6177

Somebody get’s it. This one has LED Diamonds…Diamonds of light people!

oh boy, what have I done…

6178

6179

Well hey, if the price was good, why not?

6180

I would normally agree, but the confluence of Zen 3 and 3000 series cards being announced within a month of each other seems like a perfect opportunity to plan an upgrade build around. And, hey, if Zen 3 disappoints, you can always fall back to current gen.

6181

Don’t be ashamed of your bling, Morlac!!! Everyone else is just secretly jealous of us (or at least that’s what mom always told me while crying myself to sleep).

6182

I personally wouldn’t buy intel under any circumstances, and I wouldn’t buy Zen2 right before Zen3. But I also won’t buy an inferior Zotac or MSI 3080; I had both in my cart and passed.

6183

Wait why is MSI bad again? I missed a post I guess?

6184

It has a plastic backplate. Not a huge deal, and it benchmarks fine, but if I’m paying $700+ I want aluminium. Pisses me off that they shaved $10 off their bill of materials on such an expensive product.

The Zotac is actually inferior in performance and nobody should buy one at MSRP.

6185

What is the importance of a back plate? I saw on the EVGA site they had a $699 3080 and then a $749 card with a metal back-plate. Why is that worth $50?

6186

I can’t wait to watch all these “announcements” about new tech that won’t be available except to the bots for the next couple months while I game away on my new rig with my shades on to help with my diamond studded blingy RAM.

:)

6187

These cards are extremely heavy, and the backplate provides rigidity. It can also help dissipate heat. Aluminum (or aluminium) is more rigid and a much better conductor than plastic, even “graphenized plastic” or whatever bullshit MSI is spouting.

6188

Honestly…not a whole lot. Backplates look sexy but do very little beyond some PCB protection for those that throw their cards around. It’s like bling for your GPU but no lights. For some even a plastic one is deal breaker…shrug.

6189

I agree the rigidity is more important than heat dissipation, but a poor backplate can actually insulate the card. Note I haven’t seen evidence the MSI one is that bad.

6190

No it does not help dissipate heat. It literally only provides protection to the PCB (minor deal) and support from sagging (bigger deal). Some can increase the heat.

6191

Yes, some can increase heat, haven’t seen if that is build dependent or not. Regardless you are talking 1-2 degree differences either way. Good news is they are easy to remove if you are not into their aesthetic benefit or need the extra support. I still prefer one as it just seems cheap not to have one of some sort but wouldn’t let it weigh my choice too much on type/etc. Plus they do look sexier with one.

6192

Incorrect, every properly designed backplate dissipates heat. I’m sure even the MSI plastic one does that, or the reviews would have savaged it-- my old EVGA GTX1080 had that exact problem. Perfectly fine aluminum backplate, but EVGA neglected to put thermal spreaders on, so it insulated the card.

Now you could argue the amount of heat they dissipate doesn’t really matter, and… that would be basically correct. But they do something.

6193

You can get a GPU bracket to prop up the back of your card for $12 bucks. Your PC interior may not make the latest issue of PC Quarterly for a photo spread with one, but it’ll do the job of reducing sag and stress on the card.

I am curious @morlac why you went w/ Intel. At this point, if your order has been allocated a 3080, I guess I’d stick with it. It’ll be fine. But NZXT does offer AMD builds, and only grandma’s order Intel these days. :P

6194

Yea, yea, they dissipate heat as much as RGB lighting increases speed.

6195

Gaming is the only thing I push with it and Intel is still best ‘gaming’ cpu currently on the market. I don’t stream, develop content, etc. I will alt tab out of games and surf the web. I think 10850k can handle that.

Oh and the GPU bracket is definitely the better way to support your card. I wouldn’t trust a back bracket to do that solely. I am going to grab one at Microcneter when I get a new monitor this weekend. I’ll wrap it an LED strip to brighten it up ;)

6196

Some AMD hints…