Differentiate Reference and Non Reference Cards

[greybaby]

Best way I've found is to google the card and whether people have water cooled it. Most have documented cases of people attempting to water cool or their dismay at not being able to.

 

[sidrockrulz]

They take GTX 670 compatible parts, for the most part. IE, that while there isn't a reference GTX 970, most makers are re-using reference GTX 670 PCBs (that could be 99% of the coil whine problem, too). You'd need to check on the specific card, though.

Cool... The coil whine is only on the blower isn't it ?

 

[Cerb]

Cool... The coil whine is only on the blower isn't it ?

No, it seems to be on random samples of any GTX 970. Now that it's become a commonly known thing, there are many reports of no whine, with the same cards getting bad whine reports. I'm replacing my bad whine one with another of the same model, so I'll get at least two samples worth of data for myself.