Which gtx 970 to get?

[KuroI-Kaze]

I am hesitating between zotac 970 the normal one vesus leadtek 970 hurricane oc.

If judging only the cosmetics leadtek is the better choice as it has a backplate. I wiwh to hear from the hidden experts opinion first before i decide which to get.

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[royfrosty]

All the GTX970 is mainly because of its cooler capabilities.

Its very hard to explain in full details but will digress how it works.

Every brand has their own "special" cooler and they also have other type of coolers for a cheaper variant.

For example MSI GTX 970 has many variants, the Gaming Edition is spotted with a Twin Frozr 5 technology. On the other hand they have the GTX 970 Armor Edition, which is actually not as good as the Twin Frozr 5 but uses somewhat a older Twin Frozr 4 Advanced technology.

So it depends on the brands you gonna buy.

Zotac: Dual fans, OMEGA, AMP!
MSI: Armor, Twin Frozr 5, Tri Frozr, Golden Edition
Giga: 2x Windforce, 3x Windforce

and the list goes on.

DO NOT look at base clock speed. It does not matter which card you take, be it the fastest or the slowest. For Nvidia GPU Boost 2.0 it depends on the cooling capabilities of the card. The cooler it is, the better the performance. Also depending on the ASIC value of the card. The higher the ASIC, the boost clock will be higher, and thus you can't overclock that much. But you are somewhat already getting a very high clock speed usually the limit of the GPU. For lower ASIC, the boost clock will be lower, and you have higher room for overclocking, but you may not get the guaranteed high boost clock against the higher ASIC value.

So depending on your budget. See how much you willing to pay for the GTX970. This will determine on what card is suitable for you.

 

[djdestiny]

I would like to point out that Zotac's GTX 970 has 5 year warranty.

 

[ksrokiller]

For the zotac it is smaller compare to other gtx 970 is there performance difference and is the cooling good?

 

[KuroI-Kaze]

All the GTX970 is mainly because of its cooler capabilities.

Its very hard to explain in full details but will digress how it works.

Every brand has their own "special" cooler and they also have other type of coolers for a cheaper variant.

For example MSI GTX 970 has many variants, the Gaming Edition is spotted with a Twin Frozr 5 technology. On the other hand they have the GTX 970 Armor Edition, which is actually not as good as the Twin Frozr 5 but uses somewhat a older Twin Frozr 4 Advanced technology.

So it depends on the brands you gonna buy.

Zotac: Dual fans, OMEGA, AMP!
MSI: Armor, Twin Frozr 5, Tri Frozr, Golden Edition
Giga: 2x Windforce, 3x Windforce

and the list goes on.

DO NOT look at base clock speed. It does not matter which card you take, be it the fastest or the slowest. For Nvidia GPU Boost 2.0 it depends on the cooling capabilities of the card. The cooler it is, the better the performance. Also depending on the ASIC value of the card. The higher the ASIC, the boost clock will be higher, and thus you can't overclock that much. But you are somewhat already getting a very high clock speed usually the limit of the GPU. For lower ASIC, the boost clock will be lower, and you have higher room for overclocking, but you may not get the guaranteed high boost clock against the higher ASIC value.

So depending on your budget. See how much you willing to pay for the GTX970. This will determine on what card is suitable for you.

Thank you for your comment, its enlightening.

another burning question,

should i wait for new gpu(polaris???14mm chip??) or just grab gtx970 now?

Assuming i not going to change my current config monitor 1080 and budget still same around 400-500.

 

[royfrosty]

For the zotac it is smaller compare to other gtx 970 is there performance difference and is the cooling good?

Its smaller due to the PCB design. It is because Nvidia themselves do not have a reference design for the 970. So brands took out their older design boards to implement the 970. Example the zotac and palit gtx 970 uses a old gtx760 670 design.

Performance will really depends, although it wont be the best, with 4+2 power phase, and a normal cooler strap onto it, do note that you wont get the best out from it.

Cooling wise, the GTX970 for Zotac is getting at mid 70s region.

So higher chance that, you will hit thermal limit if you intend to overclock further.

