Which brand of GTX 980 to buy?

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Core i5-3570K (running @ 4.2 Ghz - slight auto voltage OC).
Asus Sabertooth Z77 Motherboard
Asus 670 GTX DC2T
16 GB of G.Skill ripjaw-X DDR3 1600Mhz
SSD 256GB Crucial M4.
HD Western Digital Black 2TB
CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-D14
Case: Corsair CC600T Graphite White Special Edition
Running Win 8.1 64bit. Pro

Monitor: Asus ROG SWIFT PG278Q 2560 x 1440p

I was planning on skipping the GTX 980 and wait for a 980ti or 990 (however it will be called). But I have been thinking it over, and I think GTX 980 is a great pick right now. What do you think?

Anyway, trying to choose between the two brands: Asus or EVGA ? In terms of stability, cooling (most important probably), performance, size and design etc.... Which GTX 980 should I get?

I currently only have Gigbyte, MSI and ASUS in Israel where I live, but it is possible that an EVGA model will arrive soon.

My 670 is an Asus DC2T.

Finally - should I get some kind of an OC / superclocked version?
Please tell me brands and exact model names that you can recommend. Thanks!
 
Solution
MeteorsRaining
For 900 series, GB has the best OC out of the box, great thermals, and is the 'boss' brand. MSI is close on stock performance, and the coolest (along with GB) around. OC versions are what we both were talking about. EVGA has kind of ripped its repo with ACX 1.0 on 900 series cards. Asus has a coil whine issue with 900 series, and both can't OC as well as MSI or GB, implying that both of the later have better thermals.
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MeteorsRaining

MeteorsRaining

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In terms of cooling, MSI or Gigabyte, they both run the coolest, MSI runs the quietest. Asus/ GB has the best design due to backplate. GB is the longest at 312mm. MSI and GB have the best performance, Asus was said to be suffering from coil whine. EVGA ACX 1.0 has flawed design, avoid it, ACX 2.0 is better but MSI/GB are still better than it.

I'd go for MSI GTX 970 Gaming, the best 970 out there, coolest, quietest, best OCing potential.
 
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I have already decided to buy the GTX 980, although I am aware the 970 is awesome too.
How are the EVGA/MSI/GIGBYTE and ASUS models of the 980?

Also I thought about buying a slight pre-OC version, because I don't plan on OCing my card, its kind of unnecessary in today's gaming. I never had to OC my 670 (factory OC).

Personally I am surprised you are all for the GB model - I have always thought GB were the weakest yet cheapest brand - like the most simplistic "budget" brand. Everyone always recommended me to buy the EVGA or ASUS brands, and now a friend of mine got the EVGA 980. Don't know which type exactly though.
 
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MeteorsRaining

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For 900 series, GB has the best OC out of the box, great thermals, and is the 'boss' brand. MSI is close on stock performance, and the coolest (along with GB) around. OC versions are what we both were talking about. EVGA has kind of ripped its repo with ACX 1.0 on 900 series cards. Asus has a coil whine issue with 900 series, and both can't OC as well as MSI or GB, implying that both of the later have better thermals.
 
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Solution
MeteorsRaining

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It is the most powerful out of the box, the coolest (obviously, 3 fans cooling it!), and very quiet (quietest is MSI).
 
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Wow I am actually shocked...
So the card I am looking at now is:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125682
or
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127834

I am leaning toward the Gigbyte but I might be wrong, do you think I have enough room in the case? I have zero cables in the case (all are neatly managed in the back, and I typed the case name above, its a mid-tower I think, very spacious. I have no watercooling or something in it, only a massive Noctua lol.

Also, what is "coil whine issue"? What's the deal with the 1.0 and 2.0 with EVGA? I am shocked to hear these two expensive brands messed up.
 
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Shame in prices in Israel are so high. I am probably not going to SLI this thing, so I am looking for the best single card I can get, I mean maybe one day I will SLI, but I think GTX 980 will be able to max out all games including The Witcher 3 and The Division when they come out.
I am playing at either 1080p on my big Samsung TV, or 1440p on my Asus SWIFT.

Also I can order the GB Gaming GTX 980 from Amazon at 769.18$ but I will have ZERO warranty unlike the 3 yr (somewhat limited) warranty when buying in Israel.
I say limited because I buy from an official importer, not from GB themselves, so the always want to put the card in a lab before deciding if they fix or replace it. And we all know that you can't fix these things... Israel is a terrible place to be a gamer lol..
 
