Asus STRIX GTX 970 vs. MSI GTX 970 Gaming Golden

[aw1983]

Hi all,

I'm looking forward to buy a GTX 970 card. Problem is I cannot decide which one. Here are some things to consider:

- Not for heavy gaming, at least not for 2560 and beyond. I'm still using the good old 1920x1080.

- Games including but not limited to: heavily modded Skyrim, Dragon Age series including Inquisition, The Witcher series and possibly other third-person or RPG games. Playing racing games for hobby and fun and FPS occasionally but not often due to motion sickness.

- Doing heavy rendering with V-Ray.

- Doing photography and dealing with large resolution images regularly.

- Heat/temp is important. Not using a LCS.

- Power consumption is important. PSU is not a problem, but the less the gpu consumes power the better.

- Backplate. Had a nasty experience involving exposed back side of PCB and a screwdriver. Just for protection, not anything else.

If any of you have suggestion about anything (brand, model, etc) please feel free to tell me. I need to hear from the GTX 970 users, if any, but everyone can contribute. Please share your experience(s) using a GTX 970. Thanks for everything.

 

[RCoon]

They both perform near identically, the MSI is cheaper but doesn't come with a backplate. Depends entirely on how much price/backplate matters to you, because there is no difference besides those and the aesthetics. My card boosts to 1500mhz without me touching it, I imagine the Asus does too.

I'd say it all comes down to price and how clumsy with screwdrivers you are.

EDIT: Just realised you're talking about the Golden MSI card (which does have a backplate), in which case there is zero difference between the two besides price.

 

[aw1983]

Thank you. I'm not clumsy with scredrivers but I once took apart my PC parts for cleaning and when I pulled a box from the shelves near my PC desk I accidentally knocked over a screwdriver near the box which then dropped onto the back side of my GPU on the desk and scratched it. The card ran and performed normally but it scared the hell out of me.

How about this coil whine the GTX 970 card make? Is there anything I should be worried about?

 

[RCoon]

How about this coil whine the GTX 970 card make? Is there anything I should be worried about?

It's random, and a total lottery. Some get it, some don't. I went through 3 780's, only one had coil whine, and my current 970 has not even a peep of it. That being said, whichever card you buy could have it. You just gotta pray to RNGesus.

 

[silapakorn]

Gigabyte G1 Gaming looks more promising than those two.

 

[aw1983]

It's random, and a total lottery. Some get it, some don't. I went through 3 780's, only one had coil whine, and my current 970 has not even a peep of it. That being said, whichever card you buy could have it. You just gotta pray to RNGesus.

RNGesus?
Anyway what I was asking was the risk. My old cards never had coil whine so I have no idea if it's going to harmful or just a mere distraction due to high pitched noise (I'm very sensitive to sound by the way). I think people shouldn't worry about coil whine unless it damages the card over time, right? Unless in case of damaged card making coil whine. But how severe or harmful is this GTX 970 coil whine can be?

Gigabyte G1 Gaming looks more promising than those two.

Unfortunately Gigabyte is nowhere to be found near my area, at least for now. Perhaps out of stock, currently not available for unknown reason or the store's waiting for the next shipment. But thanks for the suggestion. I keep that in mind if I find a Gigabyte GTX 970 card.

 

[RCoon]

going to harmful or just a mere distraction

Coil whine is an irritation, nothing harmful at all.

 

[64K]

If those were my only choices then I guess I would take the Asus Strix. Where I live the MSI Golden is $50 more than the Strix. If you like the way the Golden looks enough to pay the extra money then it's worth it to you but the performance isn't very much different from the Strix. I chose the MSI GTX 970 Gaming (not Golden) and I am very happy with my purchase. Great card and no coil whine.

 

[Jborg]

I personally chose the Gigabyte GTX 970 G1 Gaming. I am a fan of the windforce cooler, and also the looks of this card.

It performs great, no coil whine at all. (I thought I might of had some coil whine, but it was my LIGHT BULB in my bedroom lol)

You probably won't be able to tell the difference in performance though, its more of a personal choice here.

One thing to consider with the G1 Gaming is it is longer than normal with its Backplate/encasement. (Forced me to switch cases to fit)

 

[Icarus]

I owned a MSI Gaming 4G 970 and 980 and the Asus 970 OC. The MSI is far sturdier and doesn't sag huge like the Asus ones do. The Golden Edition would be even better I'd think as it has the backplate. The Asus was voltage locked as well (though I never tried OC'ing the MSi in all fairness.) The support service from MSI is far far better than Asus as well (Asus blows for any service in my experiences, which has been a lot unfortunately!)

