Looking for Zotac GTX 970 Testimonials/Overclocking Results

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mcknigk

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Aug 7, 2014
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Hi All -

I am on the verge of purchasing my first Nvidia GPU, GTX 970. I had originally planned to purchase an EVGA model due to their reputation. I have seen many concerns from buyers about the quality of the EVGA GTX 970 board components as well as noise associated with the ACX 1.0 and 2.0 coolers. Needless to say, I have become very apprehensive.

So, with that being said, does anyone have any feedback on the Zotac GTX 970 (non-OC version)? I really like the look of the card and have read good things about Zotac customer service, despite their being a smaller company. Hoping to get input on overclockability, temps and noise.

Thanks!
 
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I just gave it a quick try. I could up the base clock (1076MHz) with afterburner by 200MHz and memory clock by 100MHz without issues. Seems afterburner ups the boostfrequency coupled with the base clock as there's no separate setting for it.

The unigine valley result was 2400 in extreme HD:
http://dl.eve-files.com/media/corp/TherconJair/UnigineValley200MHz.jpg

CPU clock was stock i7-2600k, no overclocking save the card.

Clock speed hovered mostly at around 1380MHz, temperature with automatic fan control never exceeded 84 degrees celsius.

I tried to go a bit further, but the card didn't like it. Whenever core clock spiked past "1400 and something"MHz the card locked up and the drivers reset.

It seems their bundled firestorm program...
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mcknigk. I also jumped from eVGA to Zotac coz of very same reasons and I also felt a bit cheated as eVGA promised 5 years warranty and a free backplate. They decided to remove that promotion.

For Zotac I follow some threads that might be useful to you too:
1. http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/answers/id-2311031/evga-zotac-gtx-970-reference.html
2. http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/answers/id-2309468/zotac-970-plain-jane-buy-good-refernce-card.html
3. some decent OC with it: http://www.overclock.net/t/1514089/zotac-970

Btw I also found out that Zotac is a sister firm of the Sapphire (AMD). It is owned by the same group PC Partner Ltd. Zotac offers also 5 years warranty which is a plus and they have a very responsive customer support as I read.
I think it is a no brainer.
 
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I just gave it a quick try. I could up the base clock (1076MHz) with afterburner by 200MHz and memory clock by 100MHz without issues. Seems afterburner ups the boostfrequency coupled with the base clock as there's no separate setting for it.

The unigine valley result was 2400 in extreme HD:
http://dl.eve-files.com/media/corp/TherconJair/UnigineValley200MHz.jpg

CPU clock was stock i7-2600k, no overclocking save the card.

Clock speed hovered mostly at around 1380MHz, temperature with automatic fan control never exceeded 84 degrees celsius.

I tried to go a bit further, but the card didn't like it. Whenever core clock spiked past "1400 and something"MHz the card locked up and the drivers reset.

It seems their bundled firestorm program has built in safeties, boost clock never exceeded 1215MHz while trying to overclock with that.

EDIT: I'm a fool, firestorm just needs to run as admin, it doesn't give these rights itself like afterburner does. According to it, upping clock by 200MHz pushes boost to 1415. With these settings, card went up to 1427. If it stayed for longer there it became a bit unstable. Seems for mine 1400MHz is the limit.
 
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Hiya, I think it is very decent OC. Are you able to describe how loud were the fans at these settings? Second thing, are you able to tweek also voltage on this card? On overclock.net I saw a report that somebody went above 1500 on core and 8000 on mem what is almost un-believeble. best, d.
 
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Surprisingly quiet. Fans went never above 70%, I don't have an expensive insulated case, and the fans of the cards were not much louder than the case fans. Granted, I'm coming from an ASUS Radeon HD6950, the old revision 1 card with the double bios that you could run as HD6970, and required a bit higher fan revs.

No, only power draw, voltage seems to be auto-adjusted.
 
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Got it to +220MHz, locks up and resets driver after that.

You can actually do all of this in Firestorm, too. I just really didn't overclock all that much yet, so am learning new things while doing it. 😉

What is, probably an interesting find:

106% is the max power you can get with these tools. BUT: Firestorm has 3 presets. You can go advanced, which opens a window with sliders. You can then click on the quick presets with the slider window staying opnen.

Load the 3D+ preset as it has 110% power draw. You can then unlink powerdraw and temp limit, and proceed to set all the other items. For as long as you don't touch power draw it won't reset sub 106%.

Haven't tried with that, but I think my card won't go past 250, if I manage to get it past 220MHz at all. Might try on Sunday again.
 
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Thank you for all of the links, definus, they are very helpful.

I went ahead and pulled the trigger on the Zotac 970, I'll report back with my own results as soon as I have them!
 
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so how was the testing the Zotac GTX 970 went so far?e
 
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Posted this on an overclock.net thread today:

So, received my Zotac 970 yesterday.

Love the look of the card, and the performance is outstanding (900 series in general). Have not had the time to overclock it yet, but will do so this weekend and report back.

Only issue is what I believe is quite bad coil whine - first experience with it, based on what I've read and heard, seems like a bad case. More a clicking/buzzing than than a whine. Not going to blame Zotac for this, seems to be a systemic issue with the 970's across the board (no pun intended)

Turned on Vsync and capped frames at 60, may have improved it a bit. I then did some light gaming and ran Unigine Heaven on the Extreme preset for a couple hours in hopes that it would "break-in" the card.

Seemed to work! To some extent - this morning the clicking/buzzing was quieter - really hoping that after a week or a few weeks it will go away completely or at least be unnoticeable. Suppose I could RMA if it doesn't improve.

