Nvidia GeForce GTX 1000 Series (Pascal) MegaThread: FAQ and Resources

[azzazel_99]

I paid $649 usd for my 1080's. So $1300 plus tax for both at microcenter

 

[azzazel_99]

I felt the Asus looked the best overall with its all black and rgb lighting. I will throw up a pic later when I get home. They look great in my machine.

 

[lucas_7_94]

Please if you dont have any troubles! I'm between the EVGA (FTW or SC) and Asus currently.

 

[Math Geek]

sc is a reference pcb and ftw is a very over-engineered pcb. both net the same performance while the ftw has dual bios and a heck of a lot of headroom for oc if one can ever figure out how to unlock any extra. otherwise grab the cheaper one since they perform nearly identical and have the same cooler

 

[lucas_7_94]

sc is a reference pcb and ftw is a very over-engineered pcb. both net the same performance while the ftw has dual bios and a heck of a lot of headroom for oc if one can ever figure out how to unlock any extra. otherwise grab the cheaper one since they perform nearly identical and have the same cooler

Yeah, i'm agreed, but here (Argentina) they almost cost in the same range of money (620 to 650U$D) so currently, i can affort it. I'm not a big fan for overclocking, but i was thinking in the future get some water blocks from EK or similar website to do my own water loop with a future upgrading cpu/mobo.

I'm playing @ 1080p, i know, its a overkill card, but due i have the money (and i don't want to change cards each 2 years) my first shot is the GTX 1070.

 

[Math Geek]

for almost the same price, the ftw card gets the nod from me. why not get that little extra engineering for similar money. and ek already makes a waterblock for the card. did you see the ftw dt card by any chance?? stock clock speeds out of the box but the same pcb as the more expensive ftw brother. same price as the sc card in the US.

then can easily oc it back to ftw speeds for (maybe) less money. just a thought anyway.

 

[TehPenguin]

Pascal is super easy to overclock, though.

Download Afterburner
Core Offset: 100 MHz
Memory Offset: 500MHz
Save

You can go higher and test stability but these should be perfectly safe values that will get you to 2GHz on any pascal card.

 

[lucas_7_94]

for almost the same price, the ftw card gets the nod from me. why not get that little extra engineering for similar money. and ek already makes a waterblock for the card. did you see the ftw dt card by any chance?? stock clock speeds out of the box but the same pcb as the more expensive ftw brother. same price as the sc card in the US.

then can easily oc it back to ftw speeds for (maybe) less money. just a thought anyway.

The only thing i didnt like is the cooler, and i dont know why i think less fans impacts in temperature lol.

About the water blocks, well, currently, due a limits in the imports, i can't affort it. I can only buy 2 items each year from any website outside of Argentina (except if the shipping is Free or a gift product).

So maybe if i start this year buying, i can finish my loop in 4 years lol. Disgusting.

 

[azzazel_99]

Yep since all cards literally oc pretty much exactly the same regardless the extra power phases and power plugs of the FTW,classified etc is useless. The voltage being locked is what's keeping the cards held back and that's done by nvidia so unless they unlock it we aren't getting any higher than 2150'ish

 

[azzazel_99]

I was going to water cool my gpu's but with as cool as the strix card runs I no longer see the point. Plus I like all the pretty lights on the strix card

 

[turkey3_scratch]

I was going to water cool my gpu's but with as cool as the strix card runs I no longer see the point. Plus I like all the pretty lights on the strix card

And watercooling won't always cool things like capacitors as well as air coolers (as a matter of fact, it often won't cool some components at all). IMO I think an air cooled card would last longer than one with water cooling, depending on how much of the VRM is actually part of that cooling. Because, frankly, not every part of the VRM can be cooled; different things like chokes and caps have different heights, it just doesn't happen. It's true that cooling the GPU better would reduce heat spread to other areas of the PCB, but sometimes the opposite is true. If an air cooler works just as well, it'll exhaust air away from the entire PCB better than with watercooling.

 

[Math Geek]

seems to me like the hybrid cards have the right idea. water cools the gpu while the fan cools the rest. but the pascal cards run cool enough that it really is not needed. though i still want to do it anyway just cause i want a custom loop to play with.

