Suprised how good it is compared to the very good stock nvidia cooler although the monster size is a bit of a drawback.

Be interesting to see one of these employed where it's really need - i.e. on an R9 290X…. Any chance Hexus, or is that just too much reviewing for a niche product?

Wait a couple of days for a face-off between this and a new liquid-cooled GPU block on an R9 290X.

Looking forward to it already :D

Nice :D

One thing that always strikes me about upgrades like this is that the old cooler exhausts out the back of the case. While the aftermarket one merely pushes a load of hot air all round the rest of the case.

Sadly the figures here don't show the difference in system temps but personally I'd stick with the stock cooler if it's the same exhaust style as the 780/titan reference cooler

The amount a graphics card cooler actually exhausts out the back of the case is pretty limited though. Yes a bit of hot air goes out the back, and maybe in HTPC cases or others with limited cooling it's a relevant amount. But in any case with reasonable airflow, I doubt it makes two hoots' difference.

Furthermore, you’ll also need to buy two 120mm fans separately and those two fans have no way to interface with existing fan headers on your graphics card, meaning more cable clutter.

You can get PWM adapter cables for graphics card headers for less than £5 which allow you to then connect aftermarket PWM fans direct to the card. I have done this with my Asus GTX680 and a similar cooler (MK-26) to continue allowing the card to control the fans speed according to GPU temps. I'm not really sure about the cable clutter comment, you'll get this regardless of how the aftermarket fans are connected but thankfully most modern cases have cable management which helps with this.

I think you've missed a couple of points about the lack of market for third-party GPU coolers.

To start with not just the technical complexity but also the legal/warranty issues involved with replacing the cooler.

next major issue is non-reference cards, motherboard have standards about components in the socket area which mean manufactures can design a heat sink that should fit on all motherboards, now granted a reference graphics card will have the same pcb and component layout, however most of the graphics card companies produce their own non-reference pcb's without any standardisation so a cooler designed to fit on the reference card may not fit.

On top of this most of the graphics card manufactures use non-reference coolers and they don't tend to be more expensive than the reference card, so why go through the hassle of buying a third-party cooler, fitting it and voiding your warranty when it's cheaper and easier to get a non-reference card?

Pob255
I think you've missed a couple of points about the lack of market for third-party GPU coolers.

To start with not just the technical complexity but also the legal/warranty issues involved with replacing the cooler.

next major issue is non-reference cards, motherboard have standards about components in the socket area which mean manufactures can design a heat sink that should fit on all motherboards, now granted a reference graphics card will have the same pcb and component layout, however most of the graphics card companies produce their own non-reference pcb's without any standardisation so a cooler designed to fit on the reference card may not fit.

On top of this most of the graphics card manufactures use non-reference coolers and they don't tend to be more expensive than the reference card, so why go through the hassle of buying a third-party cooler, fitting it and voiding your warranty when it's cheaper and easier to get a non-reference card?

Oh definitely, there are other reasons - the warranty is definitely a good one. Although, many graphics card vendors will accept warranty returns if you can restore the card to its retail condition and no warranty stickers have been damaged. And the reference/non-reference PCB layout issue is equally as true.

The point about hassle is valid, hence, this review is relevant mainly for people who already have reference cooled cards. As you say there are few reasons to buy a graphics card with the specific intention of fitting a third-party cooler when you can just buy a solid non-reference card to start off with. However, a lot of people do still buy reference cards so this is mainly aimed at them!

(oh and I'm not just some random guy, I did write this review!)

Pob255
I think you've missed a couple of points about the lack of market for third-party GPU coolers.

A quick look at Scan shows 12 Air and 39 Water GPU coolers, if there wasn't a market for them they wouldn't be so widely available or such a wide range of choice.

Pob255
To start with not just the technical complexity but also the legal/warranty issues involved with replacing the cooler.

