GPU Zotac GTX 1080 Mini

[CubanLegend]

that is awesome. By the way I added a little bit to my BIOS post. It's in the Power Limit section and it's about setting the power limit to 94% if you previously had it set to 120% on the stock 1080 mini BIOS. As 94% Power Limit on the Amp! Edition bios = 120% on the 1080mini stock BIOS.

 

[Marcin5611]

Hi all,

Anybody who use zotac gtx1080 mini can test temperature on min rpm 1150 or 900-1000rpm whit bios from amp version.

I really want used this gpu on my next case Cooltek u2 but I really want silence, alternative gpu is msi gtx1070 areo itx less power but maybe more silent.. I don't know

 

[wiretap]

Read this review that the parent site did: https://smallformfactor.net/reviews/zotac-1080-mini-review

Then read this thread you're posting in.

 

[Grafite]

I really want silence,

I'm going to be honest with you, silence is not a feature of this card, at all.

 

[CubanLegend]

I'm going to be honest with you, silence is not a feature of this card, at all.

it is if you follow my BIOS reflash guide posted earlier in this thread.

 

[Grafite]

Idk what they are up too, but it seems as if LTT is going to do another Zotac 1080 Mini video

 

[CubanLegend]

Idk what they are up too, but it seems as if LTT is going to do another Zotac 1080 Mini video

What a bunch of noobs. You dont need to shave anything off the 1080mini to get it to fit in an S4 mini anymore. You just buy the alternate 7mm Acrylic Front Bezel and it'll fit just fine.

 

[Kmpkt]

Is that what you reckon they're doing is putting it in an S4? I kinda don't think so, but obviously I could be wrong.

 

[br3nd0]

Chiming in here, I know @Josh | NFC threw some NTH-1 on this beast when reconnecting everything for @CubanLegend, but I also stumbled across the below vid not long ago, which may be of interest to some in terms of reducing temps (plus a shameless plug for us Aussies maaate):

 

[Josh | NFC]

What a bunch of noobs. You dont need to shave anything off the 1080mini to get it to fit in an S4 mini anymore. You just buy the alternate 7mm Acrylic Front Bezel and it'll fit just fine.

I am pretty grateful though to have a customer buy a MINI and review it on Youtube. I'm just armoring up for the mainstream hate comments when they find out a chassis can cost more than $30 and not include a power button.

Honestly if Linus reviews my chassis in the same way he unboxed that RED camera...I will be happy. That was the funniest video I have ever seen and reminded me of NFC SYSTEMS haha

 

[stevey500]

What are you guys using to set custom fan curves on the GTX 1080 mini? The included software is junk, afterburner seems to work great up until you close the program and the custom fan curve seems to not stick.

 

[CubanLegend]

Chiming in here, I know @Josh | NFC threw some NTH-1 on this beast when reconnecting everything for @CubanLegend, but I also stumbled across the below vid not long ago, which may be of interest to some in terms of reducing temps (plus a shameless plug for us Aussies maaate):

Yeah we've seen this video before. I was GOING to do that but to be quite honest. I got my S4 Mini from Josh with the 1080 mini already wired up and preinstalled... so i never actually took it out again. And to take out that GPU I'd have to take apart the ENTIRE case and system, so yeah... maybe in the future i might do this but my temps are decent as of right now.

I am pretty grateful though to have a customer buy a MINI and review it on Youtube. I'm just armoring up for the mainstream hate comments when they find out a chassis can cost more than $30 and not include a power button.

Honestly if Linus reviews my chassis in the same way he unboxed that RED camera...I will be happy. That was the funniest video I have ever seen and reminded me of NFC SYSTEMS haha

That RED video was epic, it'd be cool if he did the NFC S4 Mini review like that, good point.

What are you guys using to set custom fan curves on the GTX 1080 mini? The included software is junk, afterburner seems to work great up until you close the program and the custom fan curve seems to not stick.

You cant close afterburner, just minimize it and it should minimize to the taskbar, also you can set it to load at startup. and you can click the SAVE button on profile 1 to save your fan and Overclock settings.

