Which 970 Are You Buying?

Just purchased 2 EVGA GTX 970 Superclocked ACX 2.0 cards. Here is hoping that they don't sound like a turbine or have coil whine.
 
I am waiting to decide which card I want as I need to compromise.
I want a reference gtx970 at stock speeds and they do not exist. I would usually go for the EVGA cards but hearing alot of coil whine issues about every brand has made me hesitant.
 
I just ordered an MSI GTX 970 Gaming from Newegg! It's replacing my 290X as a side-grade so I can try out ULMB and g-sync on my ROG Swift. I'll pick up another 970 after the holidays.
 
Tgrove said:
Anyone get one of these ?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814132038&FM=1
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Bought 2 at my local Best Buy. 1 in hand the other on order and coming in next week.

Hoping to get them installed over Thanksgiving weekend and compare them to my 670's.

Note: They dont list them on the BB website, but if you go to the store, there's a shelf spot and a $379 tag on it. I got them to price match to a 970 on Amazon for $349 out the door for each of mine.
 
That's awesome. I'm really tempted to pick up one. How's the stock Boost on it and have you tried to OC it yet?! :D
 
Limahl said:
Bought 2 at my local Best Buy. 1 in hand the other on order and coming in next week.

Hoping to get them installed over Thanksgiving weekend and compare them to my 670's.

Note: They dont list them on the BB website, but if you go to the store, there's a shelf spot and a $379 tag on it. I got them to price match to a 970 on Amazon for $349 out the door for each of mine.
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I went to my local best buy to see if they had it and they didn't (no 9xx cards). I was hoping I could order it on the website and have it shipped to the store, but I guess that won't work if it isn't listed. Congrats on getting them to price match, which model did you show them?
 
Tgrove said:
I went to my local best buy to see if they had it and they didn't (no 9xx cards). I was hoping I could order it on the website and have it shipped to the store, but I guess that won't work if it isn't listed. Congrats on getting them to price match, which model did you show them?
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A best buy employee posted in a thread over on overclock.net that the cards are not supposed to be on shelves until Nov. 23rd. Some stores are putting them out early so that's how people are able to snag them.
 
Tgrove said:
I went to my local best buy to see if they had it and they didn't (no 9xx cards). I was hoping I could order it on the website and have it shipped to the store, but I guess that won't work if it isn't listed. Congrats on getting them to price match, which model did you show them?
Click to expand...

Its not on the BB website yet, but some stores have them on the shelf. If you give them the UPC code they can find it in the system though for ordering it seems.

I simply asked them if they'd price match to Amazon and he pulled up Amazon on the register, typed 970 GTX into the search and the first match was an EVGA card (a brand they sell) and he asked me "That one?" and I said "Yup". So they took $30 off each card, the one they had and the one they ordered for me.

I got the impression he wasnt all too bright to be honest, though they are on holiday "price match to get the sale" mode so that helped I'm sure.
 
Happy Saturday All,

I have been running a GTX260 all this time, with a 4770k and 16gb of ram. I mostly play WoW - but want to play some other games on this machine as well.

I think that the 970 cards are a pretty sweet price / performance ratio right now.

After having not bought any video cards for so long, I'm not sure what to buy. I've been reading this forum (and others) for a couple of hours now.

I was mostly setteled on the EVGA 970 FTW or Gigabyte G1 970 options. Then I read this post - Is this still generally what people are feeling to be the sequence of video cards?

polonyc2 said:
EVGA got a bad rap on their 970's due to the 'misaligned heatpipe' issue which spread like wildfire online...they were never able to recover from the bad stigma

http://www.guru3d.com/news-story/evga-geforce-gtx-970-acx-has-misaligned-gpu-vs-heatpipes.html

I just bought a Gigabyte G1 970 yesterday...my preference for 970 cards would be---> Gigabyte G1 Gaming--> MSI Gaming 4G--> ASUS Strix--> EVGA
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I want a card that will perform very well, but be silent when not under load (and be quiet even when pushed). I'm willing to pay a premium for quality, dependability and features.

Suggestions?

