 Recently we made a video investigating the usefulness of video card backplates. In a shocking surprise to... no one, the thermal benefit was marginal if anything at all. So then when EVGA called us up inviting us to check out their top secret ICX technology that was going to solve video card thermal issues, we had to wonder, I mean, is this just another case of gluing on more bloody fans and backplates? Or is it a worthwhile innovation? The Phoenix O Tour is a full-sized minimalistically designed keyboard complete with Cherry MX switches and a new white backlit variant. Check it out at the link below. What the crap is ICX technology? I mean, how do I even pronounce that? I-6? I-6? Well, whatever. EVGA's marketing team helpfully describes it as a new and more efficient way to cool with optimized airflow fin design. Which is a good start because an old and less efficient way to cool with an unoptimized airflow fin design would raise a lot of questions. Essentially what it boils down to is this. Rather than try to sell us a revolutionary fan blade design or whatever, it's more about data. ICX relies on nine discrete thermal sensors to dramatically expand the card's monitoring capabilities. So in addition to the GPU, we now get readings for each bank of VRAM and the power delivery modules. The cooler can then take advantage of this sensor data to intelligently cool the entire card as needed to the point of independently controlling its two fans. If let's say the GPU temps would allow a normal card to spin down, but the the rear portion of the card was still hot. Pretty cool concept. And they've tacked on every other feature that they can think of as well. Like the perforated heat sink fins, low power fans for additional GPU power budget, really you guys? And a backplate that EVGA says helps with cooling. A claim that seems to be in vogue these days. All of this of course culminating in the bold statement, play longer, overclock better. So how do we test these claims? In our possession is a brand new EVGA GeForce GTX 1080 Super Clock 2 with an all-metal design, with a diecast backplate, a clean industrial aesthetic, the aforementioned perforated heat sink fins, and of course, ICX. As a super clocked card, this sits in the middle of EVGA's lineup with a 100 megahertz bump over the reference design and we'll be running it on our RGB test bench. So it's a Core i7-7700K at both out-of-the-box and overclocked speeds. Time for the fuzzy donut of death. Yes, FurMark's back, and so are the settings from the backplate benches. Stock settings save for the maxed out power and temperature targets. The results? Well, that's unsurprisingly the first interesting aspect of the ICX design. There are a lot of them. For the GPU, it was stable at 68 degrees centigrade, while the memory came in at 80, and the power delivery hit 81. All of this with no thermal throttling. Traditional tools like FurMark's integrated GPU temperature readout would have only shown us the 68 degree figure, which means that already ICX is doing its job. So then, we gave it a tidy 100 megahertz overclock to both Core and memory, keeping in mind, of course, that the super clock 2 is already overclocked out of the box, and went back to Tim Hortons for another fuzzy donut. And 68 degrees centigrade on the GPU, 80 for the memory, and 81 for the power delivery again. Zero throttling. I'm noticing a pattern here. The super clock 2 ICX is a good card, and measures up well to the Aorus that we checked out recently. But this sensor tech just doesn't really seem to do anything for performance directly. And under normal conditions, both fans go full blast when the card's working hard, and sit idle when you leave it for a while. So why did they bother developing this? Where could it make a difference? Well, there are a couple of situations, one of which we caught on our thermal camera naturally. Because the independently controlled fans spin up and down based on the temperatures in their corresponding zones, the total time each fan needs to stay spun up can be optimized for a quicker return to quiet operation. So with precision, we can see the temperatures winding down, and the respective fans slowing down after we close a 3D application. Situation number two is less to do with acoustics, and more to do with longevity. Not every video card enjoys the luxury of an open test bench, or a full ATX tower. And hot, recycled air, or airflow restrictions in smaller cases, could lead to higher temperatures for the VRM, reducing its efficiency, hurting performance, and shortening its lifespan. So with our obstruction in the way of this fan, we can see some card temperatures rising even when the GPU is not being stressed. This is a likely scenario in a compact case. And ICX ramps the fan accordingly. Cool, literally. In our perfect world, there is still some work to be done here. Independent control of the fan's curves is neat, but a robust implementation of a feature EVGA is teasing right now, that would allow other system coolers to be controlled as well, would allow us to, for example, point a side panel fan at the card's backplate, which reached a toasty 74 degrees Celsius in our tests. Backplates don't normally contribute to video card cooling much, if at all, but in this manner, it's possible that it could. So what do you guys think then? Would you pay extra for more temperature sensors? Do you appreciate the extra control? Let us know in the comments below. Synergy is really freaking cool. It basically works like magic. Okay, it's not magic, it's complicated software engineering, but the end result seems like magic. 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