Fitting one of these air coolers is no more technically challenging than installing a CPU cooler and considerably less complex than installing a water block and adding it to a cooling loop. Regarding the Warranty some manufacturers such as EVGA do not have an issue with aftermarket cooling so if you are buying a card with the intention of replacing the cooler this does not have to be an issue. Personally I bought my GTX680 used so it came without a warranty so this wasn't an issue for me.

Pob255
next major issue is non-reference cards

I fitted my MK-26 to my non reference Asus GTX680 without any problem. Air coolers are better than water coolers in this respect as the VRAM and moffsets are cooled by stick-on heatsinks which you can position wherever they are needed. As long as the GPU is positioned in roughly the same area as reference then there shouldn't be an issue but if in doubt you can check with the manufacturer as they generally have a list of supported cards.

Pob255
so why go through the hassle of buying a third-party cooler, fitting it and voiding your warranty when it's cheaper and easier to get a non-reference card?

Because non reference cards are still constrained by having to fit within certain parameters (cost, size etc) so will not be able to give the same performance as a cooler such as the one reviewed here. The non reference (Direct CUII) cooler on my 680 although touted as one of the best was still horrendously noisy when the card was overclocked to the max and running at 100% GPU. Although my replacement cooler hasn't allowed me to overclock any higher (due to the quality of the Asus DCUII cooler) having 2 x 140mm fans instead of 2 x 80mm fans means I can just about hear when the GPU is maxed out (when not gaming I can't hear it at all).

In conclusion aftermarket air coolers do not necessarily have to void your warranty, are relatively easy to install and should offer a better noise / performance balance than non reference cards. Coolers such as the one reviewed and my MK-26 do have one drawback inasmuch as their size pretty much precludes using multiple graphics cards but despite this, I'd say yes there is definitely a market for them.

Well if some people would read the review and my comment fully . . .

The market for third-party CPU coolers has flourished in recent years while the market for third-party GPU coolers has stayed remarkably niche. Many reasons explain this trend but primarily it is due to the effectiveness of cooling solutions that ship with retail graphics cards and, to some extent, the technical complexity of fitting a third-party GPU cooler that acts as a deterrent.

I think you've missed a couple of points about the lack of market for third-party GPU coolers.

To start with not just the technical complexity but also the legal/warranty issues involved with replacing the cooler.

@Ryan Martin, I still say my points stand, when you buy a cpu, you get a stock cooler with it, sometimes you can get hold of OEM cpu's without coolers but it's far more rare and I don't know of any one/place who sells cpu's with aftermarket coolers.
Yes, when a new model of card comes out stock card and cooler is probably your only option, but within a month and cards with aftermarket coolers appear and can often be around the same price as the stock cards.
You've actually summed up the big hassle with warranties

no warranty stickers have been damaged.

common practise is to stick said sticker over one of the screws that hold the cooler on, so you cannot change it without voiding the warranty.
Also the only company that openly allows you to replace the cooler without voiding the warranty is EVGA (allowing that the card still has issues with the original cooler reattached and no physical damage is done to the card)
Other companies might turn a blind eye as long as there's no physical damage and you don't admit to removing the stock cooler, which is not the same thing.

Overall the review was excellent :) I just think that the availability of non-stock cards are bigger factors in graphics card coolers being a more niche market than the complexity of fitting them or the effectiveness of the stock reference coolers.
The next big issue is the Total Hassle involved, not just fitting it, but the added cost of the cooler, making sure it will fit (ok not a big factor, but a factor of the total) the added worry that you'll do it wrong and then have trouble with your warranty and the fact you can buy non-reference cards for near enough the same price.
One of the things you can do is to look at the cooler market, there's very few lower cost options, just the high end coolers, I think the main reason for this is that the manufactures are already using the coolers which would of been the mid range option which has turned aftermarket coolers into a niche market.

Pob255
I think the main reason for this is that the manufactures are already using the coolers which would of been the mid range option which has turned aftermarket coolers into a niche market.

This is a golden point, sums it up brilliantly.

With regards to lower-cost options only one springs to mind, the Gelid Solutions Icy Vision Rev 2.