Cheaper brands, worth the extra savings?

archvince · Oct 9, 2015

I am basically asking if it's worth it to save a few bucks and get cheaper brands such as Palit or Zotac over more known brands such as MSI or Gigabyte?

The card in question is the GTX 950 btw. I am really loving the MSI Gtx 950 (aesthetics, better fans, more reliable?) but I am on a tight budget. Was wondering what your thoughts are regarding these brands (Zotac and Palit) as I have never had any experiences with these brands

Dark Lord of Tech · Oct 9, 2015

I usuallly stick to the mainstream brands , MSI is my favorite , last 3 cards are MSI.

jimmysmitty · Oct 9, 2015

The best I have seen for nVidia is EVGA and Asus. MSI is good but they every now and then seem to have a few bad batches, although recently their newer GPU designs have been solid.

I do not suggest the cheaper brands. They tend to get lower quality chips and parts hence why they are so much cheaper. Stick with a decent brand like MSI, Asus or EVGA if you want the best quality in a GPU.

eodeo · Oct 9, 2015

Palit is good. Zotac i'm not familiar with personally.

archvince · Oct 9, 2015

Thank you for your responses, unfortunately EVGA cards are notiriously expensive here in the Philippines, so they are out of the equation. I too am loving the MSI Gtx 950 Gaming Edition and am leaning towards it currently. Although I am also really liking the Zotac 950 Amp (higher clock, comes with a backplate, very cheap compared to MSI) the only problem is I don't know anything regarding the brand's reliability/durability

spentshells · Oct 9, 2015

Both are fine, I'd prefer zotac more due to their will to be among the best, the service they offer is beginning to really help them stand out.

Palit has been around a while as has Gainward. They have been doing this a while so they must be doing something right.

Dark Lord of Tech · Oct 9, 2015

I have owned 2 lower end Zotac cards in the past , both ran perfectly fine , but I stick to MSI right now.

Solandri · Oct 9, 2015

Carefully review how warranty service is handled. I went with a cheaper brand for a GPU once. It died and I contacted the manufacturer for warranty service. They told me they handle warranty claims with an equipment swap at the retailer, and I should contact the store where I bought the card. I contacted Newegg and they told me to contact the manufacturer.

3 months of back and forth with both companies and I couldn't get them to talk to each other to set up the warranty swap. By that time the warranty period expired and I just wrote off the card as an expensive lesson. Make sure the brand you're buying from handles their own warranty service (and that their return address is in the U.S. so you don't end up having to ship the item to China for warranty service).

Dark Lord of Tech · Oct 9, 2015

http://www.zotac.com/en/support/warranty-manager.html
Zotac Warranty ^

http://us.msi.com/page/warranty
Click Gaphics Card tab for MSI Warranty info^

archvince · Oct 9, 2015

Thanks for the help guys, I chose Blackbird as the solution since he actually had what I was looking for (first hand experience on the brand). But thank you all!

anyways, to sum it all up, Zotac is still a good pick despite being cheaper, right?

gibbly · Oct 9, 2015

archvince :

Yes, zotac is very good. They are Owned by pcpartner which is the company that made the ati/radion cards before other companies took over board production and they still make the cards for sapphire. Zotac is mostly popular in asia. Their cards aren't the coolest running but they are some of the quietest and they still don't run hot.

eodeo · Oct 9, 2015

gtx 950 is such a low power consumer that any brand would have a difficult time screwing it up.

It's up to nvidia to design a good chip and it's up to partners like msi to implement and cool the said gpu. Which brings me back to my first point- gtx 950 is such a low power consumer that any brand would have a difficult time screwing it up.

archvince · Oct 10, 2015

eodeo :

Thank you, looks like I'll be going for the Zotac 950 AMP then. Not unless I can somehow fit the MSI 950 2g into my budget.

NextGenLifeHD · Oct 10, 2015

A deciding factor would be whether you are planning on overclocking. If you are, then I suggest getting a more reputable brand such as MSI, but otherwise I would say go for the cheaper brand to help your budget

giantbucket · Oct 10, 2015

Solandri :

this is funny. if you had bothered to read more about the OP's situation, you would realize that for him/her, shipping to China is probably easier than shipping to the USA. why? CUZ HE/SHE IS IN THE PHILIPPINES!!!

wh3resmycar · Oct 10, 2015

get the zotac. 5 years warranty vs msi's 2 years warranty.

archvince · Oct 10, 2015

On a side note, what do you guys think? Should I get the cheapest (Zotac GTX 950 Single Fan) considering the 950 doesn't really need that much cooling in the 1st place since it's a pretty energy efficient card. Or should I dish out about 9$ more for a Zotac GTX 950 AMP (highest clock out of any 950s out of the box and comes with a dual fan and an awesome backplate)

giantbucket · Oct 10, 2015

how much is $9 for you really? for some people, it's not much, it's a lunch. for other people, it's a lot. you could probably overclock the normal one reasonably well anyways, though Zotac might have already tried it and decided that the chips that CAN overclock well enough are in the AMP card, and the other ones are in the normal card. or maybe Zotac doesn't do any pre-screening and they either leave it as is (normal) or overclock it for you (AMP).

the AMP does look a little bit nicer.

Solandri · Oct 10, 2015

giantbucket :

If these forums existed simply to answer the original poster's question, each thread would be deleted after the question had been answered to OP's satisfaction.

The answers are kept around so that other people with similar problems or questions can search and find answers without having to re-ask the question. I try to tailor my responses so they will also be helpful to these other people who will run across this thread via searches, not just the OP.

cst1992 · Oct 10, 2015

Get the AMP if you can afford it. An extra fan couldn't hurt, and the 950 is not that efficient, it still consumes 90 W of power.

archvince · Oct 10, 2015

Thanks again! Will be getting the GTX 950 Amp this Monday

Cheaper brands, worth the extra savings?

Distinguished

Retired Moderator

Champion

Distinguished

Distinguished

Judicious

Retired Moderator

Illustrious

Retired Moderator

Distinguished

Reputable

Distinguished

Distinguished

Reputable

Dignified

Distinguished

Distinguished

Dignified

Illustrious

Splendid

Distinguished

Share this page