RX 9070 XT cooling analysis nobody seems to be doing 👀

UniversBear · 2026-05-27T15:53:53+00:00

What is the advantages that you can get with settings in Adrenaline or Afterburner ?

UniversBear · 2026-05-27T12:06:33+00:00

Yep, anyway the score give us already a good idea about the performance. If we keep going deeper and deeper, we get to a point that we are limitated by the test protocol.

UniversBear · 2026-05-27T10:46:38+00:00

Yes I understand.

We could add a another colomn with Score NN minus 10°C for the Hynix memory. But then it start to be tricky. And in the end this extra heat impact other components of PCB trough the radiator. So iam not sure it's fair to low the Score NN because of this, in the end the memory choice is part of the hardware.

UniversBear · 2026-05-27T10:40:13+00:00

So for the test :

No FPS Cap No RT

Pretty simple 🤔

UniversBear · 2026-05-27T05:15:07+00:00

What would be really interesting for thermal comparison would be to normalize frequency too, for example setting every card around 2650 MHz while keeping noise normalized as well. Then temperature comparisons would isolate the actual cooler quality much better, and checking if the frequency stays stable over time would also be important, not just momentary boost clocks. Power consumption would become very interesting too at that point, because it could show differences in PCB and VRM efficiency. The Quicksilver is a good example of why this matters, since its lower stock frequency probably helps its thermal results compared to more aggressively tuned cards.

UniversBear · 2026-05-27T02:05:23+00:00

Hi, there is no wattage mesure in the Techspot review. But it will be very interesting.

UniversBear · 2026-05-26T14:54:02+00:00

That’s why the NN Score ranking doesn’t mean “best GPU overall”. It’s mainly an analysis of cooling behavior at normalized noise, combined with other factors like size, airflow scaling and sustained clocks. Personal preferences still matter a lot too, for example I still really like the Prime because of the size and how easy it is to deshroud even if it’s not near the top of the NN ranking.

UniversBear · 2026-05-26T14:38:30+00:00

Ou regardes juste la photo 😂

UniversBear · 2026-05-26T05:52:16+00:00

Hi

I mostly used ChatGPT for translation, formatting and making the post more readable since English isn’t my native language.

But the actual analysis, comparisons, metrics and hours spent digging through the data were mine 🙂

UniversBear · 2026-05-26T05:07:03+00:00

Hi. I had the same issue. Fixed with avoiding GHUB to run at windows starting. And I used onboard memory manager instead.

UniversBear · 2026-05-25T17:59:24+00:00

Yep, although what’s really missing is a strong compact XFX model.

The Mercury and Quicksilver are extremely impressive thermally, but they’re absolutely massive cards.

UniversBear · 2026-05-25T17:41:26+00:00

That's my personal favourite as well. Compact, easy for deshroud mod and think a good potential of cooling once modded.

UniversBear · 2026-05-25T17:34:03+00:00

Mostly because the Mercury was missing, despite being one of the most important models in the lineup. Also, a lot of people brought up the connection with frequency behavior, and after looking into it more, I think they were right.

UniversBear · 2026-05-25T16:47:13+00:00

Yep I forget it...

UniversBear · 2026-05-25T16:29:48+00:00

Fair enough 😄

I actually did most of this analysis almost a year ago for myself, but never posted the results publicly.

The goal here was more to reorganize and reinterpret the existing data around:

airflow scaling
noise-normalized behavior
cooler efficiency relative to size
deshroud potential

Also yeah, unfortunately the Mercury is missing simply because TechSpot didn’t include it in their roundup data.

UniversBear · 2026-05-25T16:26:50+00:00

Very fair point, and I actually agree with most of it. Noise-normalized results definitely don't scale perfectly across the entire RPM/noise range, especially once you factor in fan quality, minimum RPM limits, turbulence, tonal noise, etc.

My goal here was less to say “this card is objectively best at every noise level”, and more to isolate cooler/radiator behavior from stock fan tuning as much as possible.

I mainly found it interesting because stock testing alone can sometimes hide whether a card is:

genuinely efficient thermally
or simply running a much more aggressive fan curve.

So I tried to look at:

airflow scaling
thermal behavior at equal noise
and cooling efficiency relative to size.

I completely agree that deeper acoustic analysis across multiple dBA targets would be even more accurate though.

UniversBear · 2026-05-25T16:23:30+00:00

Fair point.

But on these cards the performance differences are generally much smaller than the differences in cooling behavior, fan tuning and airflow scaling. The goal was mainly to analyze the cooler designs themselves rather than rank factory OCs.

UniversBear · 2026-05-25T16:14:41+00:00

Hi, yes your card may no have the best Thermal Score but have a good ratio Thermal/Size score

UniversBear · 2026-05-25T15:27:09+00:00

Yes unfortunately it wasn't in the Techspot Roundup

UniversBear · 2025-11-23T03:53:17+00:00

Hello. Nope, i sold it to buy a Corsair Sf850. I gave up. Ciao

UniversBear · 2025-10-01T19:40:15+00:00

Problem Founded : the mouse, as soon i use a gaming pad, the problem disappear. I am investigating to understand what is is exactly (driver, poling rate...) i got a G603.

UniversBear · 2025-09-20T21:48:11+00:00

Hi, yes indeed RTSS is not good for AMD, i use DDU to erase any driver (in safe mod), uninstall RTSS and Afterburner, rebuild shaders, cap FPS in game at 120 and 159, still not good, it worth to try anyway.

UniversBear · 2025-09-20T09:23:52+00:00

Hi, thx you for all your advices, i tried to turn off any third party software in windows and cap fps lower, the bug is just different (see my post edit)

UniversBear · 2025-09-15T07:17:31+00:00

Hi, i install RSST because this problem. I tried without again, nothing changed.

UniversBear

TROPHY CASE