GTX 970/980 owners thread

[Freddy1765]

Could anyone comment on microstuttering on the 970/980 compared with Kepler 700-series? I'm pretty tempted to go SLI 970s as I've never tried it before and gaming on 1440p will benefit from it. Smoothness is very important to me though, I'd rather turn down settings and use one card than run two with stuttering.

 

[Subyman]

Got my 970 SC card installed. Slight coil whine under load, but I can only hear it if I am listening for it. Card runs great, max temp. after a run of the Heaven benchmark was 62°C. Max boost was 1342MHz, held for the entire time. I'll play some games later on with it, and finish up my comparison between my 460, 770 SC, and this 970 SC.

Eymar, what was your stock max boost clock?

Edit - GPU-Z says I have Samsung memory, wonder how it'll overclock... :hmm:

Need to try Crysis or Battlefield. Heaven didn't heat the card up for me. I was mid 60's in heaven and 73C in Crysis 2 with a bit of a core bump.

 

[Eymar]

Got my 970 SC card installed. Slight coil whine under load, but I can only hear it if I am listening for it. Card runs great, max temp. after a run of the Heaven benchmark was 62°C. Max boost was 1342MHz, held for the entire time. I'll play some games later on with it, and finish up my comparison between my 460, 770 SC, and this 970 SC.

Eymar, what was your stock max boost clock?

Mine was 1317. Checked the 3rd pipe and it's closed, just recessed in the fins. Still not the best design and I hope the "backlash" makes EVGA be more competitive in the cooling performance and quality.

 

[RaistlinZ]

Got two MSI Gaming 970's on the way. :biggrin: I'm glad I went them them after all. The MSI's seem to be the only 970 with ideal contact area between the heatsink and GPU.

ASUS Strix 970

EVGA ACX 2.0 970

MSI Gaming 970

Comparison review: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2014/09/19/nvidia-geforce-gtx-970-review/1

 

[Freddy1765]

The MSI's seem to be the only 970 with ideal contact area between the heatsink and GPU.

You realise of course there are more than 3 AiBs?

Not sure what you dislike about the Asus heatsink; both it and the Gigabyte one appear to make perfect contact from the images I've seen.
I don't know what's going on with the MSI in the picture you posted, it's weird how the heatpipes aren't exposed and no thermal paste can be seen.

Going by temperatures (or any other metric for that matter) it wouldn't be fair to say the MSI is any better than the Gigabyte 970. The Asus does appear to have higher load temps, though that could be due to a less aggressive fan profile.
EVGA clearly messed up, which seems to be the consensus on numerous fora.

 

[Kronvict]

Well nVidia has confirmed that DSR does not currently work in SLI.

 

[exar333]

Just fired-up my card. Seems to be much more sensitive to memory overclocks vs. core so far. Get some minor artifacting > ~7850mhz on memory. Rock-solid at 7780 (can maybe tweak this a bit higher, but need more time).

1501 core seems to be the sweet-spot with the voltage/power options upped. Much higher and the card is throttling, but right around 1500mhz will keep a nice, stable core speed and stay under 72C. I think I have some more headroom, but I would like to keep the fan relatively quiet and the temps lower as well. Seeing about 45% more performance on Valley (vs old 670)...will try some games out tomorrow, but very happy with the purchase so far.

I do like the blower-style cooler...my CPU temps are noticeably better with the heat exhausting out of the case from the GPU vs. re-circulating. Very happy so far.

 

[toyota]

Well nVidia has confirmed that DSR does not currently work in SLI.

lol wow. SLI gives you the graphics power to use DSR yet DSR is not compatible with SLI? brilliant!

 

[Grooveriding]

Well nVidia has confirmed that DSR does not currently work in SLI.

Nice how that information was omitted and left for initial buyers to discover.

 

[skipsneeky2]

My gtx770 has a new home,should have the rest of the funds for a 970 pretty shortly. Perhaps the Zotac or a Evga SC will be what i choose, small card preferred so maybe the Zotac.

In the mean time i got a gtx650 keeping me company,got a bit of time to do the research on which 970 is really for me.

 

[guskline]

Just fired-up my card. Seems to be much more sensitive to memory overclocks vs. core so far. Get some minor artifacting > ~7850mhz on memory. Rock-solid at 7780 (can maybe tweak this a bit higher, but need more time).

1501 core seems to be the sweet-spot with the voltage/power options upped. Much higher and the card is throttling, but right around 1500mhz will keep a nice, stable core speed and stay under 72C. I think I have some more headroom, but I would like to keep the fan relatively quiet and the temps lower as well. Seeing about 45% more performance on Valley (vs old 670)...will try some games out tomorrow, but very happy with the purchase so far.

I do like the blower-style cooler...my CPU temps are noticeably better with the heat exhausting out of the case from the GPU vs. re-circulating. Very happy so far.

The GTX 970 is really the star vs the GTX980!:biggrin:

 

[x3sphere]

Nice how that information was omitted and left for initial buyers to discover.

yeah, lame. Didn't see it mentioned in any reviews either.

 

[Cookie Monster]

The important part here is currently.

Being an early adopter of a brand new card that has a brand new GPU.. your bound to come across these compatibility issues. Give it time and the drivers will improve/features enabled.

