Power, Temperature and Noise
Here is where it hurts, comparatively speaking. Evaluated as a complete system, having this card in the machine adds 41W more to the overall power consumption, pushing it to RTX 2080 Ti levels.
That extra wattage translates to an average 2.72 percent performance lead over the Founders Edition at 4K across seven titles, constituting a poor return in the energy efficiency department.
Remember how we said the cooler was capable. It clearly is, as the under-load temperature from a 270W board is only 66°C.
We feel that, out of the box, Gigabyte is being too aggressive with the cooling curve. We'd happily sacrifice a few degrees of temperature for a quieter gaming experience.
Yet that's what the Quiet Mode is for. Running exactly the same tests reveals four truths: power consumption remains the same, performance remains identical, temperature increases to a still very respectable 69°C, and noise drops from 40.9dB to 38.1dB, thanks to the three fans spinning at 1,650rpm instead of 1,970rpm.
Noting all the above, we'd certainly be running the card in Quiet Mode all the time.