RX 6500 XT Single Slot Retrofit or aftermarket cooler? (PowerColor ITX)

[LabRat 891]

I have a PowerColor RX 6500 XT ITX on the way. I realized too late (and without a factory option anyway) that a single slot cooler would be needed for the preferred option in my envisioned system config.

Anyone have the RX 6500 XT's cooler's mounting pattern by any chance? I mean, someone has to be looking to make a water block for it. Even if I'm looking to mod-on an air cooler, the dimensions are needed for either.

In my case, I've got a bin of old coolers and even several old GPUs in various states of function. I'm wondering if something like an old FirePro's single slot cooler might work? I'd even be willing to make a silver or copper thermal shim if the Navi 24's die is recessed. I should have a few pre-65 US quarters and a jar of pre-82 US pennies still on hand.

 

[Caring1]

Mod the Case so it fits.

 

[LabRat 891]

Mod the Case so it fits.

Case isn't in the way/the problem.
In fact,
Option A. doesn't even have the card mounted traditionally in the case.
Option B. doesn't require case modding either.
In either situation, the stock 2-slot cooler will cover a PCIE slot I must access.

 

[toilet pepper]

The situation and card is so niche that I doubt a waterblock would be available for the card. Deshrouding might help. Better yet - give us an idea about your case/layout for more ideas.

 

[Chrispy_]

The situation and card is so niche that I doubt a waterblock would be available for the card. Deshrouding might help. Better yet - give us an idea about your case/layout for more ideas.

Yeah, what he said - we could use some more description about why you're trying to mod it and maybe some photos? What the use-case is would also help as the 6500XT doesn't really bring performance or performance/Watt to the table, and at single-slot short-depth card you're likely going to struggle above 60W on the card unless you have epic case airflow and low ambients.

Nobody is going to making a waterblock for the 6500XT and there's no reference design either, so you're going to find manufacturers using a mishmash of different PCBs for it depending on what they retrofit. I don't know if any of them will custom-build a PCB just for the 6500XT - they're probably going to re-use a low-end design from the RX5500 and 5300 models.

Given that the 6500XT is missing half of its video engine, lacks the ability to raytrace in any way other than a complete joke, and isn't particularly power-efficient because it's clocked so high, something like the RX 560 exists in multiple variants as single-slot and/or half-height from MSI and XFX to name just two.

 

[LabRat 891]

The situation and card is so niche that I doubt a waterblock would be available for the card. Deshrouding might help. Better yet - give us an idea about your case/layout for more ideas.

I don't actually want a waterblock. Merely that a waterblock manu needs the mounting specs I'm looking for; ideally, to reuse some old single slot cooler.
One of the reasons I went w/ the 6500 XT was it's relatively low power consumption and heat output. There's lots of old GPUs w/ single slot coolers that had a higher TDP. That's the direction I'm going, air cooling.
(inb4 pcie 4.0 problems. I'm 'hoping' the extremely short trace length in the riser will allow 4.0 reliably. The pic of the black PCB adapter is for one claimed to support 4.0)

Yeah, what he said - we could use some more description about why you're trying to mod it and maybe some photos? What the use-case is would also help as the 6500XT doesn't really bring performance or performance/Watt to the table, and at single-slot short-depth card you're likely going to struggle above 60W on the card unless you have epic case airflow and low ambients.

Nobody is going to making a waterblock for the 6500XT and there's no reference design either, so you're going to find manufacturers using a mishmash of different PCBs for it depending on what they retrofit. I don't know if any of them will custom-build a PCB just for the 6500XT - they're probably going to re-use a low-end design from the RX5500 and 5300 models.

Given that the 6500XT is missing half of its video engine, lacks the ability to raytrace in any way other than a complete joke, and isn't particularly power-efficient because it's clocked so high, something like the RX 560 exists in multiple variants as single-slot and/or half-height from MSI and XFX to name just two.

I was planning on putting up my own pics after the card comes in, Thursday.
Here's some pics to give an idea of just how unorthodox my first choice is.
Plan A is to put the 6500XT in the CPU-connected M.2 slot. The X16 will be fully occupied with a bifurcating riser for an NVME array.

Plan B, the 6500XT can go in the Chipset-connected X4(x16 phys) 4.0 slot, but the Chipset M.2 will also be receiving a PCIE adapter and will have an NVME array on it, through a PCIE bridge/switch card.

In either Plan A or Plan B I need single-slot cooling.
I'm already wanting to experiment with the clocks to see how power efficient I can get it. The interest to me here is precisely because it's a limited-capability mobile GPU.

