EK Water Blocks this week announced that it will be releasing water blocks for NVIDIA’s reference design GeForce RTX 2080 and GeForce RTX 2080 Ti video cards. The EKWB EK-Vector RTX water blocks are designed for custom-built liquid cooling systems for NVIDIA’s latest graphics adapters and will hit the market later this month, offering not only improved performance for the new NVIDIA cards, but also a new look.

EKWB’s EK-Vector RTX 2080 and EK-Vector RTX 2080 Ti full-cover single-slot water blocks for NVIDIA’s reference design GeForce RTX 2080 and GeForce RTX 2080 Ti add-in-boards come in eight versions, all featuring the company’s cold plate with proprietary Open Split-Flow micro-channels. Traditionally for EKWB, the EK-Vector RTX water blocks use standard G ¼ inch barbs for tubing and are therefore compatible with a wide range of LCS setups. To further improve cooling performance, EKWB will also offer specially designed backplates.

Depending on the version, the cold plate is made of bare electrolytic copper or nickel-plated electrolytic copper, whereas the cover is made of transparent plexiglass or black acetal. Meanwhile, all versions featuring nickel-plated cold plates are also outfitted with RGB strips, which use a 4-pin 12 V connector and can be controlled by RGB command software from the leading motherboard brands (ASUS, ASRock, GIGABYTE, MSI).

As is typically the case, custom liquid cooling does not come cheap. EKWB’s EK-Vector RTX GPU water blocks will retail for €129.9 – €149.9 depending on the specific SKU, whereas the backplates will cost €39.9 – €43.9. EKWB will start shipments of its water blocks on September 20, whereas backplates will hit the market in October.

EKWB's GPU Water Blocks for NVIDIA's GeForce RTX Cards
SKU Price in EUR
with 22% VAT
Price in USD
with 22% VAT
Price in USD w/o VAT
EK-Vector RTX 2080 Ti – Copper + Plexi €129.90 $151 $124
EK-Vector RTX 2080 Ti – Copper + Acetal €129.90 $151 $124
EK-Vector RTX 2080 Ti RGB – Nickel + Plexi €149.90 $174 $142
EK-Vector RTX 2080 Ti RGB – Nickel + Acetal €144.90 $168 $138
EK-Vector RTX 2080 – Copper + Plexi €129.90 $151 $124
EK-Vector RTX 2080 – Copper + Acetal €129.90 $151 $124
EK-Vector RTX 2080 RGB – Nickel + Plexi €149.90 $174 $142
EK-Vector RTX 2080 RGB – Nickel + Acetal €144.90 $168 $138
EK-Vector RTX Backplate – Black €36.90 $43 $35
EK-Vector RTX Backplate – Nickel €43.90 $51 $42

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Source: EKWB

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  • PeachNCream - Thursday, September 6, 2018 - link

    Selling modding toys for halo products in a market with limited demographics. That's a niche inside a niche inside a niche. Glad it's working out for them and someone is making their boat payment. The rest of us lesser mortals will just have to scrape by with peasant-class air cooling on our minimum wage GPUs from one to three generations ago. Woe is us!
  • darckhart - Thursday, September 6, 2018 - link

    unless you get FE, it looks like quite a few of the "OC" AIB cards on air are 2.5 slot....
  • ikjadoon - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    I think it's working out for them, but just a year ago, EK's CEO, CTO, and Head of Marketing all departed around the same time.

    The CEO & CTO both ended up at Corsair: https://www.techpowerup.com/239706/corsair-opens-p...

    I believe the founder took over CEO responsibilities, but it's a little unclear.
  • Hxx - Thursday, September 6, 2018 - link

    I love EK stuff, best in my experience. Pricing is similar to pascal so im glad to see they didn't jack those up. But question : i know they were showcasing some new blocks at Computex , are these the new design? I see the jet plate being vertical as opposed to horizontal i wonder if thats part of their new design.
  • Railgun - Thursday, September 6, 2018 - link

    I paid $168 for my OG Titan nickel/acetal block, so I’d say, if the US price ends up being the same, good on them. However, in reality, there aren’t that many differences from block to block, so there shouldn’t be any price difference really, if not cheaper.
  • rocky12345 - Friday, September 7, 2018 - link

    EK as always hits it out of the park but I have to ask at what point did they start selling the back plates for their water blocks by them selves at a extra cost or has it always been that way? I only ask because when I watch reviews on YT and they get sent EK stuff it always comes as a kit with back plate and I do not remember anyone ever mentioning block and back plate not being together as a full kit even when they are stating costs. It would only make sense they are together as a full kit because why would anyone just buy half of a cooler.
  • DanNeely - Friday, September 7, 2018 - link

    My 2 year old 1080 block from EK didn't come with a backplate. I'll have to check when I'm home to see if it installed without, or is using the one from the GPU itself.
  • darckhart - Friday, September 7, 2018 - link

    Backplate was always separate. IIRC the backplate for my OG Titan was around $30. they *do* sell "kits" where you can get it bundled, but that obviously costs extra.
  • rocky12345 - Friday, September 7, 2018 - link

    That is probably what I was thinking about. I seen them together in the reviews and I was sure they had them at one of the shops in the city all together as well so I just assumed that was how it was.
  • evilpaul666 - Saturday, September 8, 2018 - link

    I'm not sure about other AIBs, but EVGA updated their page with Boost Clock speeds for most of their cards.

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