Plano_Tech To be fair, i think GN was the only "Scathing" review. There were a number good reviews for it, TechPowerUp included, and a few mediocre reviews that did mention added fan noise on the Ultra.

I think everyone (even XFX themselves) are under no illusion that the THICC II cooler is a disappointment and needs to be addressed for its issues. Any comparison to OTHER third-party coolers paints it in a bad light, even before you take the huge size into account, with all of the potential compatibility issues that accompany it.The first page of Google results for reviews of the THICC II, seem to be mixed - but there are a lot of negative reviews, not just GamersNexus.4/5 - "louder than other custom options", "requires some necessary tinkering", and "Very high power consumption""We have to talk acoustics, you've seen the numbers for both perf and silent modes" and "this noise level is just not okay""Do Not Buy", "plagued with firmware and hardware issues alike", "one-upping those deficiencies with a lapse in judgment for heatsink design"Gives it an Editor's choice, but then goes on to say "compared to other custom designs we've reviewed, they [noise levels] are a little bit high. While the "quiet" BIOS does offer slightly better noise levels, I would have wished for a bigger difference between BIOSes.They give it an "approved" award because it performs 'decently' and looks good, but note that the bulk could easily be a problem and power consumpion was higher than anticipated. Approved is the lowest grade of award Vortez give out, and they give out awards like candy, it would seem.Many of thecommenting on"better than the reference card", which is a fair point, but also their only 5700XT comparison, so obviously a huge open cooler is going to perform better than a compact single radial blower fan. No surprises there."Great stock performance" but "Questionable heatsink contact". No award or recommendation given."fan shroud is also a source of a lot of the cards issues" and "The shroud also plays a role in limiting airflow at the top and bottom. All of this leads to cooling performance that I think could have been better, especially with this being a flagship card."Again, compared to a reference blower only. They gave it a gold award despite it running 91C @ 43.8 dBA which is terrible, and also accepting that it "consumed more power than any card tested to date". WTF makes that deserving of a gold award?!