Nvidia GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB Review

[gaborbarla]

I don't understand why would anyone think about upgrading to 4k from 144Hz 1440p monitors until the 4k 120-144hz monitors will surface. The 980Ti is actually great for 1440p 144Hz gaming which to me is much more important than a higher resolution at a lower Hz. Am I alone on this?

 

[Eggz]

@JackNaylorPE - That time line of discrete GPU market-share is amazing! Where did you get it?

 

[JackNaylorPE]

I don't think I am the one with the fanboy glasses. Tom screwed it and since The Witcher 3 is now a new benchemark to achieve I am questioning the input on it at all. Right now AMD CF is beating Nvidia SLI with the proper patch. The number povided in the becnh clearly demonstrate that CF is not activated.

For comparison purposes

@JackNaylorPE - That time line of discrete GPU market-share is amazing! Where did you get it?

https://forum.beyond3d.com/threads/nvidia-shows-signs-of-strain.43294/page-161

I don't understand why would anyone think about upgrading to 4k from 144Hz 1440p monitors until the 4k 120-144hz monitors will surface. The 980Ti is actually great for 1440p 144Hz gaming which to me is much more important than a higher resolution at a lower Hz. Am I alone on this?

No, you're not alone

1. Display port can't handle 144 hz at 2160p until the new DP spec compliant stuff hits the streets.

2. We have seen that with G-Sync, 144 Hz and ULMB technology, IPS can now compete with TN with regard to lag and ghosting....and methinks that is currently where enthusiasts will set their baseline.

3. I was thinking that we wouldn't see 60 fps at 4k Until 2016 but the 980 Ti in SLI should hit 72 fps or better overclocked in SLI. However, without 144 Hz, I'm not interested.

 

[Vlad Rose]

@JackNaylorPE - By chance, what title is that the benchmark for before the witcher 3 one?

 

[JackNaylorPE]

Not sure what ya mean, the one above came from Guru3D....the one in the previous post was from Techpowerup....summary of like 17 games

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/MSI/GTX_970_Gaming/27.html

 

[maxalge]

Your Witcher 3 bench are off. You didn't install the right 15.5 patch and used the leaked one.

My Crossfire setup with two 290x is averaging at 45FPS. with AA and Hair deactivated at 2160p. Of course, if you activate HairScam, then of course the AMD card crumble...

The worst is that it is not even good looking.

You must not research before settling on settings.

Easy to tweak it for minimal fps loss. Google it.

 

[Vlad Rose]

Not sure what ya mean, the one above came from Guru3D....the one in the previous post was from Techpowerup....summary of like 17 games

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/MSI/GTX_970_Gaming/27.html

K, just wondering since I know some titles run crippled on AMD hardware and vice versa on Nvidia hardware. The list they used looks pretty legit and equal though.

 

[teamhead]

Why are there no benchmarks for GTX 780 or GTX 680? I upgrade every couple years and have a GTX 680. Maybe real people would be interested in comparing cards they would be realistically upgrading from. Of course I could be wrong and and everyone besides me already has a GTX 980 and is looking to upgrade again.

 

[MonsterCookie]

I feel your pain. USA isn't the answer though; Michigan at least where I live. 2 degrees, EE and CS, stuck as a contract engineer for an automotive company with my college loans taking out enough to were my take home pay is just above minimum wage. What is really sad is that my wife is Chinese and I'm actually considering moving there just to find a better job because there just isn't one here.

Actually I am even grateful to the Flying Monster Cookie that in this messed up economy I got a job at all which can pay my bills. Since here in Europe the universities are very cheap, state supported, I accumulated only around 30kEuro depth as a student.

Imagine those poor basterds, who are down in the hole with 80-100k$ after a university degree, with which they cannot get a job. Nowadays you cannot even default on your student loan, it follows you till the end.

Regarding the "sad" thing to move to China, I am not surprised at all about it. I work in a quite multicultural place, and my Chinese/Taiwanese colleagues do not want to stay in EU, because they say it sucks. Sometimes even EU people actually move to India (mostly Bangalore), because they say life is better
there, and job opportunities are better too.

This is why I do not get it why some people are throwing money around here like in the rap-videos. I MUST do something wrong for sure, and I have to figure out what very soon...

