re: So... EVGA ends partnership with Nvidia due to "disrespectful treatment"...

Sounds like more 4090's for me and Josh to choose from.

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I want to go water (hybrid or aio, not custom, probably...)

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I've only seen water cooled EVGA GPUs. How does their breakup with NVIDIA and GPUs in general affect finding this? I'm assuming other companies will make them.

Oh, and I don't think I'll be dropping 1600 on a GPU. But, never say never.

As an update, MSI announced a hybrid version of the 4090, using only a 240mm rad which is... a choice...

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Besides the air cooled versions of the SUPRIM series, this generation will also introduce a version with the name SUPRIM LIQUID. Only available on the GeForce RTX® 4090, this series applies a closed-loop liquid cooling system that keeps temperatures even lower to allow new levels of performance. The 240 mm radiator is cooled by a pair of MSI Silent Gale P12 120 mm fans, designed to provide massive air pressure at extremely low noise. A single TORX 5.0 fan on top of a dedicated heatsink ensures more than adequate cooling for the power delivery components.

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Looks sexy, though. But I can't fathom a 240 rad being able to handle that much wattage comfortably.

I explicitly recall Linus doing a video on this. Obviously, the 240mm rad performed better, but the 120mm rad was something like sub 70C with full boosting

Alright, believe I found the video: LINK

His testing methodology was frustrating, because he didn’t track boost clocks beyond saying that the 120 matched the air cooled variant. Which… isn’t why people buy water cooled cards

In his perfect case scenario in which the radiator has unlimited fresh ambient air with no restriction, the 120 rad hit 68c and the 240 hit 48c, which having spent a fair amount of time in the AfterBurner frequency tables would mean a significant uptick in boost clock compared to the 120. When he tested the 360 (again, in perfect conditions) it only dropped 4c from there.

What this shows is that with zero air restrictions, a 120 is still frankly insufficient, because there’s zero point to moving to water if you’re just seeking the same performance as air. It showed that a 240 is probably sufficient, for a 350w TDP card. If he would have bumped the power limit, I imagine the 360 would start pulling away.

And the 4090 starts at 450w out of the box. Bump the power limit in AB and you’re easily topping 500w.

Can you run that on a 240? Sure, you probably won’t thermally throttle. Will you get the level of enthusiast performance out of the card that someone paying a premium for water cooling is expecting, including climbing up the frequency curve? I very seriously doubt it, because if a 360 is gaining 4c on a 240 at 350w, it’s going to gain far more than that at 500w, and better temps means better clock speeds. Selling a 4090 with a 240 is almost certainly gimping performance. How much performance remains to be seen.

ETA: And his testing was done with a custom loop, not an aio. I would expect a further separation between rad sizes in a system with less water mass and less powerful pumps, which is what you would see with an aio.

Yep. And I think they are intentionally pricing this release to push people into clearing out 30 series stock.

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I envy you researching so much. I used to do that back in the day, and now I just don't have the energy for it.

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That kind of tech nerd deep dive is zen for me. I have a hard time shutting my brain off, so if you give me something just detail oriented and tedious enough, it will get my brain to focus on that, but it doesn't actually require much effort or energy.

Because believe me, I hear you on the lack of energy. The first time I sat down to game and was honest with myself that I just didn't have the energy for it made me feel very, very old

To revist the subject of AIO gpus in the 40 series, these are the ones that have been announced thus far, all 4090s:

MSI Suprim Liquid:



Colorful Neptune:



Inno3D iCHILL Black: