Gigabyte GTX 1080 Ti Aorus Xtreme Tear-Down

We tear-down the new Gigabyte GTX 1080 Ti Aorus Xtreme video card, looking at the PCB, cooler, & disassembly.
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[@GamersNexus]

Thanks for watching! Review is forthcoming. Probably shooting that this weekend. In the meantime, we just re-stocked our shirt store (store.gamersnexus.net) with GN Logo shirts from S->5X, and we've got a "Getting Started" guide to VPNs & private browsing on the site that we published today (article-only format): www.gamersnexus.net/guides/2879-private-browsing-tutorial-vpns-tor-https

[@jarrubber]

+Gamers Nexus Nice, now I can finally get my hands on a GN shirt, and looking forward to the review for this beast. Gigabyte is one of my favorite brands.

[@Pyromanaic28]

Regarding the fans for this card, the thicker fins on the center of the middle fan are probably also because the center spins slower than the outside portion of the fins and it more evenly distributes the air pressure across that fan.

[@loose_tooth]

I loved the teardown, I know that for any cooling solution it is about what works, but the Aorus cooling solution looks too bulky and a bit mental so it would be interesting to see if that extra heft actually translates into extra performance of note. One thing I was interested in was the Aorus Radeon box that kind of keeps peeking out from behind your left hip. Is that a new card and will we be seeing information on that soon? Many thanks.

[@hellsgate09]

Likely just the Aorus 570/580.

[@DCG909]

Thanks for the teardown, was able to reverse this and get the stock cooler back on after using a waterblock for years.

[@foreignsgamingtech]

I love these tear-downs. My biggest interest in computer hardware is exactly what you're showing and talking about here, so thank you!

[@incrediblePsychoheaD]

thanks to that video, i finally found the courage to disassemble my gpu and change the thermal paste. first i ever done this... worked very well. thank you! :)

[@davidjohn4835]

You properly tear things down. From an engineering standpoint, your videos are excellent. I hope your sub base increases. Thanks for the video

[@Heliossoileh]

I'm impressed that the video has been brought to me by a bundle. As a human, I feel positively obsolete.

[@costiqueR]

6 years later the tear-down is very useful, as the card is still worth a lot, I just installed a liquid cooler on it, and is going well better than the original fans (in my game with superior setup is now around 20 degrees lower!). Thanks! PS: How did they fool us to buy $1000-2000 premium video cards, from $600 6 years ago?

[@johndeere7027]

How thick is the Thermal Pad?

[@seanbrockest3888]

So glad this exists. Going to revitalize my 1080, it's overheating a bit. Hello from 2022!

[@Starwarsfun1-Leo]

Thank you very much for this video 💪 I wasn't confident opening up my GPU before 👀

[@edev455]

I just successfully re-pasted my heavily used 1080 Ti (on a GN Modmat) with the help of this tear-down. My temps are down significantly. Thanks!

[@FastLikePuma]

this video just blew my mind. I tearing down my old hp gtx 1080 to put a kraken bracket on it and Im learning more about it watching past you. 6 years ago! dang lol

[@jubuttib]

Thanks for this video. I'm prepping to put one of these (well, the non Xtreme version to be honest) that's getting replaced in my main rig into an ITX build, and the thickness is just too much normally. This teardown will help me remove the fan and shroud assembly and put in some slim Noctua 120mm fans right on the finstacks. =)

[@robrath31]

Abso-freakin-lutely awesome thank you - VERY USEFUL VID FOR REASSEMBLE!

[@kiela7859]

Can anyone describe to me how thick thermopads are in this model? I mean power supply, vram etc. 0.5? 1? 2mm? Help my Aorus have in stress 82-84C After Thermal Grizzly 70C +- but thermopads look poor

[@SpesDesperatio]

Need the same infos.. :/

[@ShivREdits]

@@SpesDesperatio seems like we all do, can't find it anywhere, considering just taking mine apart and measuring them with a caliper

[@jaysellers5397]

Please do these same teardowns on the Vega cards when they come out. This is awesome.

[@viperrcr]

Awesome video, thank you!

[@HelmetLawSux]

do you know what is the thickness of the thermal pad?

