Guide to Nvidia 3080 FE Thermal Pad Mod
The Nvidia 3080 FE and other partner cards have memory junction heat problems, but the fix is simple
The Nvidia 3080 and 3090 are fantastic graphics cards that have managed to genuinely impress the PC community with their performance. The success of these cards can be seen in how incredibly difficult they are to buy at retail price. However, despite the incredible performance, many of the 3080 and 3090 models suffer from thermal throttling due to the GDDR6X VRAM overheating. Luckily this problem can be solved at home with new thermal pads if done properly. This post will discuss the overheating issue and provide a walkthrough on modifying the Founder’s Edition 3080 including diagrams for the thermal pads.
The Problem
If you were lucky enough to actually purchase one of these graphics cards, you may or may not have noticed that the new GDDR6X memory is overheating and throttling performance. Not every card is affected by this issue, but I have seen reports of the Founders Edition, Dell pre-built, MSI trio, Asus Tuf, Gigabyte Vision, and Gigabyte Gaming all overheating. Long story short is it seems that a substantial number of cards are experiencing memory junction temperatures above the rated operating temperature that leads to thermal throttling. My card was so bad that even with the fans at 100% I would experience throttling due to the memory junction reaching 110 degrees, despite relatively cool core temps.
Many people haven’t noticed this because most temperature applications read out the core temperature of the GPU, which is not the issue on the RTX 3080/3090. The memory junction temperature wasn’t exposed on Nvidia GPUs before the 30 series, and only one app — that I know of — has been updated to show it to the user: HWiNFO4. HWiNFO4 is a free app designed to provide you with information about the hardware in your system; my primary use case for it is finding the temperatures of various pieces in my system like SSDs and my GPU. Here is a screenshot of what some of the GPU information looks like:
My personal Founders Edition (FE) card had this problem. When mining at stock settings the memory junction temperature would immediately hit 110 degrees Celsius and then the card would throttle to avoid going above 110 degrees.
Using MSI Afterburner I was able to get the memory down to 100 degrees with power limited to 63% and the memory clock speeds turned all the way down. This limited my previous hash rate of 91MH/s to only 73MH/s, which is a nearly 20% reduction in profitability!
Even playing games like Star Wars Battlefront 2 would cause the GPU to throttle due to memory temps. Clearly, there was an issue, but Nvidia support reps insisted that it was normal. Until last week Micron listed the maximum operating temperature of GDDR6X as 95 degrees Celsius. Now they have updated it to 95/105 degrees, which allows for a little more headroom but phew that is very hot and still lower than the 110 many cards are hitting.
Just the temperature gradient this creates on the PCB is worrisome to me. Since I wanted to get the full performance out of my 3080 and I was worried about the impact on the card’s lifespan, I decided to follow the advice of several Reddit users and change my thermal pads.
The Solution
Luckily, there is a simple solution to these memory temperature issues: new thermal pads. Many 3080s have poor quality thermal pads on the memory chips, which I will show you below. My 3080 FE had oily, crumbly, and overall low-quality thermal pads on the memory chips. They looked like they were starting to disintegrate from the heat, and my card is only a few months old. Ideally, high-quality thermal pads will do a better job at moving this heat into the cooler so it can be dissipated.
Swapping the stock pads for Gelid Extreme dropped my memory temperature by 18–25 degrees depending on the settings. My new maximum memory temperature is 92 degrees, and that is with a significantly hotter ambient temperature since I moved last month. I will discuss the final performance further in the Results section, first let’s discuss how to do the mod.
I will show you how to change the pads on a 3080 Founder’s Edition since that is the only 3080 I currently have access to. It is also one of the most common and consistent cards with memory temperature issues. However, once you know what to do, you can find resources specific to your card. I will do my best to link guides or Reddit posts about various cards in the Resources section at the end.
3080 Founders Edition Thermal Pad Guide
The Founders Edition 3080 is a little harder to take apart than some of the partner cards, but it is really not bad with some patience. For months I have seen people go back and forth on Reddit about whether to put thermal pads on the front (GPU side), back, or front and back of the PCB to get the best results. I can comfortably say the front side is by far the most important.
There are many posts about people only applying new pads to the back of the 3080 FE since it is much easier to access the back of the card. I couldn’t find a single comment on Reddit saying that only doing the back of the card resulted in major temp drops, but I did find several people who had great results doing both sides.
To me, it seemed like the front of the card is where a majority of the heat is drawn off the memory chips and into the cooler. The 3080 FE does not have memory chips on the back of the PCB as the 3090 does. So I started by only replacing the front pads, and the results were fantastic, which we’ll discuss at the end. For now, I will just say that I personally wouldn’t spend the time or extra $30 on thermal pads for the backplate of the 3080 FE.
