Round-Up: GeForce GTX 980 and 970 Cards From MSI, EVGA, and Zotac Reviewed

Name: GeForce GTX 980 and 970 Cards From MSI, EVGA, and Zotac Reviewed
Brand: GeForce

by Marco Chiappetta — Friday, January 30, 2015, 01:19 PM EDT

How We Configured Our Test Systems: We tested the graphics cards in this article on an EVGA X79 Dark motherboard powered by an Intel Core i7-4960X six-core processor and 16GB of Corsair DDR3-1866 RAM. The first thing we did when configuring the test system was enter the system UEFI and set all values to their "high performance" default settings and disable any integrated peripherals that wouldn't be put to use. The memory's X.M.P. profile was enabled to ensure better-than-stock performance and the solid state drive was then formatted and Windows 8.1 Professional x64 was installed. When the installation was complete, we fully updated the OS and installed the latest DirectX redist along with all of the drivers, games, and benchmark tools necessary to complete our tests.

HotHardware's Test System

Intel Core i7 Powered

Hardware Used:
Intel Core i7-4960X
(3.3GHz, Six-Core)
EVGA X79 Dark
(Intel X79 Express)

Radeon R9 290X
GeForce GTX 980
GeForce GTX 970
GeForce GTX 780 Ti
GeForce GTX Titan
MSI GeForce GTX 980 Gaming 4
Zotac GeForce GTX 980 AMP! Omega
EVGA GeForce GTX 970 FTW

16GB Corsair DDR3-1866
OCZ Vertex 3
Integrated Audio
Integrated Network

Relevant Software:
Windows 8.1 Pro x64
DirectX April 2011 Redist
AMD Catalyst v14.30.1005 B2
NVIDIA GeForce Drivers v347.25

Benchmarks Used:
Unigine Heaven v4
3DMark "Fire Strike"
Bioshock Infinite
Hitman: Absolution
Metro Last Light
Sleeping Dogs
Crysis 3
FRAPS

Unigine Heaven v4.0 Benchmark

Pseudo-DirectX 11 Gaming

Unigine's Heaven Benchmark v4.0 is built around the Unigine game engine. Unigine is a cross-platform, real-time 3D engine, with support for DirectX 9, DirectX 10, DirectX 11 and OpenGL. The Heaven benchmark--when run in DX11 mode--also makes comprehensive use of tessellation technology and advanced SSAO (screen-space ambient occlusion). It also features volumetric cumulonimbus clouds generated by a physically accurate algorithm and a dynamic sky with light scattering.

Unigine Heaven

As you'd expect, the GeForce GTX 980 cards we tested took the top spots here. The MSI GeForce GTX 980 Gaming 4G led the pack overall, but Zotac's offering wasn't far behind. Both were measurably faster than the reference model. The EVGA GeForce GTX 970 FTW also performed very well, significantly outpacing the stock GTX 970 and overtaking the Radeon R9 290X.

Tags: Nvidia, MSI, GeForce, Gaming, graphics, Zotac, GPU, evga, GTX

Marco Chiappetta

Marco's interest in computing and technology dates all the way back to his early childhood. Even before being exposed to the Commodore P.E.T. and later the Commodore 64 in the early ‘80s, he was interested in electricity and electronics, and he still has the modded AFX cars and shop-worn soldering irons to prove it. Once he got his hands on his own Commodore 64, however, computing became Marco's passion. Throughout his academic and professional lives, Marco has worked with virtually every major platform from the TRS-80 and Amiga, to today's high end, multi-core servers. Over the years, he has worked in many fields related to technology and computing, including system design, assembly and sales, professional quality assurance testing, and technical writing. In addition to being the Managing Editor here at HotHardware for close to 15 years, Marco is also a freelance writer whose work has been published in a number of PC and technology related print publications and he is a regular fixture on HotHardware’s own Two and a Half Geeks webcast. - Contact: marco(at)hothardware(dot)com