EK Launches Active Backplate For Zotac Trinity RTX 3080/3090

[Uskompuf]

EK, the leading computer cooling solutions provider, is introducing another addition to the EK-Quantum Line. EK-Quantum Vector Trinity RTX 3080/3090 active backplate is made to complement the existing EK-Quantum Vector Trinity RTX 3080/3090 water blocks and actively cool the backside of ZOTAC Trinity GeForce RTX 3080 and 3090 GPUs.

EK-Quantum Vector Trinity RTX 3080/3090 active backplate links the water block and active backplate part with a new terminal, which replaces the stock terminal that comes with your water block. This way, the whole enclosure requires only one inlet and one outlet, removing unnecessary additional tubing and reducing clutter. It is the ultimate aesthetic and performance solution that finds your GPU sandwiched between two water blocks, allowing maximum cooling.





The brand new Vector Active Backplate directly cools all PCB hotspots found on the backside of the GPU core and VRM (voltage regulation module). In the case of Trinity RTX 3090, the VRAM located on the backside is being cooled, while the PCB on RTX 3080 GPUs is being cooled around the front-mounted VRAM. Cooling liquid is channeled over all these critical areas.

These newly developed active backplates feature a fin array with six wide channels allowing for very low flow restriction. This, in turn, provides overall lower temperatures, while the active backplate itself gets more than sufficient surface area for heat transfer.

The base of the active backplate is CNC-machined out of nickel-plated electrolytic copper, while the top is either CNC-machined out of glass-like cast Acrylic or black POM acetal. The rest of the backplate is made of nickel-plated or anodized aluminium, and it doesn't come in contact with the liquid. These Vector Active Backplates also feature terminals that match the top cover - the Plexi version has an acrylic terminal, while the acetal one boasts the black POM acetal terminal. The watertight sealing is ensured by high-quality EPDM O-rings.

Compatibility

EK-Quantum Vector Trinity RTX 3080/3090 Active Backplates are compatible with EK-Quantum Vector Trinity RTX 3080/3090 water blocks made for ZOTAC Trinity PCB design.

D-RGB Lighting on EK-Quantum Vector Trinity RTX 3080/3090 Active Backplate

On the acrylic model, the aesthetic end-piece is housing the addressable D-RGB LED strip, while the acetal model has no LED lighting. This active backplate boasts a total of eight individually addressable RGB LEDs, and it's compatible with popular RGB sync technologies from all major motherboard manufacturers. The arrow marking on the 3-pin D-RGB LED connector is to be aligned with the +5V marking on the D-RGB (addressable) header.

Availability and Pricing

The EK-Quantum Vector Trinity RTX series active backplates are made in Slovenia, Europe, and are already available for pre-order through EK Online Shop and Partner Reseller Network. They are expected to start shipping in early April 2021.

• EK-Quantum Vector Trinity RTX 3080/3090 Active Backplate - Acetal | 134.90€
• EK-Quantum Vector Trinity RTX 3080/3090 Active Backplate D-RGB - Plexi | 139.90€

View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[Caring1]

More expense for the consumer.
If they know the cards run so hot, they should be recalled and fixed.

 

[Deleted member 205776]

Why would you release a backplate for a card that doesn't exist yet?

 

[Count Shagula]

My EVGA 3080 runs super cool. Cant wait to get one of those on it with the rest of my custom loop. PC has been on for 3 days. 22c outside atm during the day. Min temp of 24c, max of 73. EVGA 3080 FTW ULTRA everything set as stock

 

[Chomiq]

Miners won't need this.

 

[kayjay010101]

More expense for the consumer.
If they know the cards run so hot, they should be recalled and fixed.

It's not that simple. GDDR6X runs bloody hot. Having it fixed means making a new memory chip. With the massive shortage already for G6X, there is no way NVIDIA or Micron would be willing to scrap all their work and start from scratch to make a new memory chip.
Unless you're mining, this isn't an issue anyhow. The FE should be recalled because that does throttle memory clocks on stock speeds because of the awful thermal pads, but the rest of the partner models run just fine without throttling in gaming workloads. It's only with mining that temps increase and throttling occurs, which is where an active backplate is quite useful.

 

[Animalpak]

Everything related to graphics card as " NEWS " now is completely useless and waste of time.

 

[AnarchoPrimitiv]

Inside the EK boardroom:

"Is there any way we can sell people two waterblocks when they only need one?"

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

Oh look, wrong-side-up cooling!

 

[ZoneDymo]

Active because it's actively searching for cards to cool.

 

[Voodoo Rufus]

Things might be getting a bit absurd when we need this to keep cards from melting down. Can't get heat out of CPUs fast enough because of power density, and GPUs making enough heat to be space heaters.

 

[bogami]

A very good solution for lower operating temperatures and longer DIE life. The difference can increase the maintenance duration of the operating frequencies and add something to the OC profiles .

 

[thegnome]

More expense for the consumer.
If they know the cards run so hot, they should be recalled and fixed.

It's not that simple, due to G6X only being available in 1Gbit chips for the 3090, 24 seperate chips need to be placed, and obviously the proper side doesn't fit so the back it is. Problem is that due to the PCIe design you cant really add any proper heatsink or it would interfere with possible things above the card.

Only option is to get Nvidia to use the 2Gbit chips, but that would hurt the shortage even more.

