Which GTX 970 Should I buy with my PC Specs?

[Berzerka]

I bought a pre-made computer which I completely regret now however I plan to slowly upgrade it and make it custom. I was looking at new graphics cards and thought a 970 would be good, but I'm not sure which one (kind of a n00b). If there's any other upgrades you think I should make leave those too!

My PC Specs:

Desktop - M51AD
Intel® Core™ i7-4785T 3.2 GHz
NVIDIA GTX 750
2TB Serial ATA hard drive (7200 rpm)
12GB DDR3 RAM

Monitor - ASUS - 23.6" LED HD Monitor - VN247HP x2
1920 x 1080 resolution
1 ms response time
60Hz refresh rate

 

[Jomari Gonzales]

Asus Strix GTX 970 to match the branding of your pc. Or you could go with either MSI Twinfrozr or Gigabyte G1 gaming

 

[hamzahfelix]

I would check if the psu 12v rail is enough to run a 970 first. A quality 500w psu should be more than enough to run the system.

As mentioned above by Jomari Gonzales, those are the 3 most popular variant of the 970 and you really can't go wrong with those 3. Performance wise they are very similar. Overall the g1 come out on top, msi coming at 2nd and the strix at 3rd. Go for whichever one fits your budget or preferences.

 

[Zeriu]

You say you are a "noob" when it comes to something like this. When it comes down to which GTX 970 you want to purchase. More often then not which brand you want to buy just comes down to general preference of which one you like buying. Some people like ASUS, others like Gigabyte, I myself actually only buy EVGA cards. Everyone likes a different brand. Honestly they are all generally the same.

If you want though some come pre clocked faster then other. In other words they try to squeeze more power into the card at the cost of a premium. For EVGA those will be listed under Super Clocked, FTW, FTW+ etc...

 

[nb7760]

Gigabyte has great cooling and performance.

MSI has decent cooling, great applications (Afterburner, MSI Fan Control, Gaming App), easy to use, and looks nice.

Asus Strix, well it looks like an owl so I guess if you're a birdwatcher...

EVGA is also pretty good I hear, but I'm not too sure why.

Get Gigabyte or MSI if you can, but don't pay too much of a premium for either of these brands. The difference between the performance of the best and worst brands of a video card is only about 5%. The standard price of a GTX 970 is 350 USD.

 

[Th3R3ALaSSaSSin4]

Go for MSI Edition,because it has more advantages:

Gigabyte
+ coolest on full load, has backplate, OC the best, has LED logo if you fancy stuff like that
- the longest of them all, bit more noisier, no fan-stop technology, more expensive than other 2, rumours about seaizing fans on previous windforce coolers, ugly (subjective opinion

ASUS
+ backplate, fan-stop technology, nice look, quiet, metal shroud around fans
- single 8 pin connector (can be advantage for other, though), worse OC of them all, also the slowest of those 3 in tests, VRMs are exposed and more prone to overheating

MSI
+ TwinFrozr cooler , fan-stop technlolgy, quieter and cooler than ASUS, OC capability (better than ASUS, tad worse than GIG), LED dragon&MSI logo (if somebody fancies that, also you can programme its behaviour from desktop), VRMs are heatsinked, just purely beautiful (subjective , cheapest of them 3
- no backplate, plastic fan shroud (although really it doesnt mean much, heatsink and heatpipes are MUCH better than in previous TF4 so shroud is more like cosmetc feature)

 

[nb7760]

Go for MSI Edition,because it has more advantages:

Gigabyte
+ coolest on full load, has backplate, OC the best, has LED logo if you fancy stuff like that
- the longest of them all, bit more noisier, no fan-stop technology, more expensive than other 2, rumours about seaizing fans on previous windforce coolers, ugly (subjective opinion

ASUS
+ backplate, fan-stop technology, nice look, quiet, metal shroud around fans
- single 8 pin connector (can be advantage for other, though), worse OC of them all, also the slowest of those 3 in tests, VRMs are exposed and more prone to overheating

MSI
+ TwinFrozr cooler , fan-stop technlolgy, quieter and cooler than ASUS, OC capability (better than ASUS, tad worse than GIG), LED dragon&MSI logo (if somebody fancies that, also you can programme its behaviour from desktop), VRMs are heatsinked, just purely beautiful (subjective , cheapest of them 3
- no backplate, plastic fan shroud (although really it doesnt mean much, heatsink and heatpipes are MUCH better than in previous TF4 so shroud is more like cosmetc feature)

Actually the STRIX runs cooler than the MSI, though not by much (around 1ºC less) and has slightly better overclockability. The two are equal in sound level.