I had this happen to my strix/ekwb after i put on waterblock, then all of a sudden i was doing 99% gpu load at 1011mhz and RMA'D it dunno if installing the waterblock damaged or crushed something i followed the instructions :D. Same kinda symptoms where it was doing better benching before i put on wb, another week passed then any hard gpu load would freeze the pc till i hard booted it, and if it would take a load like i said 99%/1011mhz, toast.

elbramso
Guys! I found the reason why the card actually does what it does.
For some reason the card only runs on pcie16 x4 native mode (MB: ASUS ROG STRIX Z370 Gaming F). So my pcie slot is either damaged or the card is (doupt it).
I'll try to reset my BIOS but if this doesn't help I think the slot is damaged.

Had this with my strix aswell had it running x8 finally got it back to x16 but card was TOAST!

OK guys my card is finally back in business.
After all it was a broken capacitor near the outer screw holes. Somehow I managed to damage this capacitor after remounting my barrow waterblock (this block was bad for my card but that is a different story).
Learn from my mistakes and be super careful when mounting your waterblock. There are a lot of capacitors sitting directly near screw holes.
If I had to guess what killed all the other cards in regards of waterblocks here on forum, I'd say damaged or broken capacitors.

Btw. I managed to score 14801 on PR with the xc3 BIOS and 14380 with Std OC BIOS again.

arestavo
Glad you got it sorted, and nice PR score.

thx mate - I was kinda happy to even find the issue^^
btw. XC3 BIOS all the way:
https://www.3dmark.com/3dm/59424122