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MeteorsRaining

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Your case has plenty space 312mm long G1, it supports card upto 360mm:
http://www.corsair.com/pt-pt/special-edition-white-graphite-series-600t-mid-tower-case

And yes it's indeed very spacious.

Also, Asus 900 series cards are said to produce coil noise while on load, and they don't have any particular feature better than G1/ MSI, so I won't really recommend it over those two. EVGA ACX 1.0 specially has a bigger issue, the heatpipes are misangled and only two out of three actually touch the chip, resulting in higher temps. ACX 2.0 is better (that issue is solved) but I'd give EVGA a miss in 900 series for MSI/ GB/ Asus.
 
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Umm.. I think I will go with the Gigabyte GTX 980 Gaming, especially if its both cool, powerful and quiet with a built in OC. How much is it OC'd btw? I hope not too much, I have heard of Superclocked cards that were so unstable out of the box - that users under-clocked it after installing the GPU.

Any other comments/opinions regarding gtx 980 brands?

Also, I know this is irrelevant to the subject:
But the Asus SWIFT monitor I have bought and installed yesterday: is connected via a displayport:
And it never shows up the display during POST (bios selection) and windows load up. The monitor only comes up when windows has loaded - while loading the profile.
My BIOS is up to date and was working fine... I am afraid that DisplayPort simply cannot display the screen before going into windows, is that correct?
 
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If you have decided that the gtx 980 is the best solution for you I would buy the Asus gtx Strix 980.

The Strix is the most quiet card card on the market, with its 0db features. It is also amongst the coolest which many people fail to look for. If you keep your card card cool and its not overheating you dont need to spend extra money on a GPU cooler, and chances ate you will have it for years to come.

Asus achieves this with its patiented Direct CU design that it has brought foward from its top teir cards 770 780 780ti all of which have been revied extensivly on this site and all have won awards.

The final reason is the extreme overclocking headroom that Asus has left us with in this card. 1500mgz stable without GPU coolinf is sweet. I purchased two of them.
I hope this helps.

James
 
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James, its funny that you say, because the guys above were realyl adamant about the Gigabyte being the coolest with its 3 fans design, and 2nd place to MSI in terms of being quiet, and the MSI being the quietest. I am talking about the "gaming" models.

I don't plan on overclocking since I don't have enough experience iwth it, and last time I owned the Asus 670 DC2T which was already OC out of the box. I rather buy a stable factory OC card. Are you saying the Strix is OC to 1500mgz? what is the standard of the 980?
Also what is the factory OC of Gigbyte Gaming 980 and MSI Gaming 980?

Also I don't have the Strix yet in Israel, only the Strix version of GTX 970 which cost 2000 ILS instead of 3000ILS (GTX 980). I have 2 stores who sells the MSI GTX 980 Gaming, and one that sells the Gigabye GTX 980 Gaming.
 
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The STRIX is overclocked out of the box, do a google search for review asus strix 980.
I own the card its a beast I recommend it.

Furthermore overclocking the card is just point and click with provided software.

Do the internet search, the card has won every award.
 
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I don't have the STRIX 980 yet in Israel, do you think its worth the wait?
Or should I go with the Gigabyte G1 Gaming 980 (which was also very recommended by many).

What software are you using to OC/monitor? Evga Precision, MSI Afterburner, GPU Tweak?

I have been using EVGA Precision on my Nvidia gaming rig, and MSI Afterburner on my ATI secondry pc - both to monitor performance and temps, while also applying Automatic software user defined fan control to lower temperatures.

I have stopped using using EVGA Precision ever since one of their updates removed the use of Riva Tuner Statistic server and they changed the interface to a really bad circle "gauge" menus. That really put me off Precision.

When you overclock - do you increase the core and memory clocks? or do you just raise the Power Target scale (in EVGA Pr.)?
 
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stolicran

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Asus GPU tweak works great, just point and click, not overly complicated.

Just oc the boost clock speed and mem clock as well as max gpu voltgage and your good to go.

try some of the online retailers, like Amazon and see if they will ship. If it was me and my money I would wait about two weeks to see if I can get it, to a month. If it becomes on obtainable in Israel, when I would go with the other choices that you listed which are solid choices. But in my opinion and the opinion all of the review websites this card is the best money can bye today.

quotemsg=14452967,0,883311]I don't have the STRIX 980 yet in Israel, do you think its worth the wait?
Or should I go with the Gigabyte G1 Gaming 980 (which was also very recommended by many).

What software are you using to OC/monitor? Evga Precision, MSI Afterburner, GPU Tweak?

I have been using EVGA Precision on my Nvidia gaming rig, and MSI Afterburner on my ATI secondry pc - both to monitor performance and temps, while also applying Automatic software user defined fan control to lower temperatures.

