and the reputable warranty service.

xorbe said:
Point taken, but the gpu die doesn't look big enough to actually span all 3.
Click to expand...

There are however alternatives ways to design the contact area for better effectiveness as shown by competitors and even themselves. I've given examples earlier.
 
I have one of these cards in the ACX 1.0 form, I don't think they screwed up on the ACX as bad as people are saying. Heat will still transfer through the block and through the pipes. If you look here, the pipes aren't sitting directly on the die either: http://www.fudzilla.com/images/stories/Reviews/Graphics/Nvidia/Kepler/770/SC_ACX/acx-5.jpg The cooler on mine works better than expected and the fans are quiet.

Having said that, I am sending the card back to Amazon due to coil whine. When VSync is off and the card is sitting in a menu or I am playing a game and getting like 120+ FPS, it sounds like someone stepping on a rodent :( The top of my case is open with exhaust fans, and the case is on the floor to my side. Anything making noise inside the PC comes right up through the top.
 
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Maybe not screwed - after all it works, and cards get to nice clocks, but I admit, they got bit lazy at their design, compared to Twin Frozer V or Strix cooling. And not only in cooling, but in build quality of the card either. Quoting Bit-tech.net: "On the other side of the GPU is a metal contact plate that partirally cools two of the four memory chips on this side, leaving the other two exposed. It also cools the MOSFETs of the power phases serving the memory, but no thermal pads are used, so heat transfer is likely to be limited."

It looks like that someone at managment decided that it's time to cut the cost and ride on word of mouth and general opinion. It usally started at every company - even Corsair had some problems with their quality too.

Was going to get the EVGA, but after all the reviews and opinions, I'm going with MSI.
 
Is this a storm in a teacup, or does this actually mean these cards have inferior temps to others? Not that I care much, EVGA abandoned the market here years ago.
 
I had totaly forgot about coil whine, my old EVGA gtx 570 had that and it bugged the hell out of me, was planing to buy a EVGA 970 in a week or 2 but ya Cant deal with that sound lol. Any idea what other brands that use better parts? Was only thinking about EVGA till i read this post so not sure which brand to go with now
 
EVGA maintains their awesome CS by cutting corners everywhere else.
ASUS Strix is probably the best 970, shame ASUS sucks at everything else.
 
TaintedSquirrel said:
EVGA maintains their awesome CS by cutting corners everywhere else.
ASUS Strix is probably the best 970, shame ASUS sucks at everything else.
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Certainly unfortunate EVGA doesn't have a card like the Strix. I am stuck between the Asus Strix and the MSI Gaming card now. I swore off Asus everything after some bad support experiences, however I don't want to spend the extra $20 for the MSI Gaming card... I'd be happy as heck with my EVGA if it didn't squeal.
 
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I believe I commented on this here, but I've been calling it out since Friday on OCN and had finally posted a summary Saturday night (9/20) after people kept asking about the issues I had mentioned prior, in the main review news thread:

http://www.overclock.net/t/1513723/various-nvidia-gtx-980-970-reviews/4040_40#post_22881537
Razzaa said:
Not sure if you posted but what was defective about it?
Click to expand...

Tec Savy said:
Yes, please share your feedback. What defects you found and why you don't like it? Looking forward to your reply. :)
Click to expand...

9/20 summary post I had made:
GoldenTiger's summary from a couple of days ago said:
One of the two fans on the first card would run at full tilt (it's actually noisier than my properly-working card is if I set it to 100% even!) regardless of fan speed setting, beginning at POST from cold boot. I actually think the busted fan on the first card was running overvolted somehow :(.

In addition to the actual defective part on one of the cards, there are a host of issues with the evga design unfortunately :(:

The heatsink doesn't make proper contact with the core by design, and the vrm/volt controller are of low quality (and only 4-phase rather than 6 on other custom designs) as discussed here by TPU's review: http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/EVGA/GTX_970_SC_ACX_Cooler/4.html Look at the picture and you can see it only contacts about two of the three heatpipes. http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/EVGA/GTX_970_SC_ACX_Cooler/images/cooler2.jpg

The fans aren't as quiet as other models, talked about here: http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/EVGA/GTX_970_SC_ACX_Cooler/24.html

And finally there is a coil whine present by multiple user reports and a review here: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2014/09/19/nvidia-geforce-gtx-970-review/14
Bit-tech quote:
"For those of you interested in small form factors, the EVGA GTX 970 SC ACX2 is a good option, as the height of the card does not extend past the edge of the PCI bracket, which can be an issue in certain mini-ITX cases. More generally speaking, it's also the fastest card out of the box, so if you're not interested in overclocking yourself then that's good reason to go for it. However, we dislike the small but apparent noise emitted from the power circuitry under load. It won't affect everyone – only those with otherwise quiet systems or with their PC right next to them, but it does put us off.
Click to expand...
 
TaintedSquirrel said:
So... Did you email EVGA?
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Did I, about their design flaws? Why and who would I have mailed to about it? :) I cancelled my rma on the card with the defective fan and both the working & defective one are going back to amazon. In their stead a pair of MSI Gaming GTX 970 cards are in a UPS package due on Thursday for me at a lower price :).
 