 

[royfrosty]

Thank you for your comment, its enlightening.

another burning question,

should i wait for new gpu(polaris???14mm chip??) or just grab gtx970 now?

Assuming i not going to change my current config monitor 1080 and budget still same around 400-500.

If you can wait for it, then why not?

At this moment of time, i would encourage you to wait.

 

[JasK]

If you can wait for it, then why not?

At this moment of time, i would encourage you to wait.

bro royfrosty, would you share abit n tell me more about the msi turbo white edition one. and also for gigabytes 970 other than allowing us to hook up 3 x 4k monitors whats else is so special.

 

[KuroI-Kaze]

If you can wait for it, then why not?

At this moment of time, i would encourage you to wait.

Can briefly explain why its worth the wait instead of getting a gtx970 now? May i know roughly how long is the wait?

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[enenyi]

Can briefly explain why its worth the wait instead of getting a gtx970 now? May i know roughly how long is the wait?

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Rumours have it that the Pascal mainstream chips (GTX 1070 or wadever they decide to name it) will be released in June 2016, near Computex 2016 period.

But my personal opinion is that if ur budget is 400-500, u r only using for 1080p screens and u have a need to buy now, just get it now. Technology is always improving, u can wait for the next 5 years and still cant find a time to justify ur purchase. Just buy wad u need now. It's hard to say whether the next iteration of the GTX 970 will have similar performance, or higher-than-500-dollar price point, or both.

 

[watzup_ken]

Can briefly explain why its worth the wait instead of getting a gtx970 now? May i know roughly how long is the wait?

If you are not in a rush to upgrade, then it makes sense to wait since current generation of graphic card will depreciate quite a lot. So you have the choice of choosing a cheaper current gen card, or a more powerful next gen card.

But as with all new generation of graphic cards, they may not be that stable at the beginning and will cost a bomb.

 

[katata]

According to tomshardware who have conducted a series of tests, the performance difference betweent the various GTX970s are about 5%. So you should just go for the cheapest. Recommend the zotac because of the warranty. Do check out if they include the game bundles. If you wait a while, they might come bundled with the rise of the tomb raider game.

I would also recommend waiting for polaris if you can. its expected to have a significant performance increase for the readiness of the VR headsets. Probably the same performance jump we saw during the 8800GT era.

 

[watzup_ken]

Anyway, I am not sure if this is the case but I do that what you pay is what you get on hardware. So if you get a cheap GTX 970, I feel apart from the cooling, the build of the card will also take a hit, i.e. the components used on the card.

 

[watzup_ken]

I would also recommend waiting for polaris if you can. its expected to have a significant performance increase for the readiness of the VR headsets. Probably the same performance jump we saw during the 8800GT era.

I would expect no less given the shrink from a 28nm to 14/16nm. However, I feel the first gen 14/16nm cards may not be as optimized and we can potentially see better cards based on the same 14/16nm down the road. Take the current 28nm as an example where we can see how much AMD and Nvidia is able to squeeze out of it over the years. I also feel 14/16nm is here to stay for awhile.

 

[katata]

Anyway, I am not sure if this is the case but I do that what you pay is what you get on hardware. So if you get a cheap GTX 970, I feel apart from the cooling, the build of the card will also take a hit, i.e. the components used on the card.

I highly doubt that would be the case. The cards are all based on the reference design, they just add their own cooling design on top of it. Even if the quality differs (though I highly doubt so), it is still better than getting a reference card.

But I agree that this is the case for other components such as motherboard or power supplies

 

[KuroI-Kaze]

Can i conclude that with my usage and budget gtx970 would actually be much suitable?

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[kandinsky]

Can i conclude that with my usage and budget gtx970 would actually be much suitable?

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If you need a card soon, yes. But your specs already list the zotac 970??

 

[KuroI-Kaze]

If you need a card soon, yes. But your specs already list the zotac 970??

I sold it early last year after i got it as i was under-utilizing it.

 

[ragnarok95]

So why are you getting back the same card back? You very sure you won't under utilizes this time?

 

[waway625]

sorry to but in. Im tempted by the Zotac but considering evga first because..well evga is (to me) on of nvidias tier 1 partners.

But how is the RMA process for evga cards?