What do you think is better? 2 GTX 970 or 1 GTX 980.

Solution
These are the graphic cards i am planning on buying.
If i am going to go for GTX 970. these are the graphic cards that i can get in my store.

http://www.cplonline.com.au/gigabyte-gv-n970g1-gaming-4gd-geforce-gtx-970-4gb-graphic-card-gv-n970g1-gaming-4gd.html
http://www.cplonline.com.au/msi-gtx970-4g-graphic-card-gtx970-gaming-4g.html

If i'm going to go for GTX 980.
http://www.cplonline.com.au/evga-geforce-gtx-970-4g-superclocked-graphic-card-04g-p4-0974-kr-45488.html.

So if i get 2 GTX 970, that would be a total of $1038.

And if i go for the GTX 980 it would be $749.

Do you guys think i should go 2 GTX 970 or 1 GTX 980? Also which brand should i go for, the GTX 970 has no reference cooler, MSI or GIGABYTE G1.
I have a 1.1k Budget.
Two GTX 970 cards in SLI give a 60% to 70% improvement over the GTX 970.
One GTX 980 is about 15% faster than a GTX 970.

There is no question that two GTX 970 cards in SLI has better performance.
Downsides are that you wil sometimes have trouble with SLI support in games, especially new games when they are first released until a driver update follows. Some old games don't support SLI, but a single card is fine for these games anyway.
Power usage is also higher, 290W for the two GTX 970 cards compared to 165W for the GTX 980.
 

Mac266

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As VincentP said, GTX 970 SLI is Faster but a single GTX 980 is generally accepted as better.

Pros for 970 SLI:

- More performance (generally)
- If one breaks, you have a spare ;)

Pros for 980:

- Less heat
- Less power
- Generally more reliable performance envelope.
- Cheaper
- Can SLI later for even more performance (moar speeeed!)
 


Define "better".
With the GTX 700 series, the GTX 780 had more VRAM than the GTX 770 and this was a selling point beyond the small speed increase.
The GTX 970 and 980 have the same amount of VRAM. The high cost of the GTX 980 is simply because it is the best single GPU card available. It is a huge price to pay for a fairly minor performance improvement.
Two GTX 970 cards in SLI however are much faster than the GTX 970 or GTX 980. Aside from a few minor compatibility problems these are better than the GTX 980.
 

Mac266

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Probably bad wording on my part, better as in most recommended. Generally, it is recommended to get the more powerful single card over two lesser cards (not to say that the GTX 970 is weak!).

Now that I've said all that, I just happened to buy the two 970's over the 980 :D
 


This is true where there is a big performance difference between the cards, say two GTX 760 cards in SLI compared to a GTX 780.
The ideal card for SLI in the 700 series was the GTX 770 4GB version, or the GTX 780 6GB version if you had deep pockets.
Buying two low end cards for SLI is not worthwhile when there is a single GPU card of similar performance to the SLI setup.
There is however no single GPU card to match two GTX 970 cards in SLI, and won't be for quite some time.
 

Mac266

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True that. Could go for a 980 SLI
 

Peter0007

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These are the graphic cards i am planning on buying.
If i am going to go for GTX 970. these are the graphic cards that i can get in my store.

http://www.cplonline.com.au/gigabyte-gv-n970g1-gaming-4gd-geforce-gtx-970-4gb-graphic-card-gv-n970g1-gaming-4gd.html
http://www.cplonline.com.au/msi-gtx970-4g-graphic-card-gtx970-gaming-4g.html

If i'm going to go for GTX 980.
http://www.cplonline.com.au/evga-geforce-gtx-970-4g-superclocked-graphic-card-04g-p4-0974-kr-45488.html.

So if i get 2 GTX 970, that would be a total of $1038.

And if i go for the GTX 980 it would be $749.

Do you guys think i should go 2 GTX 970 or 1 GTX 980? Also which brand should i go for, the GTX 970 has no reference cooler, MSI or GIGABYTE G1.
I have a 1.1k Budget.
 
Solution
I would not buy the GTX 980, I think it is overpriced for the performance offered.
I have heard a number of people complaining of coil whine with the MSI GTX 970.
The Gigabyte card is also faster, so I would go with this.

The other thing you could do is just get one GTX 970 card for now and get a second one later if you want.
The GTX 970 will push 60 FPS in any game at 1920 x 1080 resolution, you really only need to step up to SLI if gaming with a 120 Hz monitor, multiple monitors with Nvidia 2D surround, or a 4K monitor.
 

JamesHeller

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if only the evga gtx 980 is available then I guess you should probably go for the MSI GTX 970
that would be a good choice