 

[turkey3_scratch]

You know, I was going to bring this up the other day, but I forgot, so here it goes. I feel like a lot of people are hypocrites because when the R9 390 came out everybody cried about how nothing needs 8GB VRAM, the 3.5/4GB on the 970 is more than enough, it's just AMD marketing trying to make something seem better when it's not.

But now I see people running around the forums going "3GB might not be enough, get 6Gb for future". Hypocrites!

 

[Deleted member 217926]

You know, I was going to bring this up the other day, but I forgot, so here it goes. I feel like a lot of people are hypocrites because when the R9 390 came out everybody cried about how nothing needs 8GB VRAM, the 3.5/4GB on the 970 is more than enough, it's just AMD marketing trying to make something seem better when it's not.

But now I see people running around the forums going "3GB might not be enough, get 6Gb for future". Hypocrites!

Except the 390 ( which is a 290 with a factory overclock and the extra RAM ) isn't powerful enough to utilize 8GB of VRAM. Veering off topic though.

 

[turkey3_scratch]

You know, I was going to bring this up the other day, but I forgot, so here it goes. I feel like a lot of people are hypocrites because when the R9 390 came out everybody cried about how nothing needs 8GB VRAM, the 3.5/4GB on the 970 is more than enough, it's just AMD marketing trying to make something seem better when it's not.

But now I see people running around the forums going "3GB might not be enough, get 6Gb for future". Hypocrites!

Except the 390 ( which is a 290 with a factory overclock and the extra RAM ) isn't powerful enough to utilize 8GB of VRAM. Veering off topic though.

Well, the 1060 6GB has 50% more VRAM than the 970 (well, or 71% if you consider it 3.5GB) but it is only about 10% more powerful which means one of two things.

1) The 1060 6GB has more VRAM than it needs
2) The GTX 970 has too little VRAM

But if you think this is offtopic (I'm linking it to the Pascal 1060 6GB) I'll move it to the casual thread.

 

[Deleted member 217926]

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2015/06/18/msi_r9_390x_gaming_8g_video_card_review/9#.V9hp0K1SQ6U

The GTX 1060 is more on par with a GTX 980 than a 970. Since there was never an 8GB GTX 970 there are no comparisons but I'd say it would look very much like the 290X/390X test above.

 

[turkey3_scratch]

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2015/06/18/msi_r9_390x_gaming_8g_video_card_review/9#.V9hp0K1SQ6U

The GTX 1060 is more on par with a GTX 980 than a 970. Since there was never an 8GB GTX 970 there are no comparisons but I'd say it would look very much like the 290X/390X test above.

Yep about 10% better than the 970, which is about where the 980 sits. The 980 was always poor value IMO. The same argument can be made for the 980.

1) The GTX 1060 has the same performance as the GTX 980.
2) The GTX 980 has 4GB VRAM and the GTX 1060 has 6GB VRAM.
3) Cards are supposed to have VRAM amounts that are sufficient for their performance levels.
4) Therefore, either the 1060 has too much VRAM, or the 980 has too little VRAM.

IMO the 1060 would have been fine being 4GB. But would that have lowered its prices? Probably not so I'm happy they went with 6GB.

 

[James Mason]

You need more VRAM for higher quality textures in games, ala the Skyrim High Res Texture mod that comes with the game, but is optional.
The higher Vram will allow the cards to hold more higher quality textures as well as run higher resolutions as well.

 

[Eximo]

seems to me like the hybrid cards have the right idea. water cools the gpu while the fan cools the rest. but the pascal cards run cool enough that it really is not needed. though i still want to do it anyway just cause i want a custom loop to play with.

I picked up an XSPC Razor for my EVGA SC. Haven't had a free weekend yet to put my water cooling loop back in.

I've been watching the ACX setup for a while, and it seems to like to keep itself under 75C for some reason, hasn't exceeded it no matter the load. Bounces around above 1900Mhz and peaks at 2012Mhz with no overclocking or changes.

Next step, an overclock attempt before and after water cooling, just to see how it goes. Not really expecting much, but I hope for rock solid max frequency.