 

[stevey500]

You cant close afterburner, just minimize it and it should minimize to the taskbar, also you can set it to load at startup. and you can click the SAVE button on profile 1 to save your fan and Overclock settings.

Thanks ! But, laaaaaame. Would be nice for that fan profile to stay applied upon reboot to another OS such as some real content creation environment action in Mac OS or some hackary Ubuntu action. I'm beginning to think that bypassing the built in fan controller on GPU's and finding my own/building my own small modular pwm fan controller might do the trick, all while making it look neat in the end, voiding warranties are fun.

 

[CubanLegend]

Thanks ! But, laaaaaame. Would be nice for that fan profile to stay applied upon reboot to another OS such as some real content creation environment action in Mac OS or some hackary Ubuntu action. I'm beginning to think that bypassing the built in fan controller on GPU's and finding my own/building my own small modular pwm fan controller might do the trick, all while making it look neat in the end, voiding warranties are fun.

I believe there are GPU fan header to regular fan header cables. They should be able to let you connect the GPU fans to the motherboard, where you could control them that way. Check my Build's PC Part Picker in my sig and you'll find 1 or 2 different ones i think.

 

[james0]

Hey, used your this guide step by step: flashed, set up power limit, fan curve and stuff, applied that.
It was quiet for a moment, but in the process of stress testing my PC shut down and never booted again. No POST, no CPU fan activity -- just instant shutdown. I put back my old GPU and booted as usual. Turns out my brand new Zotac 1080 Mini burned out at it's 1st test. (100% checked PSU, MB, RAM, all power connections and GPU itself on test bench)
For all 1080 Mini users, please, don't try this method; it _can_ permanently destroy your card and (of course) will void your warranty.

TL : DR: burned GPU after flashing custom 0% fan ROM.

 

[LocoMoto]

Hey, used your this guide step by step: flashed, set up power limit, fan curve and stuff, applied that.
It was quiet for a moment, but in the process of stress testing my PC shut down and never booted again. No POST, no CPU fan activity -- just instant shutdown. I put back my old GPU and booted as usual. Turns out my brand new Zotac 1080 Mini burned out at it's 1st test. (100% checked PSU, MB, RAM, all power connections and GPU itself on test bench)
For all 1080 Mini users, please, don't try this method; it _can_ permanently destroy your card and (of course) will void your warranty.

TL : DR: burned GPU after flashing custom 0% fan ROM.

Any GPU flashing is risky, especially those were you're flashing a BIOS from a GPU with a different set of components on it.
However, it's good that you share your experiences doing this.

I'm curious if a reference PCB, 0db BIOS would work better than the one suggested in the guide...

 

[CubanLegend]

Hey, used your this guide step by step: flashed, set up power limit, fan curve and stuff, applied that.
It was quiet for a moment, but in the process of stress testing my PC shut down and never booted again. No POST, no CPU fan activity -- just instant shutdown. I put back my old GPU and booted as usual. Turns out my brand new Zotac 1080 Mini burned out at it's 1st test. (100% checked PSU, MB, RAM, all power connections and GPU itself on test bench)
For all 1080 Mini users, please, don't try this method; it _can_ permanently destroy your card and (of course) will void your warranty.

TL : DR: burned GPU after flashing custom 0% fan ROM.

Okay that sounds quite odd, are you absolutely positive the 1080mini is dead? How long did you use it for before you reflashed or was it brand new? I would have stressed tested it before flashing to ensure everything was okay with the card.

I'm wondering what you were using to stress test your GPU: Furmark, 3dMark, or a game-based GPU Benchmark? After you reflashed did you reboot your PC once or twice to ensure that windows was detecting the 1080 properly in the nividia control panel and that MSi afterburner was on and properly applying the new fancurve the entire time? Did you have the MSi Afterburner overlay to track GPU/CPU/RAM usage and temps?

When the did shutdown occur? And there was No POST and No CPU fan activity after the random shutdown until you connected a new GPU? So your CPU fan wasn't spinning either? The CPU fan issue really doesn't seem GPU related... But did the GPU fan still spin? And what PSU were you using during the whole process? It almost sounds like the PSU might have done something here but i honestly can't say, why would the CPU fan not spin after the shutdown?

