PC Upgrade - GTX680 OC Calibre, MSI Lightning or GB SOC?

[HyperX]

My question is about three High-End OC-able GTX680's:

- Gigabyte GTX 680 Super Over Clocked (~430€)
- Sparkle GTX 680 Calibre (~470€)
- MSI GTX 680 Lightning (~490€)

I want to run three 1980x1020 screens on one card (later SLI).
BF3 on Ultra with the standard GTX680 is about 30 fps so I need some better OC'ed 680.

Now my list of pro's and con's of the cards:

Gigabyte GTX 680 Super Over Clocked

+ highest GPU clock (factory based)
+ many coolers (Windforce X5)
+ premium features (like GPU-Gauntlet sorting, LN2 BIOS, high performance hardware, ...)
- above 50% fan speed over 50dB (up to 65dB!)
- 3 Slot card
- can demolish my PCIe 3.0 Slot (too heavy card)

Sparkle GTX 680 Calibre

+ 2nd highest stock GPU clock
+ only two slots needed
+ seems quiet
+ power target up to +122% (pic)
- not really better than the 40€ cheaper GB GTX680 SOC

MSI GTX 680 Lightning

+ voltage tweaking
+ twin frozr IV cooler
+ top quality hardware (pic)
+ seem you can OC it up to 1,3 GHz GPU clock stable! (review, OC table, BF3 bench)
- lowest stock GPU speed (1110 MHz)

In my actual opinion the MSI Lightniung would be worth to pay extra 60€ IF it really holds 1,3 GHz permanent.

My main question is, what do you think about it?

 

[Sumukh_Bhagat]

MSI GTX 680 Lightning would be Best.
It will surely Overclock Higher than any other.

But the Price Difference is a issue, if you have the Money.

Stock GPU speed doesn't matter at all.
As you'll Overclock those.

 

[maestro0428]

^I agree, I would go with the Lightning. You know though that the 7970GHZ edition will be faster with three screens.

 

[Sumukh_Bhagat]

But he wants to X-fire or SLI those cards later.

So, Nvidia is the way to go.
Most Radeon Stutter at X-fire. Specially 7900 Series.

 

[redeemer]

I would go with the cheaper Gigabyte, your not going to see a massive gain in performance from 1200 to 1240mhz. Realistically you will be able to attain 1220Mhz on most of these. Scaling is not Kepler's strong point this generation, so save a few buck!

 

[HyperX]

Thanks for your answers!

I may wait, get some more money and buy the Lightning.

 

[HyperX]

I would go with the cheaper Gigabyte, your not going to see a massive gain in performance from 1200 to 1240mhz. Realistically you will be able to attain 1220Mhz on most of these. Scaling is not Kepler's strong point this generation, so save a few buck!

I talk about 1300 MHz with the lightning, and I think that is a bit of a difference isn't it?

 

[Sumukh_Bhagat]

And That Gigabyte one will Not Overclock much.
Because it has Voltage Lock.

 

[redeemer]

I talk about 1300 MHz with the lightning, and I think that is a bit of a difference isn't it?

Lol dude 1300mhz is rare man there is no that guaranteed, maybe MSI cherry picked a few cards for reviewers and some got picked up by a few consumers.

 

[HyperX]

So what would be the "best" GTX680 for me then?
SOC is too heavy and needs 3 slots, Lightning is too expensive and the chance of 1,3 GHz is too small.

 

[redeemer]

Well if 1.3Ghz is what your after than yes the MSI Lightning may or may not get you there. So you will have to risk it!

 

[bigcyco1]

Nvidia? Simple, the GTX 680 DirectCU II Top trace the line between video cards ASUS Classic those belonging to the elite end,This 680 is the shot caller slaps the other 680's around makes them bow down! I would be all over that Asus TOP for its high factory overclock, cool temps, and really, really quiet fans,heavily modified PCB, with an efficient VRM design to produce low temperatures, improved voltage regulation circuitry, much better Chil controller , specially binned chip and voltage control and monitoring support that you won't find on most other non-reference cards.The card a straight beast!

 

[redeemer]

LOL /\

 

[bigcyco1]

LOL /\

:lol:

 

[HyperX]

Nvidia? Simple, the GTX 680 DirectCU II Top trace the line between video cards ASUS Classic those belonging to the elite end,This 680 is the shot caller slaps the other 680's around makes them bow down! I would be all over that Asus TOP for its high factory overclock, cool temps, and really, really quiet fans,heavily modified PCB, with an efficient VRM design to produce low temperatures, improved voltage regulation circuitry, much better Chil controller , specially binned chip and voltage control and monitoring support that you won't find on most other non-reference cards.The card a straight beast!

The DirectCUII is a 3-Slot card and costs 500€!

Nice, but I have no proof of the "awesomeness" of this card

 

[HyperX]

I found an overclocked Lightning:

"
Speaking of air cooling, with a voltage bump of 100mV we were able to hit a 1388MHz Boost Speed which actually led to between 1425Hz and 1472MHz in-game. Memory was also raring to go and we eventually hit 6488MHz before the GDDR5’s error correction came into effect. Naturally, the associated performance increase with these clock speeds was nothing short of amazing.
"

Link: http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum/hardware-canucks-reviews/55064-asus-gtx-680-directcu-ii-top-review-19.html

This clocks are quite equal to the ones of the MSI GTX 680 Lightening. However the Direct CUII is max overclocked with 1,3 GHz.

 

[djangoringo]

My vote goes for the msi lightning.

 

[bigcyco1]

The DirectCUII is a 3-Slot card and costs 500€!

Nice, but I have no proof of the "awesomeness" of this card

:lol: well personally i get a 670 but that's me.