as many of you know, i've been pretty vocal about the RTX cards. well, yesterday i was invited over to Nvidia's marketing dept. for a gaming session with the EVGA RTX 2080 FTW3 Ultra Hydro Copper in a alphacool eisbaer aio loop using a 320mm radiator for the gpu and the I-9 9900k. was it tasty? yes it was. was it fast and buttery smooth? yes esp. with the Asus ROG Swift PG35VQ as the monitor. this was undoubtedly the finest gaming experience i've ever had. i just wish it was in the reach of more people. the I-9 was able to easily handle highly threaded/ cpu intensive games. i pulled a few saves from the steam cloud for a late stage run of Civ 5 & 6 as well as Beyond Earth. these games get really annoying with a less capable cpu (than Ryzen or Intel 7th gen or more recent). i played AC: Origins, Battlefield V, AoTS, Cuphead, and NierAutomata oh yeah and Witcher 3. all of which were noticeably better than my 1080ti (custom loop w/ 2x 280mm). so i will say this - if you're willing to spend for a custom loop and a RTX card and you do not trust Colorful and want to keep your warranty, the EVGA FTW3 Hydro Copper is a winner. it is not for the faint of heart or those with a limited budget.