 

[INSTG8R]

Unfortunately W1zzard hasn't reviewed this card because he always has great tear down pics available that you could extrapolate the mounting measurements with some clever math

 

[LabRat 891]

Unfortunately W1zzard hasn't reviewed this card because he always has great tear down pics available that you could extrapolate the mounting measurements with some clever math

I was hoping for the same. I could guess based on, say, the Sapphire Pulse model. But, my card should be in soon. I'll measure the back myself and post pics soon after it comes in. I will not be tearing it down until I'm able to do some comparisons and benchmarking, however.

By the way, here is the case I will probably be 're'building into:
Fractal Design Focus G White ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Newegg.com
my kit is in an old NZXT case @TM. Both the current case and the new one have pretty great airflow. I run my 3600 passively w/ the exhaust fans up top CPU-therm. controlled. They're off most of the time online. While gaming they do their job quite well exhausting heat and keeping the nearby CPU cooler ventilated.

 

[INSTG8R]

I was hoping for the same. I could guess based on, say, the Sapphire Pulse model. But, my card should be in soon. I'll measure the back myself and post pics soon after it comes in. I will not be tearing it down until I'm able to do some comparisons and benchmarking, however.

Yeah all you can do is see if someone has reviewed it done a tear down on it while you wait because as was stated every OEM is pretty much winging it with their designs and yours in particular is an example of a unique design.

 

[Chrispy_]

Plan A is to put the 6500XT in the CPU-connected M.2 slot. The X16 will be fully occupied with a bifurcating riser for an NVME array.
Plan B, the 6500XT can go in the Chipset-connected X4(x16 phys) 4.0 slot, but the Chipset M.2 will also be receiving a PCIE adapter and will have an NVME array on it, through a PCIE bridge/switch card.

Plan A will smoke your motherboard, trust me - I'm a miner and have dealt with multiple people on the ethermine Discord channel trying to find creative ways of powering more GPUs than a motherboard has PEG slots. The only reason it even works for miners is that they use two-part risers into those PCIe slots that draw zero power from the slot and feed power via molex or PCIe 6-pin direct to the female end of the riser socket. Even then I've seen enough photos of melted plastic and burnt out husks of mining rigs because you need to know exactly which risers are designed for zero-Watt slot power draw. It gets even messier avoiding fires and PSU deaths caused by galvanic loops with this type of riser and multiple PSUs but at least you don't have to worry about that with your single-PSU system.

The 6500XT is likely to want about 40-50W from the slot. That puny little Berg connector is rated for transient peaks of 36W, and no more than 28.8W constant load - even assuming that the rest of that PCIe adapter card and M.2 slot itself has traces designed for heavy current draw because they're designed for a maximum of 25W. If you can find a review that proves 100% that the exact model of card and driver version you're after pulls less than 25W peak power from the slot, you could risk it - but you'd be tempting fate if you updated the drivers as the balance of power draw from the slot and the PCIe connector on the card is dynamically managed by AMD drivers based on VBIOS entries on the card. AMD can change the balance with driver updates as they did for the RX480 (which was found to be drawing 80W from the slot at launch, in violation of the PCIe spec)

What you're suggesting for plan A is either a fire risk as the Berg connector combusts, or it's just going to damage your GPU, motherboard, PSU or a combination of those three.

Plan B is your only safe option. The x16 physical slot should be able to supply 75W if Asus are adhering to PCIe power spec correctly.

 

[basco]

just a thought ?
remove the fan and plastic + front panel(metal part for the display output) and try cooling it passiv if ya have enough airflow and if its small enough then

 

[AgathoDaimon]

Are you sure it is worth the effort and chance of burning your motherboard? You'd have to undervolt it alot and with it's own issues - I no longer see why you'd need the RX 6500 XT anymore.
Isn't it completely better to grab a CPU with an iGPU like the 4300 G(nope, probably doesn't have enough PCI-e lanes for your need) 5600G or 5700G ? And eliminate this problem altogether.

 

[Adam Krazispeed]

Unfortunately W1zzard hasn't reviewed this card because he always has great tear down pics available that you could extrapolate the mounting measurements with some clever math

try going by the Power color Radeon RX 5600XT ITX 6GB ...... IT should be (or at least looks to me) Close as F**K to the 6500XT ITX.. IT LOOKS ECAXCTY LIKE TEH SAME COOLER, ( THE HEATSINKS MOUNT SCREWS SHOULD BE CLOSE IF NOT IDENTICAL!!!! IDK JUST AN IDEA, I have a Powercolor 5600XT ITX 6GB ITX card in my velkase velka3 Gen4 x16 riser 5600X zen3 CPU 32GB DDR4 3600 the whole deal, so i know how this card looks and the 6500XT looks identical, Try looking up the Powercolor 5600xt itx to check its diminsions.. not i cant say they will be the same on the pcb though as the 6500xt is anew silicon and much much smaller than the 5600xt (aka Navi10 GXL)

