Why did the G80 come with an IHS?

[tigersty1e]

It seems if the GPU can make direct contact with the heatsink you would get better temps than if the GPU had an IHS in the way of the heatsink.


So why IHS on the G80?


I don't think it was because of the die size.

The NV40 (6800) had a 130 nm process and I do recall that it was a bare chip without an IHS.

The ATI 1950 was a 90nm process and was also left bare.

 

[Extelleron]

Originally posted by: tigersty1e
It seems if the GPU can make direct contact with the heatsink you would get better temps than if the GPU had an IHS in the way of the heatsink.


So why IHS on the G80?


I don't think it was because of the die size.

The NV40 (6800) had a 130 nm process and I do recall that it was a bare chip without an IHS.

The ATI 1950 was a 90nm process and was also left bare.

Regardless of manufacturing process, G80 is the largest GPU ever manufactured. G80 is close to 500mm^2 in size, that's absolutely huge in terms of a consumer chip. Even ATI's R580 (X1950) was only 314mm^2 on 90nm. nVidia's G71 (90nm) was 196mm^2 in size.

 

[tigersty1e]

So if it was big to begin with, why add more size to it by adding an IHS?

 

[SickBeast]

I popped the IHS off my Opteron 165 and my max overclock actually went down. I saw no major difference at all when it came to temps or anything.

When G80 was released, the cards were very very expensive ($400 minimum for the 640mb GTS). Each core probably cost at least $100 to make. The IHS protects it from damage at very little cost to the manufacturer. Replacing a bunch of broken core would have probably cost much more in the end.

 

[panfist]

Pretty much everything these days has an IHS. People get some sick overclocks on core 2 duos, athlon x2s, etc and they all have IHS. So I doubt it effects the heat dissipation that much.

And you get all the benefits that SickBeast explained above.