Instead of creating a new thread, I'll just post my thoughts here, as this is somewhat relevant. I registered for the forum just so I can voice my frustration with Corsair's decision in regards to not making a water block for the Asus RTX 3080 TUF.
As many of us, I like to give my money to Corsair. With that being said, I was looking forward to creating my custom loop. I have an Asus MB and wanted to get an Asus RTX 3080. I decided on getting the TUF as opposed to the Strix since I don't really need the Strix, plus once you water cool, the stock cooler will go in the trash anyways, so why waste the Strix. So now, I have two options:
1. Get the Strix, waste $200, and trash a high quality air cooler (I know that card offers more then just the cooler over the TUF, but again, I don't need the "extras" that come with the card)
or
2. Get the FE, which I guess is fine, but I really hate the power connector on it.
Although this may be a first world problem, I think, it is slightly backwards to support a card that is excellent as is, make the customer waste money, that could otherwise be spent on a water block, and not support a card that could possibly benefit even more from water cooling (not saying that the Strix will not), and a card that a lot of people will own.
I am not sure what direction I am going in, yet. I do like Corsair products, and I really want to keep the water cooling kit I got for my build, but I know that if I end up keeping the kit, I will definitely not look at my PC the same way. First the Nvidia GPU, then the AMD CPU release fiascoes, and now this. One disappointment, after another.
...and finally, good job on adding the 3rd screw in the middle ;):