 

[Math Geek]

that's what i have noticed from the reviews. the really cool cards (water/hybrid) were smoother at higher speeds and stayed at solid levels while the other cards jumped wildly from high to low and back. so that would be one good use for watercooling. the low temps will allow for it to stay at near max speeds very steadily compared to other less cooled cards. hence, smoother gameplay.

 

[azzazel_99]

This is why i chose the asus strix cards. They meshed so much better with the rest of my system.

 

[RobCrezz]

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2015/06/18/msi_r9_390x_gaming_8g_video_card_review/9#.V9hp0K1SQ6U

The GTX 1060 is more on par with a GTX 980 than a 970. Since there was never an 8GB GTX 970 there are no comparisons but I'd say it would look very much like the 290X/390X test above.

Yep about 10% better than the 970, which is about where the 980 sits. The 980 was always poor value IMO. The same argument can be made for the 980.

1) The GTX 1060 has the same performance as the GTX 980.
2) The GTX 980 has 4GB VRAM and the GTX 1060 has 6GB VRAM.
3) Cards are supposed to have VRAM amounts that are sufficient for their performance levels.
4) Therefore, either the 1060 has too much VRAM, or the 980 has too little VRAM.

IMO the 1060 would have been fine being 4GB. But would that have lowered its prices? Probably not so I'm happy they went with 6GB.

Wouldnt really have been possible to give it 4gb with the same performance, due to them using a 192bit memory bus.

I suspect 3gb was becoming too little, so 6gb was by necessity.

 

[renz496]

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2015/06/18/msi_r9_390x_gaming_8g_video_card_review/9#.V9hp0K1SQ6U

The GTX 1060 is more on par with a GTX 980 than a 970. Since there was never an 8GB GTX 970 there are no comparisons but I'd say it would look very much like the 290X/390X test above.

Yep about 10% better than the 970, which is about where the 980 sits. The 980 was always poor value IMO. The same argument can be made for the 980.

1) The GTX 1060 has the same performance as the GTX 980.
2) The GTX 980 has 4GB VRAM and the GTX 1060 has 6GB VRAM.
3) Cards are supposed to have VRAM amounts that are sufficient for their performance levels.
4) Therefore, either the 1060 has too much VRAM, or the 980 has too little VRAM.

IMO the 1060 would have been fine being 4GB. But would that have lowered its prices? Probably not so I'm happy they went with 6GB.

Wouldnt really have been possible to give it 4gb with the same performance, due to them using a 192bit memory bus.

I suspect 3gb was becoming too little, so 6gb was by necessity.

they can. but that probably going to end up with another lawsuit lol 😛

 

[RobCrezz]

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2015/06/18/msi_r9_390x_gaming_8g_video_card_review/9#.V9hp0K1SQ6U

The GTX 1060 is more on par with a GTX 980 than a 970. Since there was never an 8GB GTX 970 there are no comparisons but I'd say it would look very much like the 290X/390X test above.

Yep about 10% better than the 970, which is about where the 980 sits. The 980 was always poor value IMO. The same argument can be made for the 980.

1) The GTX 1060 has the same performance as the GTX 980.
2) The GTX 980 has 4GB VRAM and the GTX 1060 has 6GB VRAM.
3) Cards are supposed to have VRAM amounts that are sufficient for their performance levels.
4) Therefore, either the 1060 has too much VRAM, or the 980 has too little VRAM.

IMO the 1060 would have been fine being 4GB. But would that have lowered its prices? Probably not so I'm happy they went with 6GB.

Wouldnt really have been possible to give it 4gb with the same performance, due to them using a 192bit memory bus.

I suspect 3gb was becoming too little, so 6gb was by necessity.

they can. but that probably going to end up with another lawsuit lol 😛

:lol:

 

[azzazel_99]

I'm very impressed with how fast and powerful these cards are compared to my 780ti's. Lol messing around on bf4 running at 3440x1440 with 150% resolution scale and only using 30% of the gpu power. I played last night for about 4 hours with the wife in bf4 and the fans on the gpu's finally came on after about 1 hour of gaming. Can't wait for bf1