 

[stoned_ritual]

I was an early adopter of the vanilla 780 as it came out right when I got my tax return (thanks obama!) And the maxwell offerings haven't really been tickling my wallet. This 980 ti card looks like a winner, but I'm unsure if I buy this I am worried will nvidia release another card at a better price/performance ratio in 3 months like they did to me with the 780? The 780 still performs great on current titles, but even at 1080p games like GTA V and Shadow of Mordor really make this thing work hard.

 

[10tacle]

"not all people live in USA and have good salaries. People in Romania Graduated from uni for example earn around 500 euro per month only. and is ALL spent on living and eating and clothes and rent , at the end of the month nothing remains. in places like India or Ukraine or Africa or Asia is even lower. and those work 10 times harder than any one in USA ...but live in a Poor country."

MISTER ARABIAN KNIGHT:

And this is Nvidia's problem HOW? Why should Nvidia adjust the cost of their GPUs so someone in Zimbabwe can afford one? They ARE a company that has to MAKE MONEY! They have to PAY EMPLOYEES and BILLS and TAXES! They also have to spend on RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT to advance technologies. THAT STUFF AIN'T FREE PAL!!!!!!!

And as an American, I AM GREATLY OFFENDED by your LIE that people in other nations work TEN TIMES HARDER that we Americans. The last time I checked, people in France or Spain can take a TWO HOUR LUNCH in the middle of the day. The legal full-time workweek in France is 35 hours and it is a LAW that nobody work longer than 10 hours in a day, or 4.5 hours straight without a mandatory break! I've worked 11 hours STRAIGHT one time and 72 hours in a week! WE do not have that LUXURY!

And I get so SICK AND TIRED of listening to Millennials whining about the costs of things if they can't afford them. Last time I checked, America has an immigration waiting list into the MILLIONS for people looking for a better life. If you have a poor quality life where you came from, MOVE. I left the state I was from in the US for a state that had better job opportunities. Seeketh...and ye shall findeth. Don't expecteth it to be handeth into your lapeth. If you can't afford high end gaming costs and choose to do nothing about it like BETTER yourself and your conditions for earning potential in life and instead just sit back and wet yourself and WHINE, then TOO BAD!!!!!!!!!!!! Go buy a gaming console and SHUT UP!!!!!!!!!

Good luck getting this kind of technology under a COMMUNIST DICTATORSHIP where everyone receives the SAME AMOUNT OF MONEY and the GOVERNMENT decides how much companies can earn.

/rant mode off >:-(

 

[youcanDUit]

not really sure what i think yet, considering all the bs surrounding the chopped 970. it wasn't a tech website but 1 individual who noticed the 970's misleading specs. i'll just leave this here.

https://www.reddit.com/r/nvidia/comments/380xy4/gtx_980_tis_pixel_fill_rate_is_showing_similar/

 

[stoned_ritual]

I feel your pain. USA isn't the answer though; Michigan at least where I live. 2 degrees, EE and CS, stuck as a contract engineer for an automotive company with my college loans taking out enough to were my take home pay is just above minimum wage. What is really sad is that my wife is Chinese and I'm actually considering moving there just to find a better job because there just isn't one here.

Actually I am even grateful to the Flying Monster Cookie that in this messed up economy I got a job at all which can pay my bills. Since here in Europe the universities are very cheap, state supported, I accumulated only around 30kEuro depth as a student.

Imagine those poor basterds, who are down in the hole with 80-100k$ after a university degree, with which they cannot get a job. Nowadays you cannot even default on your student loan, it follows you till the end.

Regarding the "sad" thing to move to China, I am not surprised at all about it. I work in a quite multicultural place, and my Chinese/Taiwanese colleagues do not want to stay in EU, because they say it sucks. Sometimes even EU people actually move to India (mostly Bangalore), because they say life is better
there, and job opportunities are better too.

This is why I do not get it why some people are throwing money around here like in the rap-videos. I MUST do something wrong for sure, and I have to figure out what very soon...

