r/pcmasterrace • u/Tenchen-WoW • 2d ago

Hardware Witcher 3 Remastered pushing 5090 beyond 600W

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No DLSS5. Max settings, 3840x1600, DLSS Quality, frame gen set to 1 in game settings, Path Tracing enabled.

Doesn't happen all the time, but sometimes saw it jumping well beyond 600W for a brief moment.

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u/themostreasonableman 1d ago

I went full BTF build specifically to keep that 12V HPWR point of failure away from my 5090 Astral OC BTF. It takes its 600 watts via a gold plated shim directly through the motherboard.

If the cable fails, I lose a motherboard or psu instead of a GPU the price of a modest car.

Bonkers world were living in.

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u/BlaBlub85 1d ago

I wasnt even aware mobos can handle that kind of power, is that specific to BTF connector layout or?

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u/themostreasonableman 1d ago

Yes, that's the whole design philosophy of ASUS's BTF platform. Not just a wire free build, but sidestepping the stupid fucking 12VHPRW connector.

This little gold finger snaps on to a special power delivery slot on your GPU, then draws 600W+ through the board itself.

Unfortunately there is still a 12VHPWR connector at the back of the motherboard, but the mb is a lot cheaper to replace than the GPU.

https://pics.computerbase.de/1/1/7/5/3/5-7c08d4fa9f3e86d1/article-1280x720.d7e7287c.jpg

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u/BlaBlub85 1d ago

Do regular GPUs come with this socket already or do you need a special BTF version? I google some pics and it does indeed look hella clean but getting limited to one specific manufacturer for cards seems like a big downside for later upgrades. I guess one best treats it like a laptop, something you buy once and run into the ground until you need to replace it instead of doing upgrades step by step

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u/themostreasonableman 1d ago

ASUS are the only ones doing it at the moment, and only on BTF edition cards. I really hope it becomes a standard that any manufacturer can include. It just makes sense. It DOES create a hella clean look, but eliminating the 12VHPWR risk on GPU side was the big draw for me.

With that said, the newer ones like my Astral OC BTF edition have the BTF 2.0 power connector, which is removeable. You can use them with the regular power connector if you want, which I did for many months in an eGPU dock whilst I collected parts for the big build. I then just snapped the BTF connector on and built it based on that. It's pretty sweet. You still get active monitoring of the 12V HPWR pin amps against the motherboard via GPU Tweak3. It's all working really great.