I have stopped using using EVGA Precision ever since one of their updates removed the use of Riva Tuner Statistic server and they changed the interface to a really bad circle "gauge" menus. That really put me off Precision.

When you overclock - do you increase the core and memory clocks? or do you just raise the Power Target scale (in EVGA Pr.)?[/quotemsg]

 
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Well situation now stands like this:
MSI GTX 980 Gaming - available in stock. Doesn't have a backplate which is a concern of mine, also that system when it turn off fans untill it reaches 64 celsious - I have heard that some people had issues when the fans didn't spin and the card spiked to 90 degrees.
Anyway lack of backplate can be an issue, what do you think?
Fans of the MSI are the largest.

EVGA GTX 980 ACX 2.0 slightly cheaper than the MSI, also have no backplate. The fans are a lot smaller.

Asus Strix GTX 980 probably won't arrive to Israel, not any time soon.

Gigabyte G1 Gaming GTX 980: 3 fans (smaller than those of MSI). Has a backplate, will arrive to Israel, as expensive or slightly more than MSI.

Not sure what to do now...
How does the backplate affect cooling ?

Also, aside from choosing the manufacturer.. I am starting to consider buying 2 GTX 970 for SLI.
But I feel like I rather pay the extra for the best single card for the money, and possibly SLI in the future.. (not very likely).
 
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MeteorsRaining

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My 2 cents here: I don't own any 900 series card, and therefore gave the best options available in the market, based on multiple reviews and experience. In short, I didn't give any brand a bias over others. My advise? if you're not to OC, G1 will be my choice, closely followed by MSI.
 
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Yeah I am starting to believe GB G1 GTX 980 Would be the best choice. Also some guy showed me this link from the German Tom's Harware site:
http://www.tomshardware.de/nvidia-geforce-gtx-970-gtx-980-roundup-vergleichstest,testberichte-241658-12.html

If you start rolling into benchmarks, and temperatures, you can see that Gigabyte G1 Gaming GTX 980 leads the charts among all other GTX 980 (and so does its 970 little brother): both in performance and temperature by a significant degree.
That's really surprising, in a good way.
I wish I could translate the entire page, google doesn't offer to translate the whole page for some reason.

I might OC one day, so if Gigabyte is the coolest of cards, might be good for temps while OC.
One more question though:
You saw my rig above, and Gigabyte G1 is said to take more power and resources that other GTX980 (and close to the power consumption of 780ti):
Will I be able to SLI in the future? considering my current build and PSU?
 
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Damn reading more and more reviews, Gigabyte's G1 is indeed the more powerful and coolest card, but it is also the most power hungry and more troubling - it is very noisy.

Unlike MSI which is not as cool, but a lot quiet, and also turn its fans off when idle below 50c.

Not sure how bad the noise factor of the G1 is...
 
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Good to know G1 isn't too noisy and power hungry. But why the hell did they make it an 8-pin? (EVGA higher clocks @ 6pin).

My PSU is Corsair AX850 full modular.
Will it be enough for SLI as well?

I am struggling to make a choice between:
Gigabyte GTX 980 G1 Gaming
MSI GTX 980 Gaming
EVGA GTX 980 ACX 2.0 SC

The EVGA ACX 2.0 SC looks very promising, since they have addressed the cooling issues of the ACX 1.0 and totally change and reinvented the cooling system:
But this is the only review I found on the web, and I couldn't find a decent comparison between the 3:
http://www.overclockers.com/evga-gtx980-superclocked-acx2.0-graphics-card-review
Also EVGA 2.0 SC has the best clocks - much higher than ASUS or MSI and slightly higher than GB.
I like the ascetic of the EVGA better than both MSI and GB, however - the Gigabyte has a backplate - which is a huge in my opinion: looks better, cleans up easier, and more rigid. Also the GB has a metal shroud if I recall and not plastic.
However I don't like the glowing blue led on the GB (doesn't fit my dark black-white-brown-gold rig).


The only issue I have with the EVGA is lack of backplate. Not sure how good the cooling is. The power consumption is quite low, also being a 6ipin connector unlike GB excessive 8-pin.

GB is powerful - in the Tom's Hardware comparisons of the 980s GB G1 lead the charts, but EVGA ACX 2.0 SC wasn't in the benchmarks at all - so who knows...

What do you think is the best choice?
For me, I don't have US warranty as I live in Israel. All three have 3 yr warranty from the Israeli official importer. EVGA is a bit cheaper than the other two.
 
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