The answer is debt. Credit cards. Living beyond your means is the REAL american dream.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

not really sure what i think yet, considering all the bs surrounding the chopped 970. it wasn't a tech website but 1 individual who noticed the 970's misleading specs. i'll just leave this here.

https://www.reddit.com/r/nvidia/comments/380xy4/gtx_980_tis_pixel_fill_rate_is_showing_similar/

Shakespeare said it best "Much Ado About Nothing"

http://www.guru3d.com/news-story/middle-earth-shadow-of-mordor-geforce-gtx-970-vram-stress-test.html

 

[sephirotic]

Where is the 970 on the benchmarks?! And most importantly, where is a 970 SLI benchmark?!
For a budget perspective both this card and this review seems kinda pointless. 650 USD is far too much money to burn on a card that can´t do fluidly 4k and is overkill for 1440p. Of course you could use DSR and an extra notch of AA, but that seems a waste of money for a majority of people that prefer to spend their money more reasonable. Speaking of reasonably, a 970 SLi configuration at roughly 5% more money would give you about 20~30% more performance for optimized games and would be the actual minimum configuration you will need for playing at 4k.
The only point of this card would have been if the VR hype were already launched and consolidated in the market, since we expect 1440p@90fps displays for such setups, but then again, the mature drivers of the GTX 970 SLi would be a better value, specially for us that already have one GTX 970. But then again, this scenario is still 6 months away and we still have the AMD flagship to launch and disrupt the prices by then. MEanwhile what we really need is a proper full scale updated benchmarks of 970 SLI to see how many games actually benefit of this configuration as well if the stutter and minnimun FPS are worth the extra 330 USD. My guss is that yes, they were.

I'm particualrly very discontent with the big hardware-makers princing policy lately. The Titan price was already ridiculous at launch and seems now completely pointless. I don´t get what hardware companies are thinking with their overpricing of flagship products, and I also don´t get the point of people that actually throwing their money away on such bad valued products. Well, you could always brag that "you have the money and you want the best, even if it IS steal" but that is a bad practice that result of abuse and inflation of the market itself.

 

[sephirotic]

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

i personally find 4k at sub 48 inch stupid... but than again, i had 800x600 monitors at 15 inches and played some games at 640x480 on 17 inch screens, i also played ps1 games, so once hd came around and was single gpu at 1080p i had no issues whatsoever with jaggies any more.

im not paying 500+$ for AA
im also not sacrificing that much processing power for AA
hell im 1920x1200 at 24 inch... i dont use aa.

granted, a monitor could last you 5+ years if you get a good one so you can see it as an investment, and a gpu, im learning more and more if you sell your high end gpu the moment a new high end gpu comes out, you can get a sizeable upgrade every year for under 100$ and you over all come out ahead.

sorry im tired as hell, i just realized i dont know which way to meant your comment to be taken.

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

If you don't have $1000 of discretionary income each year, you need a better job. Better question would be, what adult doesn't have $1000 for a graphics card and a monitor?

If you put it that way it is a fair point.

no it is not and he is a very rude person.

not all people live in USA and have good salaries.

People in Romania Graduated from uni for example earn around 500 euro per month only. and is ALL spent on living and eating and clothes and rent , at the end of the month nothing remains.

in places like India or Ukraine or Africa or Asia is even lower.

and those work 10 times harder than any one in USA ... but live in a Poor country.

you are selfish and rude people. very rude !

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

If you don't have $1000 of discretionary income each year, you need a better job. Better question would be, what adult doesn't have $1000 for a graphics card and a monitor?

If you put it that way it is a fair point.

no it is not and he is a very rude person.

not all people live in USA and have good salaries.

People in Romania Graduated from uni for example earn around 500 euro per month only. and is ALL spent on living and eating and clothes and rent , at the end of the month nothing remains.

in places like India or Ukraine or Africa or Asia is even lower.

and those work 10 times harder than any one in USA ... but live in a Poor country.

you are selfish and rude people. very rude !

Don´t forget the 600 million people of latin america. Even in richer countries like Brasil, Uruguay and Chile, income is considerably low and importation taxes are ridiculous high, reaching as much as 80%, not to mention the dollar exchange rate: Imagine paying 1300 USD for a GTX 980 while earning 1/3 of the average north-american. That is Like effectively paying 3900 USD for a GTX 980. This is what they are "worth" for us. These are prohibitive cards with horrid value compared to mainstrean cards with better performance x cost such as the R9 290 or the GTX 970.

 

[redgarl]

Your Witcher 3 bench are off. You didn't install the right 15.5 patch and used the leaked one.

