R9 290 VRM TIM material thickness recommendation

[Killrose]

Need R9 290 VRM TIM material thickness recommendation. I am thinking 1mm, what say you? Fujipoly premium (grey colored stuff) is what i'm thinking of using.

I have a reference 290 that i'm modding. I am using a Zalman VF3000a dual fan unit and am currently using it with-out heatsinks on the VRMs. Currently when I play Warthunder tank battles, the VRMs temps are VRM1 82c tops(usually in the low 70's), VRM2 52c tops with just the VF3000a fans blowing on them.

Furmark however I saw the VRM1 temp hit 120c and I about crapped me panties because I think that is near max operating temps for the VRMs. Dont want to go there again.

I have taken the stock cooler apart and removed the actuall heatsink/finned plate which is sweat soldered to the mounting frame. The mounting frame has heatsink pad locations for the VRMs that the factory positions the TIM material for the VRMs.

I like the idea of re-using the metal frame that was used to mount the cooler to the PCB because it keeps the PCB from flexing and possibly breaking a componet solder joint which would ruin the card and should work as a decent heatsink for the VRMs now that the heat from the GPU has been removed as a heat scource. I've got the metal frame modded for the VF3000a.

 

[MeldarthX]

never put tim on vrms; always used thermal tape with heat sinks with possible fan over them.

why thermal tape is used as using tim on the vrms could lead to a short out. get bigger heat sinks if needed and ghetto fan mod.

What were you doing to hit that temp?

Just reread........get some heatsinks on the vrms and that will control the temps. That's your problem; Zalman VF3000 will allow you to put heatsinks with it. Did it not come with any??

 

[LTC8K6]

Don't base cooling decisions on Furmark temps.

You can basically ignore Furmark temps. They don't reflect reality at all.

Do not add cooling to your VRMs because they got hot while running Furmark.

 

[Erenhardt]

Here is Gelid kit for 290 VRMs
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835426042

I have it on mine. But I never checked temps under furmark.

 

[Killrose]

never put tim on vrms; always used thermal tape with heat sinks with possible fan over them.

why thermal tape is used as using tim on the vrms could lead to a short out. get bigger heat sinks if needed and ghetto fan mod.

What were you doing to hit that temp?

Just reread........get some heatsinks on the vrms and that will control the temps. That's your problem; Zalman VF3000 will allow you to put heatsinks with it. Did it not come with any??

Ok, the factory uses a greyish thermal interface colored material between the heat plate and the VRMs which was damaged when I removed the heat plate, so I had no real idea as to what thickness it started out as. I am wanting to use the same type of material the factory uses that is non-conductive. My Zalman was originally designed to be used with an HD6970. ect, era card and came with a heatsink which I have just modded to work with my card. Zalman thermal paste was used as per the manual and my VRM1 temps are now mid 50c after hours of gaming as per gpu-z and the Zalman fan is running at just above the lowest setting of the Fan Mate 2 adjustable fan controller the VF3000a came with.

I did try a couple simultaneous runs of Furmark and the VRM1 temp was in the low 90c's after a few runs, where before it would have been 120c. That was with the cooler fans running low speed.

I really want to end up using the modded original heat plate frame because it will keep the video card PCB rigid, and it should do quite well as a heatsink for the VRMs.

 

[Killrose]

Here is Gelid kit for 290 VRMs
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835426042

I have it on mine. But I never checked temps under furmark.

I actually have one in the mail, but I could not wait and modded the VRM heatsink that came with the Zalman for the VRM1 and even modded a ram heatsink I had laying around for the VRM2 section.

it's going to be available for sale on ebay at a loss once I get it.....

 

[MeldarthX]

as I said that's thermal tape and not tim.....get heatsinks on them. Second wth are you running furmark its literally useless power virus. It doesn't reflect actual real world performance.

 

[thilanliyan]

Here is Gelid kit for 290 VRMs
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835426042

I have it on mine. But I never checked temps under furmark.

I also use that. Works pretty well for me with watercooling.

 

[MrTeal]

as I said that's thermal tape and not tim.....get heatsinks on them. Second wth are you running furmark its literally useless power virus. It doesn't reflect actual real world performance.

You're narrowing the scope of what qualifies as a thermal interface material (TIM) based on what you believe it means. Thermal greases and pastes are TIMs, but so are thermal tapes and thermal pads, even preformed indium pads and thermal epoxies. The OP's usage of the term is correct.

To the OP, I used a couple of the Gelid kits and they work well. You need something on there generally, but if you have the metal frame removed from the cooler, that should work well. I believe the original pads were 1mm, but it's been awhile. I can look when I get home.

 

[Killrose]

MrTeal, that would be great if you could check. And as per other responses i'll bag Furmark as a testing reference.

 

[MeldarthX]

You're narrowing the scope of what qualifies as a thermal interface material (TIM) based on what you believe it means. Thermal greases and pastes are TIMs, but so are thermal tapes and thermal pads, even preformed indium pads and thermal epoxies. The OP's usage of the term is correct.

To the OP, I used a couple of the Gelid kits and they work well. You need something on there generally, but if you have the metal frame removed from the cooler, that should work well. I believe the original pads were 1mm, but it's been awhile. I can look when I get home.

good point; lol I've been on earlies this week so brain is some what fried

 

[guskline]

I use Noctua NT-H1 tim but recently began using Gelid GC-Extreme.

 

[MrTeal]

Yeah, the stock pads on my reference 290 appears to be 1mm.

 

[Killrose]

Yeah, the stock pads on my reference 290 appears to be 1mm.

