EVGA Issues Fix for Overheating GTX 1070 and 1080

Following multiple reports of EVGA’s GTX 1070 and 1080 graphics cards catching fire due to overheating VRMs, the company has issued a physical fix in an attempt to counter the problem. To remedy the overheating issue, EVGA is offering free thermal pads for its customers to apply both between the backplate and the PCB, plus the baseplate and the heatsink fins, while also offering free replacement for broken cards.

The overheating issue was investigated by Tom’s Hardware Germany, which showed the VRMs of EVGA’s 1070 and 1080 reaching dangerous temperatures when stressed using Fumark. EVGA has replicated the test and believes that its extra thermal pads are an adequate solution for the problem.

“The test used in the referenced review from Toms Hardware (Germany) is running under Furmark, an extreme usage case, as most overclockers know,” EVGA writes. “We believe this is a good approach to have some idea about the graphics card limit, and the thermal performance under the worst case scenario.”

“EVGA has performed a similar qualification test during the design process, at a higher ambient temperature (30C in chamber) with a thermal coupler probe directly contacting the key components and after the Toms Hardware (Germany) review, we have retested this again,” the company explains. “The results in both tests show the temperature of PWM and memory is within the spec tolerance under the same stress test, and is working as originally designed with no issues.”

“With this being said, EVGA understands that lower temperatures are preferred by reviewers and customers,” EVGA adds. “During our recent testing, we have applied additional thermal pads between the backplate and the PCB and between the baseplate and the heatsink fins, with the results shown below. We will offer these optional thermal pads free of charge to EVGA owners who want to have a lower temperature.”

While customers have been able to request thermal pads from EVGA since 24^th October, the company has now begun to issue them. If you are an affected EVGA customer and wish to request free thermal pads, you need to log in to (or set up) an EVGA account.