My Crossfire setup with two 290x is averaging at 45FPS. with AA and Hair deactivated at 2160p. Of course, if you activate HairScam, then of course the AMD card crumble...

The worst is that it is not even good looking.

The drivers came straight from AMD, and HairWorks was deactivated for the testing. AA, however, was used, which AMD's release notes clearly mention affect performance. AMD was notified prior to today's story, and we're waiting on comment as to the technical explanation for its performance.

Who the hell use AA at 4k...? That should be removed from your future 4k benchmarks.

A 980 GTX with Ultra setting, AA and Hair removed run at the same FPS than a 290x. Anomalities are not only on AMD side here... I am really thinking you should redo the whole Witcher 3 benchmark. It is far from accurate, it is honestly misleading.

I believe your drivers were wrongly installed since your 295x is running worst then your 290x. You see 70-80% difference when CF is enabled. I know there was 2 sets of drivers circulating as 15.5. One of them was leaked and missing the CF profile of the game. The real ones had only been released on the 31 of May.

 

[sephirotic]

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

i personally find 4k at sub 48 inch stupid... but than again, i had 800x600 monitors at 15 inches and played some games at 640x480 on 17 inch screens, i also played ps1 games, so once hd came around and was single gpu at 1080p i had no issues whatsoever with jaggies any more.

im not paying 500+$ for AA
im also not sacrificing that much processing power for AA
hell im 1920x1200 at 24 inch... i dont use aa.

granted, a monitor could last you 5+ years if you get a good one so you can see it as an investment, and a gpu, im learning more and more if you sell your high end gpu the moment a new high end gpu comes out, you can get a sizeable upgrade every year for under 100$ and you over all come out ahead.

sorry im tired as hell, i just realized i dont know which way to meant your comment to be taken.

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

If you don't have $1000 of discretionary income each year, you need a better job. Better question would be, what adult doesn't have $1000 for a graphics card and a monitor?

If you put it that way it is a fair point.

no it is not and he is a very rude person.

not all people live in USA and have good salaries.

People in Romania Graduated from uni for example earn around 500 euro per month only. and is ALL spent on living and eating and clothes and rent , at the end of the month nothing remains.

in places like India or Ukraine or Africa or Asia is even lower.

and those work 10 times harder than any one in USA ... but live in a Poor country.

you are selfish and rude people. very rude !

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

If you don't have $1000 of discretionary income each year, you need a better job. Better question would be, what adult doesn't have $1000 for a graphics card and a monitor?

If you put it that way it is a fair point.

no it is not and he is a very rude person.

not all people live in USA and have good salaries.

People in Romania Graduated from uni for example earn around 500 euro per month only. and is ALL spent on living and eating and clothes and rent , at the end of the month nothing remains.

in places like India or Ukraine or Africa or Asia is even lower.

and those work 10 times harder than any one in USA ... but live in a Poor country.

you are selfish and rude people. very rude !

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

How important is gaming to you if you spend $500 on GPU and $500 on a monitor?

I guess i am the only one paying for rent out there.

If you don't have $1000 of discretionary income each year, you need a better job. Better question would be, what adult doesn't have $1000 for a graphics card and a monitor?

If you put it that way it is a fair point.

no it is not and he is a very rude person.

not all people live in USA and have good salaries.

People in Romania Graduated from uni for example earn around 500 euro per month only. and is ALL spent on living and eating and clothes and rent , at the end of the month nothing remains.

in places like India or Ukraine or Africa or Asia is even lower.

and those work 10 times harder than any one in USA ... but live in a Poor country.

you are selfish and rude people. very rude !

Don´t forget the 600 million people of latin america. Even in richer countries like Brasil, Uruguay and Chile, income is considerably low and importation taxes are ridiculous high, reaching as much as 80%, not to mention the dollar exchange rate: Imagine paying 1300 USD for a GTX 980 while earning 1/3 of the average north-american. That is Like effectively paying 3900 USD for a GTX 980. This is what they are "worth" for us. These are prohibitive cards with horrid value compared to mainstrean cards with better performance x cost such as the R9 290 or the GTX 970.

PS: Damn non-standard quote system and comments without edition option!

