Thermal Grizzly’s DeltaMate RTX 5080 block uses glass, CNC copper, and a 900g cold plate
Thermal Grizzly has launched its second DeltaMate GPU water block, this time for the ASUS ROG Astral GeForce RTX 5080. The company lists the block at €549.90 on its EU storefront and $643.38 on its US storefront, with both listings marked as prices including VAT plus shipping.
What stands out is that the RTX 5080 version is priced above Thermal Grizzly’s own Astral RTX 5090 block. The 5090 model is currently listed at $583.71 in the US store and from €399.90 in the EU store, so the newer 5080 block is not the cheaper option despite targeting the lower GPU tier.
Roman “Der8auer” Hartung posted a full video explaining why the block is so expensive, how much time it took to build one and why is RTX 5080 waterblock hardared to develop than 5090.
Source: ThermalGrizzly/Der8auer
The block uses a dual cold plate layout, including a VRM and VRAM plate weighing more than 900 grams, plus a separate CNC-machined core cold plate with 0.2 mm slot width, 0.2 mm fin width, 2.5 mm fin height, and 13,440 mm² of cooling surface area. The company also uses a Schott BOROFLOAT glass window, a black anodized aluminum housing, a brass terminal, and includes Duronaut paste, pads, and putty in the box.
Source: ThermalGrizzly/Der8auer
In the company’s launch video, Roman said the RTX 5080 version is harder to cool than a 5090 from a power-density standpoint (GPU is smaller), and he also spent a lot of time explaining the manufacturing work behind the real glass window.
According to Roma , the glass has to be cut, edge-finished, polished, and checked for internal stress, while each finished block is pressure-tested. He also said the first run is only 120 units . Put together, the pricing looks tied less to raw GPU class and more to small-batch production, machining time, materials, and packaging this as a premium showcase product rather than a standard water block.
Source: ThermalGrizzly
To give you some perspective on this waterblock price, the current price for ASUS ROG Astral RTX 5080 is $1,899.99 in the US and €1580 in Europe. This means that the waterblock costs 1/3 of the card’s price.
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