 

[mrthanhnguyen]

My EVGA 3080 runs super cool. Cant wait to get one of those on it with the rest of my custom loop. PC has been on for 3 days. 22c outside atm during the day. Min temp of 24c, max of 73. EVGA 3080 FTW ULTRA everything set as stock

3080 does not have memory on the back.

 

[leppie]

I have a Zotac Trinity 3080. Temps under load is not an issue. Most I have ever seen it hit is around 75 with furmark. The fans are also pretty silent and rarely goes over 60%. Power limits are very low on these cards, only allows 5% over for 335W. Also not a very good overclocker (mine does not like anything above 2000).

The only real is issue I have is when the card is idling. The stock fan config only turns on the fans when the temp hit 60 deg. So you idling at 60 deg. Memory junction temps are about mid 70's in this config. And I can tell you the backplate is HOT, too hot to keep your finger on it for an extended time.

The simple solution I did was to set a custom fan control profile in Afterburner just so that the fans dont turn off and run at the lowest possible speed (effectively silent). Now the card idles at a few deg over case temp, 37 deg same as my CPU currently. Memory junction temp at 54 deg now.

While I would love to WC it, paying $300 for aesthetics is a waste of money.

 

[ypsylon]

If those companies which manufacture liquid cooling equipment actually sold the card(s) with mounted blocks then it would be worth mentioning. As things stand it's completely pointless PR/article.

Especially considering that Zotac offloads capacity to miners and they mine in-house. #ZotacCancelled

 

[Breit]

My EVGA 3080 runs super cool. Cant wait to get one of those on it with the rest of my custom loop. PC has been on for 3 days. 22c outside atm during the day. Min temp of 24c, max of 73. EVGA 3080 FTW ULTRA everything set as stock

This is about memory temps. No way your 3080 runs its memory at 24C, even at idle with 22C ambient.

It's not that simple, due to G6X only being available in 1Gbit chips for the 3090, 24 seperate chips need to be placed, and obviously the proper side doesn't fit so the back it is. Problem is that due to the PCIe design you cant really add any proper heatsink or it would interfere with possible things above the card.

Only option is to get Nvidia to use the 2Gbit chips, but that would hurt the shortage even more.

Well, they produce 2-slot, 3-slot, heck even 4-slot GPUs now. They could at least release a model which has it's PCB in the middle of those 3 or 4 slots instead of on one side. Then there is enough space for a proper heatsink.

 

[jboydgolfer]

i know miners report heat issues with the 3080 & 3090's, but tbh, ive noticed good temps with my RTX 3 series cards.
the 3090 is by far the coolest, the 3080 is pretty good, & the 3060ti & 3070 i didnt really pay attention or run them long enough to notice.

while running Escape form tarkov, my 3090 reference design rarely brakes 65C (even with decent OC), although perf is no better with the 3090, compared ot my 2080ti, the temps on the 2080ti were much higher.

i DID notice while running the remastered call of duty modern warfare, the 3090 memory does get steamy hot, im guessing because there is an option in settings to pre-cache render objects in extra vram, monitoring software shows all 24Gb of Vram used while playing a 10 year old video game the card has more RAM than my PC by 1 & 1/2 times

disassembling the reference cards is a daunting task, even for someone who has done it a million time's , Nvidia went full apple with this generation

 

[Breit]

i know miners report heat issues with the 3080 & 3090's, but tbh, ive noticed good temps with my RTX 3 series cards.
the 3090 is by far the coolest, the 3080 is pretty good, & the 3060ti & 3070 i didnt really pay attention or run them long enough to notice.

while running Escape form tarkov, my 3090 reference design rarely brakes 65C (even with decent OC), although perf is no better with the 3090, compared ot my 2080ti, the temps on the 2080ti were much higher.

i DID notice while running the remastered call of duty modern warfare, the 3090 memory does get steamy hot, im guessing because there is an option in settings to pre-cache render objects in extra vram, monitoring software shows all 24Gb of Vram used while playing a 10 year old video game the card has more RAM than my PC by 1 & 1/2 times

disassembling the reference cards is a daunting task, even for someone who has done it a million time's , Nvidia went full apple with this generation

Well, GPU temp is only half the truth, because this is probably the package temperature from the GPU itself. Try opening HWiNFO64 and look out for "GPU Memory Junction Temperature" while running your games (or just try touching the backplate of your GPU for more than 2 seconds).

I'm very curious on how the EKWB Special Edition waterblock for 3090FE will perform in regards to the memory. Unfortunately they postponed the production. However, they just told me they begin shipping on april, 9th. So it seems the long wait finally comes to an end.

 

[Count Shagula]

This is about memory temps. No way your 3080 runs its memory at 24C, even at idle with 22C ambient.

92c max for junction temp at pictured clocks averaging ~90-94mh. Fan speeds are all stock, ram overclocked and core dropped. Only using 260w of power this way. Gaming I have the 450watt bios and while the GPU temp goes up the ram doesn't. Its 27c here today and I have the case side panel on.

 

[Breit]

That is looking good. 90C is fine.
The 3080 has the benefit of only having its RAM on one side and thus RAM can be cooled efficiently with the cooler. The 3090 however with its RAM on the backside only "cooled" passively by a thin backplate is a whole other story.