 

[redgarl]

I personally Play at 1080p (i use a tv) with a Panasonic plasma.
I like that FAR better than 4K LCD/LED TVs (No I did not make a direct comparison, but even in the store I can see how unrealistic the colors actually are).

I do have to say burn is is an issue a bit, but apart from that, The color fidelity flat out beats resolution/AA.

Ive never bought the high end gpus due to diminishing returns. It just does not make sense mathematically, and math does not lie.

Input lag, shitty pixel density and response time are reasons why people don't many play games on televisions.

Comparing televisions with in-store calibrations is often a waste of time, they are not usually set up optimally.

I get where you are headed with your maths line of thought, but it's flawed logic. By that reasoning we should all game on a Radeon HD 6970, as it offers a far better benchmark/$ return than any of the top-end current generation cards. It also has only about 30% of the performance.

If you play modern titles and want all they eye candy, than you need to fork out the extra dollars.

If you're like me (and also you it sounds like) and you can live with turning some of your settings down to get playable frame rates, why not save yourself a few hundred dollars.

There is nothing nonsensical about buying high end GPU's, it's all relative to your standards.

Most TVs are like that i agree but there are some TVs that are much better. I play on a plasma too, and credit to Panasonic, they made some great models for gaming. I've been gaming for over a decade and used crt/tn screens in the past and with certain Panasonic models there's no difference in response - mouse movement in FPS games is spot on. I've used an LCD TV once and the input lag (With game mode on and other effects off) was like lagging in water. Not that all LCD TVs are like that, just saying i've experienced input lag and fast monitors to know a difference and im very impressed by how these plasmas perform.

The picture quality is very decent too on these teles @1080p and upwards of 65". Its a shame LCD took over because Plasma was really underestimated and could have improved more if the market was there.

I agree, I am having a 58AX800 as my 4k monitor with Displayport 1.2... best damn tv/monitor you can afford. It is a shame Displayport has been removed from Panasonic 4k TVs. I bought mine for that sole feature and end up having an awesome gaming panel. The latency is awesome even at 4k. Playing Street Fighter 4 is a charm.

 

[redgarl]

I kind of don't understand the stigma against 4K at lower screen sizes. It kind of makes having a 4K monitor pointless then because ergonomically speaking, anything above 32 inches isn't very good for most desk usage. I'd rather not have to move my head around to see something.

Or maybe I should ask, what's with the stigma against 96 PPI based monitor usage? We praise high density displays and how they look on our phones, but apparently this isn't allowed on desktop computers.

You see the difference at 2 inches from your face quite easily. Right now, you can only clearly see the difference with video games.

 

[steve4king]

And still no dp1.3?

 

[redgarl]

I don't think I am the one with the fanboy glasses. Tom screwed it and since The Witcher 3 is now a new benchemark to achieve I am questioning the input on it at all. Right now AMD CF is beating Nvidia SLI with the proper patch. The number povided in the becnh clearly demonstrate that CF is not activated.

For comparison purposes

I am tired of explaining myself over... leaked drivers and such. By the way, CF is not activated in the bench since the 295x is running at the same speed as the 290x. An image worth a thousand words they say!

Ultra setting AA and HairScam not enabled. Image has to be converted from BMP to JPEG since the original screenshot is 23MB. 50FPS!... but mostly averaging around 44-45FPS.

290x and 980 GTX, same performance AA and Hair removed.

 

[10tacle]

Where is the 970 on the benchmarks?! And most importantly, where is a 970 SLI benchmark?!

EVGA GTX 970 SSC 2.0+ SLI owner here....there are a host of benchmarks out there comparing 970 SLI to a Titan X. Here's a snapshot from one example:

http://img.hexus.net/v2/graphics_cards/nvidia/evga/GTX970SSC/SLI/11.png

 

[tomc100]

Since I have only a 1080p monitor I don't need this unless I play on multiple monitors which I don't. AMD needs to get their act together. They are basically letting their competition take all of their market share by leaving a giant vacuum with nothing to compete against the GTX 900 series. Also, they have been absent with driver support and encouraging more game developers to use mantle which shouldn't be a big deal since the PS4 and Xbone both use GCN gpu. AMD has run ATI into the ground.

 

[ak47jar3d]

And still no dp1.3?

The 980ti can't max out demanding games at uhd. The display port 1.2 is enough for a card that calibar.