MSI GeForce RTX 5090 SUPRIM Liquid SOC Review

Now we’ve all heard about using a 360mm radiator for cooling your CPU but what about your GPU. Well, in this review I’ll be covering exactly that! How you may ask? Enter, the MSI GeForce RTX 5090 SUPRIM Liquid SOC. Designed to take thermal cooling performance to the extreme, the RTX 5090 SUPRIM Liquid takes the triple fan cooler design, often found on higher end GPU SKUs, and pushes for even more performance. Featuring not only a fan on the GPU shrouding itself but an additional 3 fans on a liquid cooled 360mm radiator, the 5090 SUPRIM Liquid benefits from the best of both cooling archetypes.

But just how well does the 5090 SUPRIM stack up against some of the other outlandish RTX 5090 designs we’ve seen on the market. Stick around to find out. I’ll be giving you the rundown on all of the key information, as well as getting down to the nitty gritty, before giving you my final verdict

Specification

As we’ve all seen by now, the RTX 5090 has a specs list far exceeding anything else we’ve seen and the RTX 5090 SUPRIM Liquid is no different. The most notable differences here between SUPRIM Liquid and Base model RTX 5090 are the bump to power consumption and healthy increase to the Boost Clock Speed, other than the price of course.

One of the more interesting features of the SUPRIM Liquid is directly responsible for the increase to both the Boost clock speed and power consumption. Both require you to take advantage of the double BIOS that comes with the 5090 SUPRIM Liquid as standard and selecting the Gaming Mode BIOS. For those who prefer a quieter mode of operation whilst still keeping the chart-topping performance, you’ll be happy to hear that the second BIOS installed on the SUPRIM Liquid PCB is a Silent mode. Selecting the preferred BIOS mode is very simple and as easy as flicking a switch on the GPU PCB.

Aside from this, the obvious difference here is the addition of the 360mm radiator and 3 fans. As expected, the dimensions of the SUPRIM Liquid differ from the standard GPU design and accounting for the radiator are as follows: Card: 280 x 148 x 51mm, Radiator: 394 x 121 x 55mm, Tube length: 450mm. Recommended PSU wattages remain the same however, with 1000W still the minimum required, even accounting for the additional power draw.

Design

Much like the standard SUPRIM, the design of the SUPRIM Liquid 5090 is one of its strong points. This, now, quad-fan GPU design still manages to retain the signature SUPRIM styling and is arguably even sleeker looking than the standard SUPRIM SKU. The GPU PCB wears the usual SUPRIM livery, as one would expect but in a much smaller form factor. Angular details, a brushed metal finish, signature SUPRIM text and accents keep the GPU shrouding itself minimal but recognisable.

Of course, however, given the attached radiator, case support varies despite the smaller PCIe slot count. With the 360mm radiator plus 3 STORMFORCE fans attached as standard, temperatures in theory should benefit greatly from the additional airflow, albeit at the expense of additional case real estate. Colour coordination is perhaps the one design are that’s not a strong point however. The added radiator is available in just the one colour, black. For the colour scheme conscious, the SUPRIM Liquid poses more than one colour mismatch headache.

Elsewhere the SUPRIM Liquid follows much of the same design philosophy as its non-liquid counterpart. The vented metal backplate remains as do the associated benefits, added rigidity and stability most notably. The top of the GPU features the SUPRIM text, which also lights up with customisable RGB lighting in addition to the standard angular accents typically found on SUPRIM variants. The SUPRIM design is said to be inspired by diamond-cut lines with a focus on minimalistic geometry, and for the most part the SUPRIM Liquid does a commendable job at putting this into practice.

Architecture

The RTX 5000-series utilises NVIDIA’s Blackwell architecture, which powers the pillar technologies that come with this card. Over the years, NVIDIA has continued to refine all of its major technologies, especially with the backing of AI. DLSS is one of these, with RTX 5000 bringing DLSS into its fourth iteration. DLSS 4.0 offers continued improvements to performance, alleviating overhead and offering better visual fidelity when enabled.

Additionally, Frame Generation now also supports Multi Frame Generation. Instead of generating one frame per every rasterised frame, Multi Frame Gen provides three, offering much smoother gameplay due to an exceptionally high framerate. For those looking for a more in-depth explanation of Multi Frame Generation and how it works, you can find out here.

The Blackwell architecture brings further improvements too. GDDR7 has since become the new standard for all RTX 50 series GPUs, improving upon the GDDR6X memory used on the previous RTX 40 Series GPUs. Tensor and RT cores both receive generational updates, whilst power efficiency across the board is greatly improved. The Blackwell architecture as a package deal brings strong improvements and tees up NVIDIA’s next generation of AI-backed GPUs perfectly.

