With the RTX 5090 now available, discussion has focused on custom AIB models, with brands introducing new cooling technologies and design tweaks to maximise performance. Gigabyte’s AORUS RTX 5090 Master ICE is intriguing, offering a unique frosted white aesthetic and innovative cooling. Given NVIDIA’s Founders Edition’s more compact dual-slot design, we wanted to determine whether Gigabyte’s larger triple-slot cooler and custom engineering offer tangible benefits.
AORUS GeForce RTX 5090 MASTER ICE 32G
Before we delve in, this is still an RTX 5090, and we’ve already reviewed NVIDIA’s Founders Edition card. Therefore, we won’t rehash what a GB202-400 GPU can do. We will, however, test a range of games to confirm performance aligns with expectations. As an OC-branded card, we anticipate a slight uplift over NVIDIA’s FE model.
With custom AIB cards, the focus shifts to design, cooling, extra features, and factory overclocks. The AORUS Master ICE has a boost clock of 2655MHz, 248MHz higher than the Founders Edition’s 2407MHz boost, a 10.3% increase. Theoretically, this translates to higher sustained performance, but testing is required to validate this. We’ve seen cards with higher clocks that don’t deliver in real-world use due to inadequate cooling, though we doubt that will be the case here, as the cooler looks substantial.
Key Features
- Powered by the NVIDIA Blackwell architecture and DLSS 4
- Powered by GeForce RTX™ 5090
- Integrated with 32GB GDDR7 512bit memory interface
- WINDFORCE cooling system
- Hawk fan
- Composite metal grease for GPU
- Server-grade thermal conductive gel
- Superconducting heat pipes
- LCD edge view
- RGB Halo
- Dual BIOS (Performance / Silent)
- Reinforced structure
- Versatile VGA holder
- 4 years warranty (Online registration required)
How about overlocking that card? Is it better than Astral or what?
Well it says 70° but at 1600rpm+ and I can say that my Aorus 5090 is pretty loud at 1600rpm. What you wanna do is you wanna use the silent bios and try to stay below 1300rpm and THAT is pretty difficult unfortunately (be quiet Pure Base 500 with 4 or even 5 fans). I can keep it at 75-78° with 1250-1280rpm but only at a PT of 85%. Anything above 90% and the shit goes up to 80°+ and the fans go up to 1500-1600rpm which is too loud for my taste. I certainly expected better temps (lower noise) with a huge cooler like that but it also requires very good airflow inside the case ofc.