5600xt itx powercolor .
https://www.techpowerup.com/gpu-specs/powercolor-rx-5600-xt-itx.b7724
best i can do for this now id ike to do this use x4 gpu and my 4x4 M.2 x16 nvme card, i have one but pro just gonna put it in my 1900x threadripper 8c/16t pc x399 TR4 Gigabyte Aorus Gaming 7 MB all teh RBG ram slots pcie i love thus x399 MB but pisses me off gigabyte didnt make x570 like this x399 gaming 7

other than that the radeon pro 6400.6500 would be a better option GPU .. but you alrady bought the 6500xt itx ;(

I don't actually want a waterblock. Merely that a waterblock manu needs the mounting specs I'm looking for; ideally, to reuse some old single slot cooler.
One of the reasons I went w/ the 6500 XT was it's relatively low power consumption and heat output. There's lots of old GPUs w/ single slot coolers that had a higher TDP. That's the direction I'm going, air cooling.
(inb4 pcie 4.0 problems. I'm 'hoping' the extremely short trace length in the riser will allow 4.0 reliably. The pic of the black PCB adapter is for one claimed to support 4.0)


I was planning on putting up my own pics after the card comes in, Thursday.
Here's some pics to give an idea of just how unorthodox my first choice is.
Plan A is to put the 6500XT in the CPU-connected M.2 slot. The X16 will be fully occupied with a bifurcating riser for an NVME array.
View attachment 234099View attachment 234100
View attachment 234101

Plan B, the 6500XT can go in the Chipset-connected X4(x16 phys) 4.0 slot, but the Chipset M.2 will also be receiving a PCIE adapter and will have an NVME array on it, through a PCIE bridge/switch card.

In either Plan A or Plan B I need single-slot cooling.
I'm already wanting to experiment with the clocks to see how power efficient I can get it. The interest to me here is precisely because it's a limited-capability mobile GPU.

ID USE THIS .. " https://www.amazon.com/ASUS-M-2-X16-Expansion-Card/dp/B084HMHGSP "

, I dont have the gen4 version though , but i do have the Gen3 x16 (4x x4 m.2 NVMe) (ASUS) Hyper 4 m.2 nve ssd card... and decent Gen3 x4 NVMe ssds are a-bit cheaper than even 1st gen (Phison e16) gen4 x4 Nvme SSDs... i want 4x 1TB (same specs as the 2TB ahead!) or (for now) 2x 2TB 3500MBps Max Seq. Reads / 3000MBps Max Seq. Writes NVMe x4 Gen3 SSDs..... (if you got a gen4 Platform, AMD zen2/zen3 (Ryzen 3000/5000) (APUS DO NOT HAVE PCI-E GEN4 (AKA the 5600G/5700G ) ;( (so dumb AMD)

I still need to get 2x or 4x / gen3 x4 NVMe SSDs for my card.... but i never thought of doing this? / Nice man....PROPS.... because, 1 I NEVER THOUGHT WE WOULD EVER GET A PCIe X4 Gen4 / DISCRETE GAMING GPU. EVER (LMMFAO!!!! ************************ ) BUT!!! i would Vertical mount the GPU (IF POSSIBLE, since there is no slot mounting for a GPU in the m.2 nvme x4 slot!!!!)id imagine you already have a vertical mount options (i hope) and a pcie Gen4 capable PCIe Riser cable, but this is and will be actually be the better/cheapest option , if you have a case and or addon to allow vertical GPU mounting in ur case/setup????? IF NOT!!! Then only option is to get a better case (If you dont already have one with vertical GPU mounting support!!!) and just side/Vertical mount the GPU .,,,,
(i think THIS Will BE The best/cheapest option, ( getting a virtical mount with gen4 riser cable with it, ther is one on amzon, but ur case has to have open i/o slot on teh case, where the I/o slot brakets go.. ther cannot be anything there when all slot brakets are removed, if there is any metal here with out the I/o Plates in teh slots.. tehn this cannot be done

************************************************************************************************************** (EDIT) ************************************************************************************************************** ** ( or if GPU vert mount braket is too close to the MBs SLots, o take it back you need a case that has DEDICATED Vertical Mounting GPU Support and away from te slots as far as possible if you do what you * ** wanna do here, so now IDK... this might be almost impossible with out heavy modifications or new parts????? *
************************************************************************************************************** (EDIT) **************************************************************************************************************

if u already have a Gen4 PCI-E Riser, connect that to vertical mounted GPU then to your m.2 / NVMe x4 PCIe to x4 slot adapter ( if not try finding just a x16 to x4 pcie gen 4 riser ((aka X16 (GPU end) to x4 (teh mb slot end??