Also, ordering the card via amazon - do I get a free game? Or just via sellers such as newegg?

One last question - Should I wait for anticipated sales around the week of Thanksgiving? Or are the cards new enough that they won't be discounted?

Thanks a bunch.
 
^ I see 'Free Game Code' advertised on some cards on Amazon. I went with the MSI GTX 970 Gaming, seems like a great card for the price.
 
Amazon is part of the Pick Your Path promotion, I believe. The FTW uses a different cooler than the one's that were paraded around with "misaligned" heatpipes. They are all fine units in reality. The biggest downfall of the EVGA is its low TDP cap which a custom BIOS can solve. They are silent at idle as the fans are off until the card reaches 60-65C. EVGA claims to have solved the coil whine issues, My 970 SC ACX 2.0 is completely whine free except where frame rates go over 300fps (like menus) but it appeares to be an earlier model.
 
Got the Zotac basic twin fan model. Nice and quiet under load, 5 year local warranty.
 
Just bought a PNY 970! Might not be the sexiest card but it was the cheapest and it came with a free game
And honestly, no matter how "bad" it is, I'd say it's a pretty good replacement for my current card



An HD4890 :eek:


EDIT: How do I redeem my free game?
 
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ZeqOBpf6 said:
Just bought a PNY 970! Might not be the sexiest card but it was the cheapest and it came with a free game
And honestly, no matter how "bad" it is, I'd say it's a pretty good replacement for my current card



An HD4890 :eek:


EDIT: How do I redeem my free game?
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Follow the directions on the Pick Your Path promo card or email.
 
Thanks! I'm guessing it doesn't come until card ships.

I cancelled my order and upgraded to the Gigabyte Windforce. Massive upgrade incoming
 
Porter_ said:
A best buy employee posted in a thread over on overclock.net that the cards are not supposed to be on shelves until Nov. 23rd. Some stores are putting them out early so that's how people are able to snag them.
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Thank you!!!
 
Limahl said:
Its not on the BB website yet, but some stores have them on the shelf. If you give them the UPC code they can find it in the system though for ordering it seems.

I simply asked them if they'd price match to Amazon and he pulled up Amazon on the register, typed 970 GTX into the search and the first match was an EVGA card (a brand they sell) and he asked me "That one?" and I said "Yup". So they took $30 off each card, the one they had and the one they ordered for me.

I got the impression he wasnt all too bright to be honest, though they are on holiday "price match to get the sale" mode so that helped I'm sure.
Click to expand...

Thanks! Needed to know what to tell my gf so she can get me one of these for Christmas"
 
Porter_ said:
I just ordered an MSI GTX 970 Gaming from Newegg! It's replacing my 290X as a side-grade so I can try out ULMB and g-sync on my ROG Swift. I'll pick up another 970 after the holidays.
Click to expand...



jackpot.
 
^^^
And the mousepad included makes my machine more responsive, too. ;)
 
Porter_ said:
jackpot.
Click to expand...

c3k said:
^^^
And the mousepad included makes my machine more responsive, too. ;)
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Starrbuck said:
Enjoy! I may be in the market for a G-SYNC monitor soon..
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a couple thoughts after installing and gaming with this card last night:

1) i did not receive a mouse pad in the box. this is an outrage :p
2) swapping from AMD to Nvidia was painless (like all the other times i've gone back and forth in the past)
c) the only issue so far is when running MSI Afterburner while playing BF4 it causes hitching. closing Afterburner fixes it. i've seen people on other forums report this problem but i haven't had time to investigate yet. it didn't do this with my 290X.
iv) g-sync is awesome! very cool technology for when you're at ~50-60 fps and want to eliminate tearing. ULMB at 120 fps is fantastic too. i need more time to play with ULMB.
banana) i arbitrarily set the power limit to 110%, core clock to 1240 (boost ~1400) and mem to 7400. this is a pretty low overclock but it was just a 5 second "i'll set it here and see what happens" sort of thing. even so the card is whisper quite and i didn't see a single dip in clocks while gaming. i'll spend more time tweaking the overclock.
 