GoldenTiger said:
Did I, about their design flaws? Why and who would I have mailed to about it? :) I cancelled my rma on the card with the defective fan and both the working & defective one are going back to amazon. In their stead a pair of MSI Gaming GTX 970 cards are in a UPS package due on Thursday for me at a lower price :).
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Where did you order those from?
 
Thank you for this post , Glad I saw this now since my order for the EVGA 04G-P4-0974-KR on Amazon was place I had time to cancel.

Place an order for the ASUS STRIX-GTX970-DC2OC-4GD5 , Plus the Asus comes with the backplate.:D

Did I make the right decision?:confused::eek:
 
ocellaris said:
Where did you order those from?
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The new MSI Gaming's I grabbed from newegg business, total price out the door will have ended up as $655 shipped. My old amazon order was for $750 for the eVGA pair between their wrong refund adjustment between the preorder price and the launch price, and tax/shipping.

All in all, it worked out in the end... at least.

gabesir said:
Thank you for this post , Glad I saw this now since my order for the EVGA 04G-P4-0974-KR on Amazon was place I had time to cancel.

Place an order for the ASUS STRIX-GTX970-DC2OC-4GD5 , Plus the Asus comes with the backplate.:D

Did I make the right decision?:confused::eek:
Click to expand...

Definitely the right decision to switch, though I've heard asus slammed some lately on warranty.
 
I changed my UPS mychoice to hold the EVGA for pickup. (which I will never pickup:D ) and already ordered a Gigabyte GTX 980. I hate fan noise and most of all, coil whine.

I was looking at the pictures during the time when newegg first posted the cards and saw the odd location of the PCI-E 6 pin connections. That should have been a dead giveaway. 95% of the heat will be dependent on the first fan to dissipate since it is basically a modified short PCB. I bet that small Zotac card cools better than the EVGA. I almost bought 2 of them.
 
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Anyone know if the same issues pertain to the 980 acx 2.0?
 
cooler2.jpg


this is from the Asus Strix
 
once again I'm glad I went with the gtx 980 with the titan cooler
 
gabesir said:
[*IMG]http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/GTX_970_STRIX_OC/images/cooler2.jpg[/IMG]

this is from the Asus Strix
Click to expand...

And just to drive the point home, here's eVGA's ACX cooler (same between 1.0 and 2.0 except the fans themselves), completely off-center with one pipe not even touching and the chip hitting the baseplate, on an old design that doesn't even integrate the heatpipes into the base like new ones do:

DT6LB98.jpg
 
Wow, that's bad. So, non EVGA 970's are fine and all 980's (regardless of brand) don't have this problem, right?
 
addictedto60fps said:
Wow, that's bad. So, non EVGA 970's are fine and all 980's (regardless of brand) don't have this problem, right?
Click to expand...

Unknown on eVGA ACX 980's, but otherwise correct.

Currently:
All non EVGA 970's are fine.
All 980's are fine, with the possible exception of the EVGA ACX 980 (waiting on info).
 
GoldenTiger said:
The new MSI Gaming's I grabbed from newegg business, total price out the door will have ended up as $655 shipped. My old amazon order was for $750 for the eVGA pair between their wrong refund adjustment between the preorder price and the launch price, and tax/shipping.

All in all, it worked out in the end... at least.



Definitely the right decision to switch, though I've heard asus slammed some lately on warranty.
Click to expand...

I noticed in that thread you mentioned the Gigabyte G1, is it actually longer than the Gigabyte 780? I have the same case and I didn't think the 780 Windforce would fit but it actually fit in with some room to spare.

ocellaris said:
I have one of these cards in the ACX 1.0 form, I don't think they screwed up on the ACX as bad as people are saying. Heat will still transfer through the block and through the pipes. If you look here, the pipes aren't sitting directly on the die either: http://www.fudzilla.com/images/stories/Reviews/Graphics/Nvidia/Kepler/770/SC_ACX/acx-5.jpg The cooler on mine works better than expected and the fans are quiet.
Click to expand...

The copper baseplate acts a heatspreader so direct contact with the die (well alignment in this case) is less of an issue. Even so I believe those coolers still reviewed comparatively poorly last gen to the competition as well. Gigabyte and MSI use a baseplate on their respective heatsinks as well (although, bear in mind it is hard to tell atm) the alignment might be better.

I did some research and the heatsink on the GTX 970 FTW edition appears to be different. I haven't seen picks of the underside or it removed but the fin orientation is different than the other EVGA 970s. The 980 ACX is also a different heatsink as it too has different fin orientation.

BETA. said:
Anyone know if the same issues pertain to the 980 acx 2.0?
Click to expand...

To summarize basically what we know is as follows -

The EVGA 970 ACX use the same heatsink as the GTX 760 ACX. The difference between ACX 1.0 and 2.0 is the fans only.
The only exception is the 970 FTW which uses a different heatsink but not pictures are avaialble yet.
The 980 ACX also uses a different heatsink but not pictures are available yet.
 
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