Would like to run two of these in SLI eventually, but in an mATX case, so cards would be side-by-side, wondering if one will choke out the other...suppose I could blast my fans and drown out the coil whine then 😛
 
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Just got this card in yesterday. It's a pretty fast card considering I'm using it for 4k gaming. Haven't tried many games out yet but it can handle high to ultra settings on games like borderlands 2 and bf4. A second card would be nice for future games. I was able to oc the card on stock voltage to 1560 Mhz core and 8.2 Gb/s mem. Ran many tests and everything is stable. This card is quiet and powerful. I definitely recommend it. It beat my friends oc gigabyte gaming 1 970.
 
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I clearly lost the silicone lottery seeing as I could only increase the memory clock by 62 Mhz and the core clock by 150 Mhz. I'm not complaining though, I did get a 10 to 20 fps gain in just about every game I tested.
 
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I'm running two Zotac GTX 970 in SLI, both running stable without getting too hot. Using firestorm and GPU-Z i'm clocking my cards at 1440Mhz Boost clock and 1950Mhz Memory clock. Remember to boost your voltage to stabilize your cards. Mine are at +38mv at the moment. Power-percentage is at 106%.
Change your temp limit to 91 and fans to 90+ (to be sure at the beginning).

Start out trying to get your card at 1400 / 1900 with +36mv and see how that works!
 
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Hey Everyone .First my rig,
Gigabyte UD-4 X99
Intel i7 5820K (OC'd to 4.5GHZ)
24GB DDR4 (Crucial Ballistix 2666 OC)
GTX 970(Reference)

Pardon My ignorance, but i was sort of wondering if someone could explain to me , what the point of overclocking this card, or any card above it - is. I guess im asking because , i just bought an Nvidia GTX 970 reference yestderday(after returning the GTX 770 i bought the day before over the ridiculous power draw)- I have taken it for a spin on every major , graphically demanding game i own(Shadow of Mordor, Fary cry 4, crysis 3, Watch Dogs, Ryse Son of Rome, COD-AWF) and have gotten amazing Frame rates without overclocking. On Far cry 4 on the "Nvidia" max setting im getting between 70 and 80 fps. On Games like Ryse and COD-AWF, admittedly , as long as super sampling isnt maxed out, even higher frame rates (COD-AWF, MAX settings minus Super sampling 103 Frames and 50-60 Frames with 1.5 super sampling). Now is it the next gen rig format thats getting me these frame rates (as my build is little over kill for gaming)- or are we just over clocking these cards only to get things like 2x2 super sampling? If i should be over clocking id sure like to become more familiar with the proper way (I got about 1550 MHZ out of my card using afterburner , saw about a 10 frame jump in COD , but then ran RYSE and couldnt break 1250, weird). Id love some feedback! Cheers

"I am on the verge of purchasing my first Nvidia GPU, GTX 970. I had originally planned to purchase an EVGA model due to their reputation. I have seen many concerns from buyers about the quality of the EVGA GTX 970 board components as well as noise associated with the ACX 1.0 and 2.0 coolers. Needless to say, I have become very apprehensive.

So, with that being said, does anyone have any feedback on the Zotac GTX 970 (non-OC version)? I really like the look of the card and have read good things about Zotac customer service, despite their being a smaller company. Hoping to get input on overclockability, temps and noise."

Thanks![/quotemsg]

 
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I can't speak highly enough about this card. Unlike some others, I've been lucky on the coil whine issue. Card is quiet and performs well. I understand that many people are playing the latest and hottest games on the market, but I bought this card so my frame rates in WoW were better (stop laughing). With the return of 40man raids, the amount of graphics power required brought my old video card to it's knees and to be honest, strain the 970. At the height of action I can see frame rates drop below 10fps. So, I purchased a second 970 to run in SLI to help when crunch time occurs. I can see why overclocking is on the minds of most people using this card and I plan to moderately overclock these cards once I get SLI setup.

I've run into a bit of a snafu though, due to my limited knowledge and experience. On the top edge of these cards are what appears to be two SLI connections. The Zotac 970 doesn't come with an SLI bridge adapter so I had to purchase one. Before I add the second card, which bridge connection do I use? Or, do I have to buy a second bridge adapter and use two?
 
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Not saying your mistaken, but thats very hard to beleive. I owned a 2006 HP core 2 duo with 4 gb of ram and a Zotac Nvidia GT740 LP (2gb DDR3 version) and used to play WOW on High graphics during 25 man and didnt see much trouble. I doubt you would need to SLI 2 970's to avoid low Frame rates in WOW.




 
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Huh, i see alot of people really happy with overclocking this thing, some people get it to 1400mhz+ at decent temperatures, (under 80c). Well... i bought the 970 strix and i am currently oc'ed to 1460mhz boost clock and im running at max 70c, (usually 60c in most games.) 50c idle with fan off.

I don't know why you would go for this card other then looks when other cheaper cards perform better...
 
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This is a bit late, but I want to chime in that Firestorm currently has my Zotac 970 at 110% power running Unigine Valley, stable, with 220 MHz added to the Core Clock, which makes my Boost Clock currently at 1435, though GPU-Z shows it bounces around a bit. Thus far I've added 120 MHz to the Memory Clock as well. Clocked a 60.1 average FPS on Extreme HD, fan temp is a stable 79C and fan speed is about 51%. I had it up about 30 more MHz higher on both clocks running very well for a long time, but I finally hit a fault and my GPU driver stopped working and then recovered.
 
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