[@sly4300]

Very cool video, that's exactly what I was looking for to be able to disassemble my graphics card and replace the thermal paste and pads. I was a bit hesitant about taking off the cover. It's just a shame that you didn't measure the thermal pad thickness with a caliper and provide their dimensions in the description. Below, in the second comment, I added the sizes that I received from Chat GBT. According to the information provided by Gigabyte, these sizes are appropriate for the thermal pads used on the AORUS GeForce GTX 1080 Ti Xtreme Edition 11G graphics card to transfer heat away from the components of the card.

[@scottwiltse4081]

Thanks for the Awesome Video's ! I'm thinking of purchasing this card to replace my Gigabyte G1 Gaming 980 ti. I just want the extra performance at a lower load heat. So I'll be looking forward to your testing on this Bad Boy !

[@chrcoluk]

yeah searched for this video, I just brought the non extreme model of this card which has the same shroud and heatsink. Gigabyte used a 2 slot cooler, but it only became a 3 slot card because the shroud hanging over it for visual appearance purposes. My palit gtx 1070 had a heatsink with twice the height as the heatsink on my auros gtx 1080ti. :p

[@5ch4cht3l7]

A 3 Slot Aorus with these 3 Fans placed next to each other instead of above each other would be so awesome.

[@sergeymiroshnikov8981]

Hey , can you write down the thermal pad thickness on this card ? was it 1.5 or 1.0 ? or both ?

[@PieluX]

Please tell us this info

[@SpesDesperatio]

I need the info too.

[@MRCarlosFactory]

Do yo know the thermal pad thickness bro?

[@AdrianTap]

yep, that would be nice :D

[@motryx466]

For all those asking. I asked Gigabyte support. The thickness of thermal pads are 0.25mm/0.65mm/1.45mm/1.5mm/1.75mm/2.45mm/2.65mm.

[@metalmulishajason]

Wow mate i have this card and its insane. The cooling block is massive.

[@metalmulishajason]

subscribed and like for u bro.

[@Khranok]

Putting this old card into my partner's pc after it previously had a water block on it, thank god for this video showing where all the fan connectors went 🤣

[@legitscoper3259]

Gigabyte did a really solid job on this one, I'm glad I've bought it.

[@jonnyc4744]

i'm looking forward to the review. My prediction will be the same that there is minimal o/c headroom like the MSI Gaming X. Many of these card average 1974MHz or slightly less average. Loads of other tech reviewers like to report the maximum clock boost, which is typically a one off.

[@exclusive_PL]

Dzięki, teraz wiem jak zabrać się za czyszczenie / wymianę pasty w moim egzemplarzu.

[@theripper121]

I just got this card in mail from newegg and I was super excited. Popped in the card and its fairly quiet, cool and games like a beast.....when it works. Every game Ive played within a half hour or so I get crashes. Every game. Driver wipe and reseating card and power plugs no dice. Same behavior. RMA'ed hate to see it go. With them selling out everywhere who knows when Ill get a replacement.

[@Elf1492]

This and the 1080ti AMP Extreme by Zotac are some of the thickest cards ever seen

[@chrcoluk]

the zotac actually has a bigger heatsink tho occupying the space, you can see in this video at 11min 45s and earlier as well, that once he took of the oversized shroud the heatsink itself would fit into a 2 slot card. My palit gtx 1070 the heatsink covering the gpu is twice the height as the one on this card and that is still a 3 slot card, the reason is, on the palit the heatsink extends into the 3rd slot space, and the shroud is tight fitting round it, whilst on this card the shroud is way above the the top of the heatsink and gives an illusion of better cooling then it actually has.

[@ucci4life1983]

Are you going to review the sea hawk?

[@jeanwelman]

@Gamers Nexus, I have this exact card and with the help of this teardown video, I had the courage to remove the cooler from my card and replace the old, bone-dry thermal paste. Now my thermals are down by 10 degrees plus it boosts a lot higher than it use to.

[@mauirixxx]

hey I have the non extreme version but I'm guessing dis-assembly is the same. Did you replace the thermal pads as well as the paste, or just the paste? I'm hitting thermal throttling around 84c and lots of hitching now :(

[@marioandresjara]

write down the thermal pad thickness please!!!

