OTOY Forums

Yo! This is my first post and also first day with Octane. I recently completed some upgrades on my computer for use in Octane, most notably I've added 2 more GTX 1070 FE cards for a total of 3 presently in my case. In preparing for this build I thought that by having enough fans blowing air at their max rpms in addition to some afterburner fan curves would keep my GPU temps at about 65C under heavy load. However... last night two of my cards peaked at about 72C, which is, frankly, a little too hot for my liking.

I've been doing a fair amount of reading on this forum looking for clues or indicators as to what others are doing to properly resolve heating issues on multi-GPU setups and the answer seems to be either: custom loop (which, frankly, I just can't afford right now as I've spent a small fortune on all of the other parts) or hybrid kits (like those offered by EVGA or NZXT).

I think that a hybrid kit, beyond being the way more affordable option of the two, would be my best bet. My real concern here, though, is space. Can anyone that has a EVGA hyrbid kit on a 1080/1070/Titan comment on if these kits make the GPU (more specifically shroud size) larger? My cards, due to my motherboard only having 4 PCI-E slots, sit fairly close together. If these hybrid kits don't alter the physical dimensions of the GPU too much then I'll definitely be looking into swapping out my fan set up for a hybrid liquid cooling option.

Any information which could/can be provided on this would be super appreciated!

Oh, and so far, I'm really enjoying my time with Octane. My workflow has already benefited immensely from the live viewer.

Hello!

From my experience with EVGA, it depends if you buy a hybrid kit to plug onto your card, or if you buy a Hybrid card from the get go:

- the kit itself does not change the form factor of the card, so, the shroud they provide with the kit is the exact same size as the original one. (But in plastic instead of metal.)
- the hybrid Titan X Maxwell I bought came with a backplate, making the card thicker than the other "regular" Titan X for which I bought the 980ti kit. But it still fits on my mobo, 4 cards in total, all hybrid, 1 with backplate, 3 without.

Yes, you should be fine with EVGA Hybrid kits, as they keep it 2-slot. If you run into problems with fan/rad spots in your case, you probably saw us recommending Thermaltake Core X9 or X5 is some of those threads. There is definitely a consensus that you can't lose with these cases. And the fact that they have the mobo horizontal essentially eliminates stress (gravity) on GPUs and putting all your GPU (and even CPU) rads up top just makes sense, since heat does rise.

Before you slap those pups on, be sure to clean off your old thermal goo from GPUs as clean as humanly possible - and use nothing less than 90%+ alcohol. A somewhat clean GPU vs a spankin' clean GPU can make a difference in temps. And a better thermal compound than stock can be used. Plus you can upgrade your rad fans to a nigher-end one (must have good static pressure).

Excellent! Thanks for the information dudes.

Lol, yes, in my brief time on this forum I've seen the X5/9 mentioned quite a few times. I wish I had done more research on cases prior to buying my Carbide 400C. It looks like a new case and the EVGA hybrid kits will be in my future very soon.