Unfortunately, replacing the front pads means you have to disassemble the whole card, but it’s not hard. With a little patience and a good guide, you’ll be done in a couple of hours. Now let’s go through all of the tools and materials you need before starting.
Materials and Tools
There are specific tools and materials needed for this mod, but they aren’t particularly uncommon. Specifically, the brand of thermal pad that you use is crucial. The screws on the cooler are also prone to stripping, so make sure to use the right size Philips or Torx bit on each step.
Tools
- Philips (size: 0)
- Torx: T5, T6, T8
- Tweezers
- Sticky Tape
- Plastic Pry Bar
- Thermal paste spreader
Materials
The Gelid Extreme pads are the secret to this mod working properly every time. The 3080 FE uses varying thicknesses of pads, and getting proper contact between the cooler and the GPU Die along with all of the memory chips is incredibly difficult with a firm pad. The Gelid Extreme pads are uniquely soft, almost like a piece of wet clay. They compress very well to fill gaps, which means that they will fill gaps without preventing the GPU die from making contact with the cooler.
Many users who try to use a more common pad end up with higher core temps or no improvement in VRAM temps, or both! They also have to buy 1.5mm and 2mm thick pads, which increases cost and complexity. While I have seen some success with that strategy, I highly recommend using Gelid Extreme pads only.
Here are the materials I used for this project. If you only want to do the front side of the GPU as I did, you don’t need the two 3mm thick pads.
- Gelid Extreme 2.0mm
- Critical for the front (die side)
- One is exactly enough with a tiny bit of scrap
- Get two if you are worried about making a mistake - Gelid Extreme 3.0mm (Optional)
- For the backside (easiest to access)
- Really need two for full coverage, but one will cut it for the most important areas
- I didn’t do this side - Arctic MX-4 Thermal Paste
- Isopropyl Alcohol & Microfiber Cloth
- To clean the old thermal paste
- Paper Towel is a good alternative to a Microfiber cloth
Thermal Pad Diagram
Front (GPU Side)
The front side of the GPU can be done with a single 80x40x2mm Gelid Extreme pad, however, you can’t make any mistakes when cutting it if you only order a single pad. It’s up to you whether you want an extra pad just in case.
Here is how I cut the 80x40mm pad:
Back
The back of the card takes two packs of 3.00mm thick Gelid Extreme pads. People on the forums have been putting a lot of pads on the back of the card, however, it doesn’t seem that it has a major impact on temperatures. When you disassemble the card, you will see why. The backplate is thin and compared to the heatsink on the front of the card the backplate doesn't have much mass to conduct heat.
Since accessing the back of the card is much easier, there are quite a few comments on Reddit from people who only did the back with minimal improvement. It does seem that doing the backside will potentially net a couple of degrees, though, so I have provided the diagram for cutting the pads created by CoolPenguin1 on Imgur.
Personally, I would do the front side of the GPU, and see if your temperatures have improved as much as mine did before also doing the entire backside. Accessing the back of the card is so much easier than the front, so it’s not a big deal to go back to it later.
Disassembly
Taking apart the GPU is best done while looking at this teardown from Techpowerup.com’s review of the card. They do a good job stepping you through the teardown and showing you how to remove the delicate cables. This video will also ensure you understand how the cables come apart. I will outline the steps here and add the notes that I made while doing the mod myself. If you feel like you need additional help, there are a plethora of 3080 FE teardowns on YouTube.
- Remove Y Bracket
- Make sure to pry the bracket with a plastic tool, metal will scratch it
- Screws underneath are Philips 0 - Remove Magnetic Covers with Sticky Tape
- Remove Philips Screws Under Covers (T5)
- Gently Remove Back Plate of Cooler
- Don’t lose the two small rubber pieces that were under where the Y Bracket sits. If these fall off, the card won’t reassemble properly.
- The thermal pads can hold the PCB pretty tightly to the cooler, so there will be some resistance
- Make sure to keep the existing thermal pads in place if you are only doing the front of the GPU - Unplug the LED and Ribbon Cables
- Go slow, watch the video
- The ribbon cables are delicate but easily slide out once the gate is open
- Make sure to not pull on the edge of the ribbon cables
- The LED cable must be pulled straight up after the cage is open
- Ensure the cage over the LED cable is fully back so it can slide directly upwards. Mine was just barely not fully open at first. - Remove IO Shield (T8)
- Remove Leaf Bracket (T6)
- Remove in diagonals to apply equal pressure
- When the screws are loose, it will pop off since it is tensioned - Remove PCB From Cooler
- Will likely be sticky, pull firmly but gently - STOP. Techpowerup’s teardown continues, but we are done here!