Ok, Thanks! i've got some 1mm thick Fujipoly comming. It will be interesting to see if using the origional metal PCB frame with its intergal VRM heatsinks is more efficient than a standalone heatsink with thermal paste.

I also origionally thought that it was the 290's reference fan spooling up making most the fan noise. After using this Zalman with a quiet fixed fan speed it turns out its the PWM fan in my power supply causing all the fan noise. I might have to mod the PSU housing for an extra cooling fan next.

 

[Erenhardt]

My gelid ICY + Gelid VRM is doing quite nicely.
81'C core in furmark (msi kombustor)
VRM1 72'C VRM 69'C
All that with fan speed reduced to 7Volts

 

[Killrose]

My gelid ICY + Gelid VRM is doing quite nicely.
81'C core in furmark (msi kombustor)
VRM1 72'C VRM 69'C
All that with fan speed reduced to 7Volts

That's pretty good, especially running Furmark w/7v to the fans. I might get that VRM1 reading with the side cover off of my computer case. My GPU temp is about the same as yours.

 

[Erenhardt]

Oh yea... That was after 5 min furmark run with side panel open.

 

[Killrose]

So my mod project went well. With just the Zalman vf3000 and a heatsink on the VRM1 and nothing on VRM2 I was getting GPU-70c, VRM1-72c, VRM2-54c respectively. Now with the metal frame from the former heatsink assy and a few 25mmx25mmx10 heatsinks thermal epoxied to the top side of the frame positioned above the BGA mem chips and the Zalman supplied combo mem/VRM heatsink which is ment to work with the 6800/6900 series cards positioned above VRM2 and some 1.0mm fujipoly premium TIM doing thermal duties on VRM1&2 and some fresh 1.0mm BGA silicon pads i'm getting GPU-65c, VRM1-65c, VRM2-47c.

These comparison temps were all obtained/monitored durring 2hrs of BF2 BC2 which seemed to keep my GPU pegged close to 947Mhz speeds, where-as War Thunder GPU usage was only hitting 947Mhz as a spike very intermittantly. The temps did jump around a bit but I would say they are fairly averaged.

I'm not sure why my GPU temp went down like it did, but it did. I did use the Zalman zm-stg2 rather than AS-5, but from what i've seen stg2 is not that much better than AS-5. So it could be possibly for some reason the heatplate portion of the metal frame focuses the fans cooling air better over the GPU, dunno. I'll take it, the big plus is the strength the metal frame gives the PCB of the video card and the fact that it makes a better heatsink than an add-on one for the VRM chip assy.

 

[Headfoot]

now its time to overclock!

 

[Killrose]

now its time to overclock!

Haha! I shoulda done some before I modded it, but ya, I will probably play with that now that things are nice and cool. It has Hynix mem on it and i've read it does not do so good? also I did check the numbers stamped on the GPU retainer and it is a xxxxx2020 sequence not xxxx2000 sequence which i guess is a 290x GPU, so no bios flash to a 290x.

I'll give er a go on some OC action!!

 

[thesmokingman]

Haha! I shoulda done some before I modded it, but ya, I will probably play with that now that things are nice and cool. It has Hynix mem on it and i've read it does not do so good? also I did check the numbers stamped on the GPU retainer and it is a xxxxx2020 sequence not xxxx2000 sequence which i guess is a 290x GPU, so no bios flash to a 290x.

I'll give er a go on some OC action!!

No, hynix is the good stuff.

 

[Killrose]

So I set the GPU to 1008mhz and the mem to 1325mhz and played BF2 BC2 for about 2hrs online last nite and checked Gpu-z sensors from time to time. GPU 65c, VRM1 65c and VRM2 45c pretty much the whole time with a few spikes above and below those temps. Zalman vf3000a fans set to just above lowest setting on the fan control 7v setting.

Probably will end up there, but I will give er another go tonite with another 25mhz GPU/mem and see what happens. I dont want to have to increase fan speeds to audible levels, but I might to see what kinda max I can get. The asiac on the GPU is 81.5 acording to Gpu-z, dont know if thats a good reading or even an indication of what to expect.

 

[Headfoot]

No, hynix is the good stuff.

yeah, I've got the crappy early Elpida in one of my 290s. I can't increase memory clock even by 25 without it becoming unstable. Pretty pathetic.

 

[Headfoot]

So I set the GPU to 1008mhz and the mem to 1325mhz and played BF2 BC2 for about 2hrs online last nite and checked Gpu-z sensors from time to time. GPU 65c, VRM1 65c and VRM2 45c pretty much the whole time with a few spikes above and below those temps. Zalman vf3000a fans set to just above lowest setting on the fan control 7v setting.

Probably will end up there, but I will give er another go tonite with another 25mhz GPU/mem and see what happens. I dont want to have to increase fan speeds to audible levels, but I might to see what kinda max I can get. The asiac on the GPU is 81.5 acording to Gpu-z, dont know if thats a good reading or even an indication of what to expect.

Voltage is what increases the temperatures a lot, not clock speed alone. Clocks will barely increase your temp. So push clocks as far as you can while still getting measured performance increase and still stable. Once you can't push it farther without voltage then you have landed at your max stock volts OC

 

[Killrose]

Voltage is what increases the temperatures a lot, not clock speed alone. Clocks will barely increase your temp. So push clocks as far as you can while still getting measured performance increase and still stable. Once you can't push it farther without voltage then you have landed at your max stock volts OC

Ok, will do. I don't have the need to push it with the games i'm playing now anyway's. I'll just see how high it will go at stk.