Id be interested to see if maxwell can benefit a further 10~20% performance from driver improvements alone which most GPUs do over their lifetime.

 

[desprado]

lol wow. SLI gives you the graphics power to use DSR yet DSR is not compatible with SLI? brilliant!

That is really something lol.

DSR must have SLI support rather than single gpu support.

 

[96Firebird]

Need to try Crysis or Battlefield. Heaven didn't heat the card up for me. I was mid 60's in heaven and 73C in Crysis 2 with a bit of a core bump.

Hmm, I played some BF4 last night and still didn't get above 62°C... Maybe my 2500K is holding it back, even though it is running full boost the whole time. I'll try Crysis 3 tonight if I have time and see if I can really push the card.

 

[SeanJ76]

Hmm, I played some BF4 last night and still didn't get above 62°C... Maybe my 2500K is holding it back, even though it is running full boost the whole time. I'll try Crysis 3 tonight if I have time and see if I can really push the card.

Yes running a 2500k@stock is def a bottleneck....You do realize that 2500k can do 4.8ghz on air very easily?
I ran my 2500k@5.0ghz@1.460Vcore for over 3 years, still running great-
http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/1947312

 

[dangerman1337]

Got two MSI Gaming 970's on the way. :biggrin: I'm glad I went them them after all. The MSI's seem to be the only 970 with ideal contact area between the heatsink and GPU.

*snip*

Comparison review: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2014/09/19/nvidia-geforce-gtx-970-review/1

Also Bit-Tech had the MSI one as the best overclocker out of the three so it is no concidence that the heatsink design probably contributes.

 

[bluechris]

Guys which 970 is the most silent? It will go in my htpc that will feed a 4k tv but till waterblocks come out i dont need too much noise.

 

[AdamK47]

Does anyone know how the voltage adjustments works for 970/980s using MSI Afterburner?

I know with my Titans if I set the voltage to +37mV it automatically allowed the GPU to boost a few extra speed bins with slightly higher voltage even if the core speed was set to +0.

This seems to be the same with my 980s. MSI Afterburner goes all they way to 80+mV, but I don't think it actually goes that high. Is there an automatic cutoff with this adjustment? I set it to +50mV and I can see the core clock automatically boost to a few more speed bins (+~20MHz).

 

[Face2Face]

Does anyone know how the voltage adjustments works for 970/980s using MSI Afterburner?

I know with my Titans if I set the voltage to +37mV it automatically allowed the GPU to boost a few extra speed bins with slightly higher voltage even if the core speed was set to +0.

This seems to be the same with my 980s. MSI Afterburner goes all they way to 80+mV, but I don't think it actually goes that high. Is there an automatic cutoff with this adjustment? I set it to +50mV and I can see the core clock automatically boost to a few more speed bins (+~20MHz).

The same way as it does on Kepler.

From Ryan's article-

As with NVIDIA’s Kepler cards, NVIDIA’s Maxwell cards are subject to NVIDIA’s stringent power and voltage limitations. Overvolting is limited to NVIDIA’s built in overvoltage function, which isn’t so much a voltage control as it is the ability to unlock 1-2 more boost bins and their associated voltages. Meanwhile TDP controls are limited to whatever value NVIDIA believes is safe for that model card, which can vary depending on its GPU and its power delivery design

I would monitor your GPU voltages with Afterburner or GPU-Z to see what your cards are using. I would think even adding +50MV you should see your cards jump up a boost bin or two.

 

[Dribble]

Guys which 970 is the most silent? It will go in my htpc that will feed a 4k tv but till waterblocks come out i dont need too much noise.

I'd pay as much attention to capacitors as fans. My Palit GTX 970 Jetstream fans are pretty well silent, but the electrics buzz like crazy, so much so I am RMA'ing it.

 

[skipsneeky2]

Hmm, I played some BF4 last night and still didn't get above 62°C... Maybe my 2500K is holding it back,

A i7 could really open up your max and average fps, i went from a 2500 non k to a 3770 and got a moderate fps boost in BF4. Feels smoother too as my 2500 was hitting 95% usage on all 4 cores which is insane.

 

[realibrad]

A i7 could really open up your max and average fps, i went from a 2500 non k to a 3770 and got a moderate fps boost in BF4. Feels smoother too as my 2500 was hitting 95% usage on all 4 cores which is insane.

No need for an i7. Going with a new i5k would do pretty much the same, and be much cheaper.

Infact, there is a big thread right now about 2500k vs 4790k and the difference is almost nothing.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2389580

 

[96Firebird]

Eh, before I buy a whole new processor I'd rather overclock the one I have or upgrade to Win 8.1 and see if that helps out. I don't even play BF4 much anymore, didn't get a chance to use that in my benchmarks because it wouldn't load after half a year of not playing. Turns out I needed check a box that says to disable Origin while in game.

Hopefully I'll have time tonight to test it out some more. Gotta pack for a bachelor party in Miami Beach Thursday till Monday, so if I don't get to it tonight it'll be next week.

 

[Fastx]

Can anyone with a Gigabyte 970 G1 post if it has vrm temp sensors?
TIA