Cleaning
Now that you have the PCB separated from the cooler, you can start removing the old thermal pads that should be stuck to the cooler mounts. Here is what your cooler should look like with the PCB off:
All of these old thermal pads can be removed and disposed of. They tend to crumble when you remove them, so take it slow and make sure to get all of the white pads off of the cooler and PCB.
Once they are all removed, take a microfibre cloth or paper towel with isopropyl alcohol and clean all of the surfaces. I like to use microfibre cloth because they can’t shed anything like a paper towel can, however, the thermal paste will ruin your cloth. Regardless of the material used, just make sure to get all of the residues from the old pads and thermal paste off of the cooler and PCB.
Pad/Paste Application
Now that the card is clean, we can apply our new pads to the card. I like to apply them directly to the PCB so that they definitely align properly. Press down gently on them to make sure they stay in place when reassembling the card; you will see some lines in my pads where I tapped it down with a spreader tool.
These Gelid Extreme pads look much better than the white pads I took off. They aren’t oily and have much more structure to them. The only downside is that they are still very soft; if you have to take the PCB off of the cooler again they may rip instead of separating cleanly.
I have to also mention that this PCB is incredibly small. The Founder’s PCBs are much smaller than the AIB cards, which is pretty cool. If you have ever wanted to do a custom water cooling loop, I think this is a sweet PCB to put in a water block.
Thermal Paste
We are ready to apply our paste! The thermal paste on a GPU Die needs to be applied a little differently than on a CPU. You will notice that there was quite a lot of paste residue you had to clean off the cooler and that is because GPUs need a lot of paste with very even coverage. The Die gets very hot, so we will be applying quite a bit of paste and then carefully spreading it evenly on the Die surface.
Here is the shape that I applied the paste:
GPUs are much more susceptible to hot spots on the Die than CPUs are, so we aren’t going to leave it to chance that the pressure from the cooler covers the whole surface evenly. Instead, we will carefully spread the paste, making sure not to create any air pockets. Here is a picture of what it looks like after the paste is spread:
Reassembly
Once this is done, you are ready to reassemble your card! If you are not comfortable working backward from the guide we used to disassemble, you can follow this YouTube video guide on this thermal pad mod. He goes through the reassembly very well. Aside from the order of his mod, his video is also a good guide to this whole process.
The only slow part is this initial step of putting the PCB back on the cooler. The shorter ribbon cable on the bottom of the card tends to get trapped underneath the PCB if you aren’t paying attention. If a cable gets stuck underneath you will need to pull the PCB off again, which could mess up the thermal pads or paste. So take this first step slow, and make sure all three cables are above the PCB before applying any pressure. Once the PCB is back onto the cooler and the cables plugged back in, the rest is pretty easy.
Results
Before changing the thermal pads, at stock settings, my memory junction temps would hit 110 degrees when gaming or mining Ethereum. After the mod, my memory junction temps never exceed 90 degrees even with an overclock. I can now also run the GPU fans at 70% with an overclock compared to a brutally loud 100% before. It’s safe to say that changing the pads on the front side of the GPU makes a massive difference in memory temperatures on the 3080 Founder’s Edition.
My computer now runs considerably quieter, cooler, and faster. Before the mod, I could only achieve a hash rate of 73MH/s. However, now I am comfortably at 92MH/s without any excessive noise or heat. Everything from gaming to training models to mining is running considerably better.
I have no idea why Nvidia doesn’t recognize this issue, but luckily the community has come together to share information and find the best solution to the issue. The single most important piece to get right is the thickness and brand of the thermal pad for your specific GPU. For the FE cards, Gelid Extreme pads are the absolute champions; they are also the only pad that can cover an entire side of the GPU with one thickness that won’t prevent the GPU Die from making contact with the cooler.
In a very small form factor (SFF) case, like the Formd T1, this mod made the 3080 FE a viable card. Before the mod, even offsetting the PSU to exhaust air didn’t help. However, after changing my thermal pads, I can comfortably run my 3080 FE in 2 slot mode with the PSU offset.
Wrapping Up
If you have a 3080 Founder’s Edition, chances are that the memory is running hot. You might not have noticed it since most applications don’t display memory temperatures, however in graphically intense workloads or mining, the VRAM temps can quickly cause thermal throttling. For $15, a pack of Gelid Extreme thermal pads can completely fix this problem. Just be sure to take your time, study the teardown, and have all of your materials before you start.
Resources
Amazon Links (Not Affiliate)
- Gelid Extreme 2.0 Thick (Front, Die Side)
- Gelid Extreme 3.0 Thick (Back Side)
- Arctic MX-4 Thermal Paste
- iFixit Tool Kit (If you don’t have the needed Philips and Torx)
Disclaimer: Open and work on your GPU at your own risk. I am sharing my experience with fixing a 3080 FE, however I am not recommending others modify their hardware unless they understand all of the risks. It could potentially void your warranty if you damage your card.