Performance

So, performance. To test the SUPRIM Liquid RTX 5090, we pitted it against the Founders Edition RTX 5090 in a head-to-head comparison spanning 3 titles; Battlefield 6, Cyberpunk 2077 and Marvel Rivals. For Battlefield 6 and Marvel Rivals, settings were tuned to 4K High rasterised settings, with Cyberpunk taking things up a notch to 4K High settings, this time with DLSS Quality enabled and Raytracing set to Medium.

Battlefield 6

In Battlefield 6, the newest addition to our benchmarking suite at the time of writing, both GPUs performed as expected, eclipsing the 100 FPS mark with ease. The SUPRIM Liquid does pip the Founders edition to the performance crown here by roughly 3 FPS and while the framerate difference here is negligible for the most part, the temperatures are vastly different.

The SUPRIM Liquid offered considerably lower GPU temps in Battlefield 6, in excess of over 15°C on average. The SUPRIM Liquid sat at a relatively cool 55°C on average for the duration of our Battlefield testing, whilst the Founders Edition sat at 71°C. What makes this even more impressive for the SUPRIM Liquid, however, is its ability to do so whilst pulling more wattage than the Founders Edition model by roughly 12W.

Cyberpunk 2077

Whilst testing Cyberpunk 2077, the SUPRIM Liquid again averaged a slightly higher average than the Founder Edition, again by a margin of roughly the 3 FPS. 1% and 0.1% lows followed a similar trend with the SUPRIM Liquid again producing results roughly 3 FPS higher on average here. The SUPRIM Liquid on average sat at 54°C, whilst the Founders Edition sat a fair way higher, at roughly 67°C on average.

It’s worth noting however, whilst the Founders Edition does sit at a higher temperature across the board, it is by no means an unsafe temperature or something to worry about. By normal standards, an average GPU temp of 67°C is considered very healthy, the SUPRIM Liquid takes these norms however, and flips them on their head.

Marvel Rivals

Marvel Rivals produced, perhaps, the most interesting result, with both GPUs averaging the exact same result, 146.7 FPS. Taking a deeper look into the percentage lows and it’s actually that Founders Edition that fairs the better of the two cards here. Producing percentage lows up to 10 FPS better at times, it’s the Founder Edition 5090 that provides the smoother gameplay in this title.

Take a look at the temperatures though and the SUPRIM Liquid reminds us just how much difference the additional radiator can make. Averaging just 53°C, in what is the lowest temperature recorded of this entire comparison, and actually a rather surprising result given its weaker performance versus the Founders model.

Conclusion

MSI RTX 5090 SUPRIM

Product Name: RTX 5090

Product Description: Now we've all heard about using a 360mm radiator for cooling your CPU but what about your GPU. Well, in this review I'll be covering exactly that! How you may ask? Enter, the MSI GeForce RTX 5090 SUPRIM Liquid SOC

Brand: MSI

• Features
• Design
• Performance
• Value For Money

4.5

Summary

So, where does that leave us? Well, the RTX 5090 SUPRIM Liquid takes what is already the best performing GPU that we’ve ever seen and unsurprisingly adds more performance. Yet, it’s the thermal performance that is perhaps the most impressive aspect of the SUPRIM Liquid design. By not only achieving what it set out to do, providing an improved cooling solution, but eclipsing it’s goal, the SUPRIM Liquid truly stands in a league of its own. The SUPRIM Liquid acts as a true enthusiasts GPU, chartering users into an unknown territory of performance and breaking down the barriers of what was previously perceived as impossible. 

As with all things, there are some caveats. Case real estate is maybe the largest potential headache. It wouldn’t be crazy to assume that someone purchasing the RTX 5090 SUPRIM Liquid has a top end CPU and cooling that CPU they have a 360mm radiator. Herein lies the potential issue. This limits case options pretty heavily, as not only does the case need to offer 360mm support in more than one location, it needs to be able to support a 360mm radiator in both of these locations at once. Colour coordination is the other notable mismatch, with the two tone colour scheme offering up a design that means the SUPRIM will never truly match the desired aesthetic.

The fact of the matter though, is this. The RTX 5090 SUPRIM Liquid offers practically unrivalled thermal performance, barring bespoke water-cooled builds, and does so whilst providing generation topping performance. Like it or loathe it, the best just got even better.

Pros

✅ Gorgeous design

✅ Impressive thermals

✅ Chart-topping 4K performance

Cons

❌ 360mm radiator support required

❌ High power consumption

❌ Difficult colour-coordination