EVGA GTX 1070 SC Thermal Benchmark vs. Founders, MSI Twin Frozr 

Thermal benchmarks remain a mainstay of our testing, backed by validation from thermal chambers in a previous exhibition. AIB partner cards distance themselves from reference designs by implementing significantly more advanced cooling solutions, coincidentally aiding in allowing higher pre-overclock configurations.

The EVGA and MSI GTX 1070s (SC and Gaming X, respectively) both use a dual-fan setup, each with push fans directly mounted to aluminum heatsinks. The reference design (“Founders Edition”) uses a single blower fan at the very end of the card, with a finned heatsink right-aligned on the PCB. This pulls air in from the case and exhausts it out of the expansion slot. Push fans will trap cool air in the heatsink, but eventually exhaust it into the case for extraction. Some of the air still escapes through the rear expansion slot.

This configuration is fine for the vast majority of gaming PC builds, as those often use mid-tower (or larger) cases. Specific HTPC or SFF builds may be better cooled by a blower fan, which will help remove hot air from other components within the confined space.

That aside, here's a look at peak GPU temperatures during load and idle times:

The GTX 1070 Reference card with FE heatsink rests at 53.86C load (Delta T over ambient) with its 1683MHz stock clock. MSI's new GTX 1070 Gaming X card, leveraging the Twin Frozr VI cooler, sees a 25.29% difference in thermals against the FE card. This plants MSI at 41.77C dT even when in the pre-assigned “OC Mode” (~1797MHz). EVGA's ACX 3.0 cooler lands it between the MSI and FE devices, at 13.84% different from FE (46.89C vs. 53.86C).

The MSI cooler pulls ahead of EVGA by nature of sticking a massive heatsink (with naturally larger fans) to the PCB. MSI's PCB is also taller than the expansion slot – somewhat annoyingly, as we've written – but the trade-off is greater cooling ability. The EVGA card performs well. It's a few degrees warmer than MSI's (46.89C vs. 41.77C), but still within a range of being largely “unnoticeably different” for most users. Overall cooling performance is greatly improved over the FE card.

EVGA GTX 1070 SC Thermals Over Time

Here's a look at the same data set, but projected versus time:

Burn-in begins at 120 seconds in this chart, at which point it's a race to the peak thermals. Cards eventually asymptote / flat-line and stabilize in their thermals. The GTX 1070 SC sits between the GTX 1080 Gaming X and MSI R9 390X.

EVGA GTX 1070 SC Noise Levels vs. Founders Edition, MSI 1070

We've simplified our decibel analysis charts. The charts will no longer show the “noise print” test, which runs prior to our test execution when the system is off, and will instead use the below logarithmic formula to create delta dB values:

The numbers can now be directly compared. Each of the four main values (Idle, Auto, Fan 50%, Fan 100%) can be directly compared/contrasted against one another. This allows a quick way to look at which video card is quietest.

Note that we do not subtract the system noise itself, only the environment noise. To this end, the values are still representative of total system noise (similar to how power tests are total system power draw). The quietest possible dB value will be capped by the system operating noise.

Idle produces the number we'd expect – an identical value between the MSI and EVGA GTX 1070 cards. Both cards operate at an effective 0RPM when under idle loads, so shy of any idle electrical whine, the values should be identical. This places the system noise at 37.1dB.

Using the auto fan curve and after 5 minutes of burn-in, the AIB partner 1070s land at 37.2dB (EVGA) and 38.5dB (MSI). The reference GTX 1070 and reference GTX 1080 operate at 40.7dB.

With 50% fan speeds, we see the EVGA 1070 stick around its 37.2dB value (the auto fan curve had us at ~50%, so that fits the performance), with MSI at 37.9dB (auto ran over 50%, in some instances).

At 100% fan speed, the EVGA GTX 1070 SC operates at 57dB, reasonably louder than MSI's GTX 1070 Twin Frozr at 52.7dB. The reference cards are at 57.2dB – just slightly louder than the EVGA card. That said, these devices should almost never hit 100% fan speeds. This often only occurs when the user manually configures such a high speed, as the auto settings will keep RPM closer to 50%.

Continue to the next page for Dx12, Vulkan vs. Dx11 Benchmarks.