EVGA 04G-P4-2974-KR arriving tomorrow. Will report in with temperature, coil whine, and overclocking results asap. Best of luck to you guys in choosing your TRUE destiny ;)
 
Is there something special about the MSI model for $399? I don't understand the pricing but if I'm missing something please point it out.
 
kuhla said:
Is there something special about the MSI model for $399? I don't understand the pricing but if I'm missing something please point it out.
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It's pretty. and has a copper heatsink.
 
discobiscuits said:
EVGA 04G-P4-2974-KR arriving tomorrow. Will report in with temperature, coil whine, and overclocking results asap. Best of luck to you guys in choosing your TRUE destiny ;)
Click to expand...



Reporting in. 55-60c idle temperature w/ fan disabled. Haven't measured out in-game temperatures, yet.

+101mhz overclock on the GPU Clock and +259mhz overclock on the Memory Clock, fully stable at 100% power.

Fans aren't noisy at all (haven't measured them, but I upgraded from a Gigabyte Windforce GPU which is known for it's silent performance, and haven't noticed a difference.)

Last but not least... NO COIL WHINE! YATTA!

Overall I'm very happy. For $300 after my BoA cashback, I'm a happy gamer for the next few years :) Finally have a card that can compliment my Core i7.

Also, CS:GO runs maxed out and maintains 120+fps average while streaming with Shadowplay on Twitch. This is a huge deal for me, and I couldn't be happier. Can't wait to upload 1080p/60fps frag highlights and gameplay tutorials soon :)
 
Got my second GTX 970 today (MSI Golden Edition), however I didn't manage to build my rig because I somehow missed a critical spec on it (I found I couldn't mount all 9 screws onto the mobo, it only mounts 6, so I returned it).

Testing out the GE now, so far so good, temp on Heaven is actually lower than my vanilla GTX 970, and fans are whisper quiet. No coil whine either from what I can see.

Happy with my purchage. Now I am waiting for a replacement mobo (Z97x-UD5H)

My only gripes with it are:

1. I didn't get a Choose your path Ticket, but I don't think my vendor was actually included in the offer anyway
2. I now have two ESO keys...
3. For some really bizarre reason the GE didn't include port covers (SLI and PCI-E covers are still there), so I had to scrunge covers from my 570. Still have open HDMI though :(
 
Picked up a Gigabyte G1 GTX970 today. Building the kids new rig with it.

4670k, 500gb Samsung EVO SSD, 8gb RAM coupled with the 970 should be pretty solid for hiM :D
 
I think I'm going to pick up a reference 970 from Best Buy today (I need to return some other stuff there anyway).

Are the reference cards decent or should I be looking at the custom ones from other vendors?
 
Killa|3yte said:
I think I'm going to pick up a reference 970 from Best Buy today (I need to return some other stuff there anyway).

Are the reference cards decent or should I be looking at the custom ones from other vendors?
Click to expand...

i haven't seen an official review of the reference card yet but the people buying them are reporting good overclocks and low temps.
 
Bought a gigabyte g1 970, should be delivered(hopefully) weds. Anyone know how much of an upgrade this card is compared to a amd 6950?
Thanks!
 
Got Gigabyte G1 Gaming editions instead of the EVGA cards I had ordered.
They boost to 1404 Mhz on default factory OC clocks. I can get them to do 1527/7500 max clocks. However, kept them at 1506/7000 to avoid too much heat in my case.

Running like a champ and a worthy upgrade from a 780 SLi setup. Almost 15-20% performance improvement across the board and huge improvement with hitching, running out of VRAM with today's latest games including Mordor, Ass Creed Unity, Advanced Warfare and Farcry 4.

Got Rev 1.1 from newegg.
 
Killa|3yte said:
I think I'm going to pick up a reference 970 from Best Buy today (I need to return some other stuff there anyway).

Are the reference cards decent or should I be looking at the custom ones from other vendors?
Click to expand...

I think I might buy the same for my sister's computer I am building (mini-ITX). If it's the same cooler as the 980 that would be sweet... looks like it is. I love the Titan-ish reference blowers. Even if you OC hard when they spin up it's a nice hum, kinda like a good V8 idling.
 
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