[@smoke4622]

@@mauirixxx did u ever find out any fix

[@mauirixxx]

@@smoke4622 I ended up reusing the same thermal pads, but applied new paste after the teardown. And boy did that help, temps stayed around 70c after, and all the hitching went away. Good luck! I ended up giving my card to my kid, it's still going strong today!

[@nickchesshir6994]

I wish there was detailed view of the rear of the pcb. Trying to repair mine and cant find a good picture to see roughly what values some resistors are

[@offmyed]

Did you measure the dimensions of the pcb during the teardown? I'd love to put one of these under water but it'll mean a major rearrangement of my loop if the card it too long. I'd be very interested to see how these do compared to a founders edition when water cooled.

[@supersayianz]

Would love if you did a teardown of the zotac extreme edition

[@ramenadventure]

Super obscure question, but do you know where I could buy the screws for this card? The ones at 3:15. Someone gave me a board but it's been disassembled and the screws lost. I have many random PC parts screws but these ones seem especially small.

[@ravenwda007]

Anyone else remember the old 8800gtx and 3870 days? I still got my two 3870's with duorb coolers.

[@dav1dparker]

This card is masterpiece and I'm still happy to own one.

[@AdrianTap]

me2

[@darkme5660]

I am gonna get one 😅

[@panther189_]

@@dav1dparker just bought one for 250$😎

[@shingnosis]

@Gamer Nexus: I was wondering, can you connect an extra fan to those free pins on the board? It might not be a bad idea to have an extra fan blowing on the top of the backplate for cooling under load. I think the Asus Strix has this feature, pretty nice.

[@Tuchulu]

By Odin's beard that thing is massive!

[@PieluX]

How thick is the thermopads? Help man !

[@robbiepearce7909]

THANK YOU STEVE! Fans stuck at 0rpm, I’d plugged them into a bloody RGB header.

[@generalgeldenhuys7175]

I always wondered which radiator is the best. Vertical or horizontal radiators. The horizontal is almost like the reference cards where air can only blown out sideways, while the vertical is blowing air from the top and bottom of card.

[@RagathRRInc]

It's 2021 with a GPU shortage. So I'd like to keep my 1080 ti as long as possible by at least reapplying thermal paste, rather than buying a new card. The tear-down is handy for that. Thank you GN for this video.

[@andyderp6473]

find out the thermal pad thickness by any chance?

[@RagathRRInc]

Oof. I'd love to answer that, but I recently picked up a 4070ti with the release of D4. Gave my old card to a friend that could use it.

[@andyderp6473]

@@RagathRRInc appreciate the reply, just opened up mine and redid paste but couldn't get pad sizes even with calipers so didn't risk it and gigabyte told me to ask the place I purchased from lol

[@Elrafau]

@@andyderp6473 i know the exact thermal pad thickness, made a post on reddit about that btw.

[@andyderp6473]

@@Elrafau aye, think I came across that while I was trying to cling to any info regarding it even if I was looking for the 1070s pad thickness but there was no info regarding the extreme 1070 model and they seem to be different not only in thickness but amount, I tried to measure with a calipers the non squished parts of the pads when I opened it up but too much variance, cheers.

[@rusruslanrus]

Nice video

[@alannguyen5050]

Does anyone know the thickness of the thermal pads for this GPU?

[@SpesDesperatio]

I need the same info :/

[@mjojrjr6231]

I think, it's better to have all the thickness you can get... from 1mm to 5mm before trying to do this...

[@SpesDesperatio]

@@mjojrjr6231 thermal pads are very expensive here in germany and I don't wanna buy all thicknesses for only one replacement.

[@kantegir]

@@SpesDesperatio what did you find out in the end? I wanted to replace thermal paste, but looks like thermal pads will tear apart while I'll be taking gpu apart

[@Pabula]

Any chance you tested the 4pin connectors if there is more than one for the fans or the bottom one controls the 3 fans?

[@morbid1.]

oh my dawg it's thick as hell... do they add some support mount for that?

[@hatdog703]

love your reviews. please review the asus next

[@Misterzen87]

How likely is it that gigabyte would know i opened it to change the thermalpaste if i am really careful? because i rly want to squeeze out a few degrees in this hot summer so i can keep the oc stable.