then your ssds x16 card should go right in the x16 main gpu slot as normally as a GPU would!!! this i think is best option?? / (if using a gen4 x16 riser ( or even a gen3, doesnt matter what it is) if its got exposed pins/pads. wiring or any type of connections and or contacts of any kind!!!! then tape over with electrical tape or (BETTER) somehow cover up the exposed PCIe riser pins/on the slot (maybe with a GPUs PCI-e slot protector/Cover that usually comes with (ON) the PCIe connector slot on teh gpu )so not shorts are possible.. even if these pins are not used, you could still get a short, i have before and it is not fun!!! be careful, in whatever you do end up doing!! its as my quote i have always said...below....

"its easy to short something, Fixing that shorted piece of hardware is a whole nother can of worms.....LOL"

(LMMFAO **************************************** (GOES HERE.. Above where ***** are!
u dont need teh gigantic heatsink on the back, just add some GDDR6 sized heatsinks (dont glue just use thermal tape) and just have good airflow over the ram/VRMs on teh card (tho 6500XT itx should not need to worry about the heat on VRMs or gddr6 Video ram??? though last best options...

on amd r9 280x (closest to teh posible mouont bolt paattern on 6500xt itx..


One other option IDK if it will work,,,, Find an AIO and mount to gpu,,, the mounting should be same as 5600xt itx ( cant be 100% sure though but this AIO is universal and supports wide variety of mounting points..

I put one these ARCTIC ACCELERO Hybrid 120 AIOs on my older Radeon RX 5700XT 8GB GPU..( and the 5600XT ITX is the same Navi10 Chip just cut down (same as 5700 NON XT But has two disabled/BAD GDDR6 Memory Controller's hence the 5600XT ITX only having 6GB GDDR6,, but the size is exactly the same as a 5700 and 5700XT as the chip is the same, now 6500xt is way smaller ( i WISH POWER COLOR MADE AN ITX 12GB RX 6700/6700XT on this size, I could really love to use/have a RX 6700XT ITX 12GB GDDR6 GPU for my Velkase (VELKA 3 ) ITS PC... 5600xt itx is too slow now compared to newer higher end cards but the AIO is on my 5700XT .. and works very well, the GDDR6 MEMORY GET A BIT HOTTER THOGH,,,, but the AIO, though i dont think they make these anymore, and so they (id you can find one used or new (ne if your very lucky and looking in the right spot) but used or new the prices can be outrageous worse then gpu prices kind of

Arctic Accelero Hybrid III (should fit on 6500xt if u can find one...)

 

[LabRat 891]

Card came in yesterday. Will catch up and reply to the new posts, as well as post pics tomorrow, hopefully.

 

[bug]

I don't actually want a waterblock. Merely that a waterblock manu needs the mounting specs I'm looking for; ideally, to reuse some old single slot cooler.
One of the reasons I went w/ the 6500 XT was it's relatively low power consumption and heat output. There's lots of old GPUs w/ single slot coolers that had a higher TDP. That's the direction I'm going, air cooling.
(inb4 pcie 4.0 problems. I'm 'hoping' the extremely short trace length in the riser will allow 4.0 reliably. The pic of the black PCB adapter is for one claimed to support 4.0)


I was planning on putting up my own pics after the card comes in, Thursday.
Here's some pics to give an idea of just how unorthodox my first choice is.
Plan A is to put the 6500XT in the CPU-connected M.2 slot. The X16 will be fully occupied with a bifurcating riser for an NVME array.
View attachment 234099View attachment 234100
View attachment 234101

Plan B, the 6500XT can go in the Chipset-connected X4(x16 phys) 4.0 slot, but the Chipset M.2 will also be receiving a PCIE adapter and will have an NVME array on it, through a PCIE bridge/switch card.

In either Plan A or Plan B I need single-slot cooling.
I'm already wanting to experiment with the clocks to see how power efficient I can get it. The interest to me here is precisely because it's a limited-capability mobile GPU.

I'm not sure I see the problem.
Plan A: video card goes into the M2 slot, PCIe slot is free (as in no obstructions)
Plan B: you'd be blowing hot air from the CPU onto the GPU; you're just yanking our chains with this one, aren't you?

 

[seth1911]

Use a cooler from antoher card, u need only to know the distance between the drilling