I'd go with the MSI Golden one imho

 

[Shou Miko]

i got the MSI GTX 970 GTX Gaming 4gb myself i love it, it does what i want and was at a good price when i brought when it came out last year, only thing i wish was that MSI sold backplates for their cards, bcs it would look even better with a backplate ^^

 

[Lopez0101]

The MSI is far sturdier and doesn't sag huge like the Asus ones do. The Golden Edition would be even better I'd think as it has the backplate. The Asus was voltage locked as well

My 970 Strix has no sag, but my R9 290 4G sagged quite a bit. Also, the Strix isn't voltage locked. It might have a voltage limit, but I've adjusted the voltage with ASUS's GPUTweak. I'd say it really denends on what the price difference is between them. If there isn't one, go for whichever looks nicer to you. There are reviews on TPU of the MSI and Strix coolers. The G1 is really the only one that is different, 2x8 PCI-E vs. Strix's 1x8.

 

[Icarus]

Maybe is was just the two Asus OC 970's I got, but both sagged a lot more than any other card I tried (I have a pic of the sag somewhere as someone on OCN didn't believe me either.) I wasn't able to get the voltage of one of my Asus 970's above 1.200 at all no matter what I used, so it was locked (according to Asus support as well, some are.) I gave up on them and sent them back.

The G1 970 has 6+8 not 2x8 btw. I do like that Asus used 1x8 there.

 

[Lopez0101]

Not saying I don't believe, just saying that it's not a for sure thing that the card will or won't sag. Also, I couldn't remember for sure if the second was 8 or 6 pin. You're probably right about the 1.2v thing, I haven't actually tried to surpass that. My Strix clocks up to 1490Mhz and the G1 doesn't get much above that, so not sure if going over 1.2v would do much since the limit isn't thermal.

 

[HammerON]

Either card is good. Flip a coin
I would personally go with the MSI card.

 

[RCoon]

Maybe is was just the two Asus OC 970's I got, but both sagged

My MSI card sags by about half a centimeter, but it still plays games and benchmarks.

I wasn't able to get the voltage of one of my Asus 970's above 1.200

Welcome to NVidia. You'll find most modern NVidia GPUs are voltage locked to 1.2 or 1.212v. It's not just a specific brand.

 

[Jborg]

My MSI card sags by about half a centimeter, but it still plays games and benchmarks.



Welcome to NVidia. You'll find most modern NVidia GPUs are voltage locked to 1.2 or 1.212v. It's not just a specific brand.

I noticed this I believe with my GTX 970 G1 Gaming, it seems to slightly sag, i have considered supporting the end of it with something.

I need to actually see how level it is in my case, if it is sagging it is only slightly, and most likely because of the length of the card.

I guess it could be an illusion from the backplate on the video card, i just haven't worred about it.

 

[newtekie1]

I'd go with the Strix, only because of the single 8-pin power. I wish more gpus did that so you don't have to run 2 power cables to the card when 1 provides the same amount of power.

Gigabyte G1 Gaming looks more promising than those two.

The G1 Gaming's cooler is loud, pointlessly loud.

 

[THE_EGG]

The support service from MSI is far far better than Asus as well (Asus blows for any service in my experiences, which has been a lot unfortunately!)

To be completely honest, after sales service varies country-to-country. Asus here in Australia (at least from my experience and also some of my friends' experience) is extremely good and very fast. MSI on the other hand, well, not so much.

The G1 Gaming's cooler is loud, pointlessly loud.

While I agree if referring to TPU's review, I've seen on other sites that it is indeed louder than others at idle however within the ball-park of competitors sometimes being louder or quieter depending on the site while remaining consistently cooler compared to competitors.

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This being said, the revised 970 ACX from EVGA, Asus Strix, Gigabyte G1 Gaming and MSI's GAMING GOLDEN 970 (twin frozr) are all fine choices.

Seeing as you stated power consumption in your criteria I'd suggest staying away from Gigabyte then as I've seen fairly consistently across different sites that it does use more power than its competitors. I'd also remove the EVGA from the list due to the lack of a backplate (though I've seen reports that you can get a backplate from EVGA after buying a card).

So after thinning out the cards, I'd recommend the Asus Strix or MSI GAMING GOLDEN. Because Asus has better service than MSI here in Australia, I'd lean towards the Asus but up to you. Happy shopping

 

[Icarus]

At idle the GB fan is quieter than any of the Noctua fans I have in my system, so think the 0db feature is more of a bane than a plus for the MSI or Asus (see what happens to fans + any dust over time when they don't spin?) The GB is louder at load than the two. The quality to me of the MSI does seem higher than the Asus. The MSi has better potential than the Asus too, though leaving 'em stock that won't matter there (the MSI will still beat it very slightly in most things/games though.) Like HammerOn said, flip a coin!? But I'd personally still go MSI...