[@tonymorodermontana3573]

Hi,i found only your vid trearing this thick block apart ...i have 8gb aourus version .... Can you talk about termal pads oily stains on backplate ...? Do you talk somewhere about that? I have litlle that on some screws near center Thanks

[@xxii.fhm_]

I have the AORUS 1070 version and similar like ur, hard to find on YT, will u share the all Thermalpad Thickness, i just want replace the original with the 3rd party thermalpad, Thanks.

[@jayopacic1470]

This is probably a stupid question, but will give it a try anyways. Is there any way that I could get those LED cables to connect and sync with Asus Aura Sync?

[@powerdirector28]

Hii, i have the same video card and in full load the temperature reach 84 degrees maximum. Is this normal or should i change the thermal paste on gpu?

[@jackjones6936]

The non-Xtreme version of this card seems to have the same cooler. Does it also have the same PCB?

[@adickurig]

I'm noticing from the side of the cooler that the coil fins have zig-zags bent into them. Clearly this would marginally impede airflow which isn't a problem given sufficient fan pressure but do you really think it improves dissipation? Also this is my first time noticing any thing like this on any heat sink coil whether that be a CPU or GPU cooler. Is this a common engineering feature you've seen before?

[@acelious]

would u buy any chance know the thickness of the pasted used on this card im selling mine and want to revert it back to air cooled instead of selling it with the waterblock on it

[@Rave_game9310]

could you strap 2 140mm noctua fans and improve the cooling solution

[@daylanmcearchern3896]

What size screwdriver do you use to remove the tiny screws on the backplate? @gamers nexus

[@thecloud1432]

I L I K E E M B I G I L I K E E M C H U N K Y

[@donnyjones24]

Can you take the big X that goes over the fans off and still run it? It is too big to fit into my graphic amplifier. Thanks!

[@RalphRomano2]

Can you please tell us the pad sizes that you need and the amount to purchase. Prefer to see a list of product example so we can utilize this video in real life.

[@sam3806]

@Gamersnexus, I have a Aorus GTX 1080ti NON XTREME, recently playing Battlefield 5 & Escape from Tarkov sometimes hit 84 Celesius, used it since August 2018 and clean dust quite often, what can you suggest the issue that cause slightly high temp? Since it yet past my warranty kinda worry to dissect the card to replace thermal paste. Also, how long does the aorus factory thermal pad last?

[@scottwiltse4081]

Wow does this card come with a support bracket to keep it from sagging?

[@samaniglo8858]

hi gamers nexus could you tell me if this Gpu has a warrenty sticker thaat would void warrenty if i wanted to watercool it?

[@leedavies3563]

I use 2 of these in SLI with the RGB high bandwidth bridge, epic cards.

[@misterxzxc7314]

You can't go far with sli in gaming to be honest you should have bought rtx 2080ti instead

[@mankindanddestiny7798]

@@misterxzxc7314 true sli is trash there's few games who support it

[@LegendMuscle]

hey, i've got the 1080ti gigabyte n108taorus-11Gd ] 11gb ill occasionally get a BSOD video scheduler internal error from the card, but was able to run an entire time spy test without an issue. once in a while i'll get a pixleated display that will crash the driver making a reinstalled driver/or device noise.. then getting my display back.. any idea whats going on with it?

[@VanilloBumbleboo1981]

5:22 They got lazy with that RGB thingy...

[@konforzone]

the nice thing with this card is the ability of pushing power target %150 instead of %122. So you can easily reach to 2.1ghz core clocks while other cards having stability problem after 1950mhz in %1 and %0.1 lows.

[@dhananjaysarsonia29]

Is the stability issue solved on this?

[@joseelfredes]

Thanks you

[@DarkExsphere]

Does the gaming X backplate cause any issues? I don't want to read the article

[@roteroktober360]

was the pcb also heard for you to remove from the cooler?

[@qwertyui90qwertyui90]

I wonder if you could replace the fans with just some 120mm noctua fans :)

[@HotboiEngineering]

Could card makers eventually make a custom card Titan X? They basically have one right there, just minus 1 VRAM chip.

[@H0LAI]

What are the 2 black connectors for inside on aorus logo side?

[@nthanhcong0]

hey, I lost a white screw in 11:47, could you tell me what size it is? Tks so much.

[@jonnyfielding7299]

Just bought one 😎

[@predator70nc46]

Do you have to take the cooler off to take the fans off?

