Well...
I was one of "the lucky ones" that got my hands on an XTX Radeon 7900 XTX MBA at launch, against all botts.
Well, I was of course one of those that got the VC issue... It worked in vertical mode as intended, but oh well, went on used market to see if anyone was selling their MBA card at a decent price. Lo and behold! I found one! The seller had also tested the card in horizontal and it maxed about 90C in junction/hotspot under heavy gaming. Drove 1.5hours and manged to haggle it down to eqvivalent to 20USD above MSRP, so I was happy. Drove for 1.5hours to get home. Lucky day no. 2!
Well...
As it seems, my case ssupd Meshlicious, has the graphics card in an "awkward" position with the IO of the card pointing down on the desk. And this "new" card, a PowerColor Radeon 7900XTX MBA, didn't like that position... got 110C almost as fast as I started CyberPunk '77... At first I thought I was scammed, but I cooled down (pun intended), let the card also cool down, laid the case on it's side so that the card could be in "normal" horizontal operating position. Ran CyberPunk '77 again and success! I got a junction/hotspot max of 87C! Even after hours of playing, rock stable! BUT! I don't want to change my case, and keeping it on it's side like that and not suffocate the card I had to build a "bridge" for the case to lay on so that it could circulate the air for the graphics card. Defiantly not ideal! This image is from before I built the "bridge with books"
Soooo, what to do? No shop in Norway would get any cards in, well all except one. And that one serves at least 4 countries... Tried 4 times to buy when they released, but they where gone before the buy button got enabled (bots, yay).
Got desperate as I already had sold my former card, and delivered it. So I went on eBay. Found a seller in another country, Germany, selling a Sapphire 7900XTX Pulse! card! @ MSRP! NEW! I double checked the measurements at Sapphire's site and it should fit, so I took a chance and ordered it. Never heard of the store, and it didn't have that many reviews even though they were registered on eBay since 2001 (If I remember correctly). Was kinda nervous. A lot of money if I get scammed. But, only 5 days later I recieved the card! She's a beauty! A tight fit, really tight, but perfect! As it should be!
I also treated myself, because of all the trouble I had to go through and got myself a new monitor as well.
Now I can game, hotspot around 80C, life is perfect! Oh, and the monitor is great too! Went from a Gigabyte G34WQC. Night and day, night and day....