GTX 780 Ti: Asus DirectCU II vs EVGA ACX

[cmasupra]

I am in the market for a GTX 780 Ti and am deciding between the Asus one with the DirectCU II cooler and the EVGA one with the ACX cooler. Specifically, I'm deciding between these 2:

Asus: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121838
EVGA: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814487003

I currently have a Gigabyte one (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125489), but it's having problems and I'm going to be replacing it with either the Asus or EVGA GTX 780 Tis I listed.

Silence is very important to me since I need to be able to record audio from my mic while the card is being stressed by games and editing software. Stock performance doesn't really matter to me since I'll be manually OCing the card.

My question is basically which cooler is quieter if both cards were to be clocked at the same speed? I know that both coolers have been changed since the 600 series of cards (I believe they both have smaller fans now?), so if anyone has any knowledge of which cooler is quieter on one of the 700 series cards, I'd like to hear it.

 

[Gam3r01]

ASUS has the better cooler, EVGA has more goodies and better support.
If the noise is an issue for you, go ASUS.

 

[nikoli707]

between the acx, twin frozr, windforce, and dc2, the asus has the one of the lowest gpu temps but the highest vrm temps. this isn't much of an issue at stock or light overclock clocks but once the 1.212v stock bios limit has been reached, the asus vrm/mosfet temps reach worrisome levels. i particualarly dont like the asus card because it uses a digi+ asp1212 voltage locked controller so even under water the card will hit a voltage bottleneck eventually. all the other 3 major manufacture cards use the stock ncp4206 unlocked controller and the upgraded ncp4208. not to mention their vrm/mostfet temps are much better, up to 15c less. the classified is by far the best with the best temps and the quietest cooler while at the same time having the highest possible overclocks due to its oversized acx fan design and exotic wide pcb and the highly coveted chil8318 controller. then there is the kingpin which is just a modified classy but you probably dont need to go there unless a water block is in the budget.

what problems are you having with your windforce?

 

[unknownofprob]

agreed, Asus's DCUI Cooler with "Direct GPU contact", is the better cooler of the two and is quieter, which is what most people want when it comes to a decision.

Get the Asus!

 

[JackNaylorPE]

EVGA Classified is great .... EVGA SC isn't in the same league as the Asus and MSI...... for the 780, the Asus clearly had the better card outta the gate..... though it had a moderate OC afrom the factory, it was extremely overclockable. When MSI switched from the Twin Frozr to the N Gaming Series card and brought the core speed up from 902 to 954, they clearly had the better card "outta the box". MSI appears to have upped their game again with the 780 Ti and seems to be getting the nod in most of the the reviews. Techpowerup gave its 2nd highest score ever tot he MSI 780 Ti, only card that ever scored higher was the Asus 670 DCII TOP. For whatever reason, this time around the Asus 780 TI DC cooler did no better on noise than the reference design. It didn't do much better on the performance testing against MSI and EVGA but it has in other reviews so I don't wanna knock it too hard there.....I'd still take it over the EVGA .... the author notes in this respect

" I'm a bit skeptical of whether we will see such high overclocks on retail [EVGA] boards, but only time will tell."

9.9 MSI http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/MSI/GTX_780_Ti_Gaming/29.html
9.4 Asus http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/GTX_780_Ti_Direct_Cu_II_OC/29.html
9.5 EVGA http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/EVGA/GTX_780_Ti_SC_ACX_Cooler/31.html

 

[mr91]

The Asus is quieter and in my opinion has higher build quality.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

Was true oin the 780 but for whatever reason, not the Ti.....From the above links

The big ASUS Direct CU cooler immediately catches your attention with its bulky, powerful looks. Out of the box, it comes in a clean, all-black color you can match to go with the rest of your system through either the red or golden stickers included in the box. Looking at noise and temperature results, I'll say that I expected better. Noise levels almost exactly match those of the reference design, which is certainly "not bad," but I was hoping for a significant reduction in noise levels. Right now, I'm testing the MSI GTX 780 Ti Gaming, which does much better here, so it is possible after all.

The real highlight of the MSI GTX 780 Ti Gaming, however, is fan noise. The card is whisper quiet in idle, which will be important if you don't game all the time. More importantly, once you start gaming, fan speed increases just a little bit, enough to keep the card cool without all hell breaking loose. At just 30 dBA, the MSI GTX 780 Ti Gaming is quieter than most graphics cards, no matter their performance segment - and this is the fastest card we ever tested! I recently reviewed several GTX 780 Ti cards, by all the big players, and none are even close in noise levels. It really is a night and day difference, even more so when you start comparing this card to AMD's R9 290X flagship.

 

[nikoli707]

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/EVGA/GTX_780_Ti_Classified/28.html

what you see above and the rest of its review only part of the story. the classified is a full .04v higher than any of the other cards.... 1.15-1.16 compared to 1.20, while the stock bios limited voltage on all the popular 4 is 1.212v. so comparing its temps and noise with cards that are clocked lower and have a noticably lower vcore is not really fair. a few independent tests have shown that pushing all 4 cards, ok well 5 if you include the reference based non classified acx cooled evga card, with the same 1.212v limit and the easily attainable 1150mhz core speed show that the classy is far ahead as far as noise and temps, msi second, gigabyte thirt, and asus forth, evga standard acx fifth. note these were done with custom bios that locked in the boost state to eliminate throttling.

the classy is the easiest to "mod" and has the dual bios, load up a custom unlocked bios on the ln2, use the few KB sized classified voltage controller and you have access to 1.5v straight on the core. thats a huge increase and under water allows upwards of 1.6ghz core frequency which is just ridiculous. though on stock air most will get to 1.25v core and around 1.35ghz +/- 35mhz until they hit 82c core with a slightly more aggressive fan profile.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

Though I referenced the EVGA Classified in my 1st post, the Classy (and the Kingpin variant) as well a sthe MSI Lightning are "separate animals" so to speak and not (AFAIK) under discussion..... The EVGA Classified is $760....all the others are $700ish..... I think the Classy is an absolutely wonderful card ..... had my fill of tech support issues with EVGA (on factory OC'd cards not being able to hold factory OC) so not quite comfy jumping on that horse again.

OP was asking about the Asus DCII versus EVGA SC. Other "comparable cards" are the Gigabyte Windforce and the MSI N gaming series. I dunno if it's a mistake or not but with the MSI 780 Ti listed on newegg at $100 cheaper ($600) than any other card, I couldn't help but introduce it into the discussion.

 

[cmasupra]

To everyone talking about the MSI card, I wasn't really considering the MSI card because of the number of reviews that say the card started leaking something after a few months. I'd hate to have a card that works for a few months, then need to get it replaced with another card that only works for a few months, and keep repeating that process. I am already scared of doing that with the Gigabyte card, which is why I've decided to just get another brand instead of getting a replacement Gigabyte card. There are already a ton of reviews of the Gigabyte card saying that people are getting artifacts with it.

The problems I'm having with my Gigabyte card are artifacts and freezing. In one game, I'll get random black splotches every few seconds, and in another game I'll get random static for 1 frame every once in a while. Also, no matter what game I'm playing, I'll get random freezes that last for a fraction of a second. I had to downclock the card by 100MHz in order to get the artifacts to mostly go away, but I'm still getting a few artifacts and the freezes.