[@Waarr909]

Wish those high end gpus would be a bit cheaper, i cant just throw 800€ out for a freaking video card. Hope AMDs Vega will throw NVidia from their high horse prices.

[@Z3rgoon]

i think VEGA is around a gtx 1080, so probably a bit lower price but not much.. sadly

[@TheMarioBikers95GamersCove]

a 1070 should be good enough for you its around $400

[@Z3rgoon]

i hope aswell that VEGA rocks, so nvidia has to go down with the prices. but i dont really think theyre that "strong"

[@oldschoolbeat1984]

no they wont vega will be expensive cause HBM2 is very expensive

[@saltyrat6920]

This has not changed for many years, the way it was explained to me was the price on release is higher so they can recoup their cost to tool and manufacture. Once they have recouped their in house cost the overall cost of them will go down. This is why the smart builder is always a version or two behind cutting edge and let those that have no patients pay more for their short live bragging rights.

[@roteroktober360]

can you remove the plastic parts from the pcb too? Mine died and I would like to try the oven baking trick to fix it

[@qwertyui90qwertyui90]

No, you should check the mosfets, that is the likely part that has dies. they are about $10 each to replace and it is likely just one or two of the mosfets that are bad.

[@panko2848]

9:55 "Ok lets mess around with this and see what happens"

[@Wooskii1]

I just received one of these cards. It's been used heavily for it's whole life and probably never cleaned. Is there any place or service to get it repasted and maybe have new thermal pads applied? I very much would appreciate any help/ advice... I haven't build a PC in a decade+ and have never opened a GPU, so the thought of taking it apart, when I can't afford a new (or used) one is pretty scary. It's going into a build using all used parts (minus the case and storage). Thank you anyone for any possible advice.

[@laylend8632]

the gigabyte gtx 970 xtreme gaming has those nuts on the heat sink as well have not torn it down to find out why

[@Chronomaxs]

Please help me, im building my first pc and I was planning on getting this gpu for my z370 aorus gaming 5 but checking further I saw that for a little bit more I could get the rtx 2080 ti in my country..... are they both compatible??? what would be better???

[@HelmetLawSux]

I try to disamble mine, but it seems to be glued hard.. unable to pull out the fan..

[@NikhchansGaming]

I am thinking to tear down my almost 2 year old above card and replace the paste with Kryonaut. Good idea?

[@OOIEatte]

Nikhchan's Gaming definitely

[@anotherwiseunpleasantperso2147]

You know ya boi is sold if a gpu has he performance to compensate for its Unique and E X T R A T H I C C design.

[@fluffypink90]

There are bolts in my R9 290x Windforce cooler. ＩＮＤＵＳＴＲＩＡＬ ＤＥＳＩＧＮ

[@AnANas00-x3p]

I like gigabyte but I don't like the overlapping fans design. Btw like your screwdriver : )

[@onesingledream]

The fan header is the one closest to the HDMI output at the back of the board. You're welcome.

[@KnurdMonkey]

So... which one is the fan header actually?

[@MancaveCentral1]

Reading too many complaints of crashes with the basic built in oc mode, excessive coil wind and fans hitting that cheap plastic shroud. Will be avoiding this one and sticking with the Zotac Amp Extreme.

[@Pazo139]

You could kill someone with that GPU!

[@trojaxx904]

any information about fan noise ?

[@shashikantt]

aorus gtx 1080 ti xtreme or evga ftw3 , need cool performance with high overclocking

[@xlostlovex]

May I ask why the unscrewing process was cut short? Are all the screw that are needed to be unscrewed shown here? All the 7 screws on the back of the PCB only? And do I use strenght to actually peel it open for them to be seperated? Becaues I tried unscrewing mine like urs in the video but I still couldnt seperate them.

[@SpesDesperatio]

You can see all steps here.

[@sladjandroo]

i got that gpu and temperature on 1080p gaming is 80C is that problem or what it really buggs me!

[@99SHS]

what about " GIGABYTE AORUS GTX 1080 Ti WATERFORCE XTREME " Edition is it worth it ?

[@RizLazey]

teardown before review lmao what a legend XDDD

[@MrKZdemos]

Steve plz, zotac amp extreme. Plz ,i know they dont like you after the 980 review but plz do a breakdown and review