Recommended 680 GTX Cooler Style?

[poobah]

So for a 4,1 flashed to 5,1 which GTX 680 card is a better fit?

1) Asus CUII 4GB, twin fans
2) Elsa 4Gb, blower style (looks like reference design)

The Asus seems like a nicer card (really hefty looking cooler and has backplate), but the Elsa reference blower looks like it would perform better in getting hot air out of the case

Both have been flashed with the same ROM so clock speeds are not an issue.

Thoughts?

 

[AlexMaximus]

So for a 4,1 flashed to 5,1 which GTX 680 card is a better fit?

1) Asus CUII 4GB, twin fans
2) Elsa 4Gb, blower style (looks like reference design)

The Asus seems like a nicer card (really hefty looking cooler and has backplate), but the Elsa reference blower looks like it would perform better in getting hot air out of the case

Both have been flashed with the same ROM so clock speeds are not an issue.

Thoughts?

I used to have the EVGA Mac Edtion 680 in the reference design. Great card, the blower style worked great for me at that time. The Asus looks massive, you may run into problems with the neighboring PCIe cards, that could be a risk.
I didn't run into a GPU bottleneck at that time, not sure if there was any throttling because of heat during games.
The ASUS might be a bit better in cooling however, the hot air will be in the case longer and exhausted through the case fan. If you don't plan to retrofit a hybrid cooler where you would need the reference design, the Asus looks promising if space allows it.

 

[ActionableMango]

Thoughts?

That CUII looks like it takes up an extra slot. I wouldn't get it just because of that.

 

[poobah]

Both are 2 slot cards. I would have nothing adjacent to them.

 

[h9826790]

Both are 2 slot cards. I would have nothing adjacent to them.

View attachment 767885 View attachment 767886

Can you check (may be from the side way), if the VRM on the Asus card is properly cooled? Some Asus cards are well known has almost no cooling proved to the VRM. If that's the case, I will definitely prefer the blower type card more.

 

[poobah]

Can you check (may be from the side way), if the VRM on the Asus card is properly cooled? Some Asus cards are well known has almost no cooling proved to the VRM. If that's the case, I will definitely prefer the blower type card more.

So, hard to get a good image, towards the video out end of the card, there's a board mount heatsink in between some aluminum electrolytics and inductors that almost reach the actual cooler heatsink. At the rear near the PCIe power connectors, there's a lot of empty space (say 10mm) or so between the PCB and the cooler, about all I can see are some electrolytics, no VRM looking stuff.

 

[h9826790]

So, hard to get a good image, towards the video out end of the card, there's a board mount heatsink in between some aluminum electrolytics and inductors that almost reach the actual cooler heatsink. At the rear near the PCIe power connectors, there's a lot of empty space (say 10mm) or so between the PCB and the cooler, about all I can see are some electrolytics, no VRM looking stuff.

View attachment 767892 View attachment 767893

The VRM should locate close on the other end of the card. On a reference card, it looks like this

 

[AlexMaximus]

So, hard to get a good image, towards the video out end of the card, there's a board mount heatsink in between some aluminum electrolytics and inductors that almost reach the actual cooler heatsink. At the rear near the PCIe power connectors, there's a lot of empty space (say 10mm) or so between the PCB and the cooler, about all I can see are some electrolytics, no VRM looking stuff.

View attachment 767892 View attachment 767893

Would you ever consider a third party upgrade for a hybrid cooler? The attached video shows that the Nvidia default system fits in the 5.1 so
it might fit in the 3.1 as well. The Nvidia hybrid cooler upgrade (just the cooler) is not available any more, however Corsair offers a great option in a similar size. To tell you the truth, this spooks in my head for a long time, it would fit my 980 as well. I am tempted.
If low noise and efficient cooling is important for you, you may look into this option. If so, the reference card would be better.