 

[Kmpkt]

Don't worry about it as @CubanLegend offers a comprehensive 0dB reflash warranty program. Just send him a PM.

 

[james0]

So, I rechecked all PC components with my old GPU and everything working as intended. 1080 was brand new, but tested before flashing using the same method: Overwatch with ultra preset (yep, not so serious). After reflash and before the test I rebooted twice: first time Windows broke resolution (restored after logon), at this point I reinstalled Nvidia driver, second reboot was normal. Then I reinstalled firestorm and set power limits (unbounded), clock (lowered) and fan curve at 100 (to check if it's working) and then ~20 before 50C, applied. I launched OW and set ultra preset and played about 3 minutes before my PC turned off.

No afterburn overlay used (my bad :/), but in-game GPU temp sensor was definitely below 60C and I heard no fan noise (so, internal temp sensor was also below 50C), don't know about vram state. CPU temps doesn't matter (CPU isn't OC and properly cooled, almost 6 months stable below 70 in any game).

After PC turned off it never responded again with 1080 GPU installed (no POST or any other reaction). GPU backlight is gone as well, fans don't spin. BTW PC still boots and works with my old GPU.

I think that GPU power controller or some chip shorted and it forces PSU to emergency shutdown (Corsair sf600). Tried to use 8, then 6 than no power cable to GPU (works with my old GPU), no results. Tried to use 2 other slots at PSU --no reaults. Motherboard does not detects direct problem with PCIe slot (no emergency LED blink), and no beeps.

0dB reflash warranty program

O, rly?

 

[CubanLegend]

So, I rechecked all PC components with my old GPU and everything working as intended. 1080 was brand new, but tested before flashing using the same method: Overwatch with ultra preset (yep, not so serious). After reflash and before the test I rebooted twice: first time Windows broke resolution (restored after logon), at this point I reinstalled Nvidia driver, second reboot was normal. Then I reinstalled firestorm and set power limits (unbounded), clock (lowered) and fan curve at 100 (to check if it's working) and then ~20 before 50C, applied. I launched OW and set ultra preset and played about 3 minutes before my PC turned off.

No afterburn overlay used (my bad :/), but in-game GPU temp sensor was definitely below 60C and I heard no fan noise (so, internal temp sensor was also below 50C), don't know about vram state. CPU temps doesn't matter (CPU isn't OC and properly cooled, almost 6 months stable below 70 in any game).

After PC turned off it never responded again with 1080 GPU installed (no POST or any other reaction). GPU backlight is gone as well, fans don't spin. BTW PC still boots and works with my old GPU.

I think that GPU power controller or some chip shorted and it forces PSU to emergency shutdown (Corsair sf600). Tried to use 8, then 6 than no power cable to GPU (works with my old GPU), no results. Tried to use 2 other slots at PSU --no results. Motherboard does not detects direct problem with PCIe slot (no emergency LED blink), and no beeps.



O, rly?

Holy crap, yeah you did everything right according to your description. Although afterburner overlay might've helped if it was an overheating thing, but the fans were off since it didnt go past 60c so the GPU core didnt overheat. Damn, idk how the GPU power chip shorted under such a light load, especially when you had the proper power limits applied. It possible that with the fans at 0 some other part of the GPU overheated, maybe thats why the fans are always on in the default BIOS, to keep some other component cool?

I've been playing on my 1080 since the reflash in watch_dogs 2 and all sorts of demanding games without incident. But, now that you came across that fatal GPU issue out of nowhere, it makes me rethink if I should reflash back to my stock BIOS, just in case. And I'll also be adding a disclaimer to that reflash guide (idk how i didnt have it before), but doing this reflash could work for some, but since you encountered this, it could have unknown effects on your GPU and would be done at the owner's own risk.

@james0 Dude, I cant stress how sorry i am to hear about your card. It REALLY breaks my heart that the reflash might have caused that problem.