Graphics Cards GTX 980 GAMING 4G

I bought this card around a month ago as an upgrade over the EVGA GTX 670 FTW Edition that I had before. It was during the period where 980s were in very short supply and there was a lot of price gouging by 3rd-party sellers and I managed to snag one of these from Amazon at retail price. This past month, I have had literally no problems with this card and I am extremely satisfied with my purchase. Pros: Quiet: the fans on this card completely turn off when the temperature is under 50 C (see note at the bottom). This results in silent normal operation but when the card gets hot, the fans turn on quickly and stabilize the temperature. But they are still no louder than my case fans and I can barely hear the GPU fans while gaming. Additionally, I have not noticed any coil whine that has troubled numerous other 980 and 970 models. Cool: I have not seen the GPU temp exceed 67 C even while playing demanding games like BF4 and AC: Unity at maximum settings. The driver-operated fan manages to maintain this temperature at 50% speed, which is impressive, though the second fan is VBIOS-controlled and could be running at a different speed. Idle temp is around 32 C, which is pretty good for a card whose fans aren't even running at that temperature. The cooling solution is more effective than the blower fan on my old 670 by far. Fast: This is one of the best-performing cards on the market at this time. Boost clocks are 1327 MHz on my card and it can handle everything I throw at it. I'm running BF4 at max graphics except for no antialiasing at 120% resolution scale and I normally get over 100 FPS. I can smoothly play AC: Unity at maximum graphics settings including TXAA without any stuttering or frame drops. Basically this thing can handle everything you can throw at it at 1080p without any problems. Cons: Price??? Not really a con, but $580 isn't cheap. But you get what you pay for and you're getting a lot. MSI Live Update: it doesn't work on my system. I can't get my VBIOS version information or any useful info out of this application. Caveats: not really cons, but things to be careful of. VBIOS: The default video card BIOS that came with my card had a bug where it would say the fan is running at 1% of its max speed even though the fan wasn't actually spinning. A video BIOS update from MSI fixed it, but as far as I know, this BIOS update has to be found on the MSI forum, not via its update utility. The new BIOS also seemed to tweak the fan profile; the fan now starts spinning when the temp reaches 50 C. I vaguely remember that the fan would start at 55 C using the old BIOS. Neither issue is actually problematic as the fans are so effective and they start properly, but it's something to keep in mind: VBIOS update beneficial. HOWEVER, if you plan to use the newer Nvidia drivers, you MUST update your bios as the newer drivers (after 344.16) don't work well with the old bios. This is a BIOS problem, so newer drivers require newer VBIOS. Drivers: I have heard that there are problems with the past few NVidia graphics drivers. I'm running an old version, 344.16, which most people say is stable and has been perfectly stable in my experience. I am using an HDMI connection and those with DisplayPort and UHD screens might have issues with this driver (these appear to be fixed in the latest beta driver 344.80). Size: Make sure you know how long this card is! I bought this card basically on a whim as it was the only one available at a reasonable price. This card is an inch longer than a standard card and might not fit into smaller cases. I was lucky and it just barely fits in my Zalman mid-tower case. Check the specs! Trivia: You get an MSI gaming mousepad along with the video card. It's a nice, large, stable mousepad with plenty of friction for precise mouse movements, but it has a strong plastic smell that fortunately dissipates with time. Overall I could not be happier with my purchase. This video card and the GPU within are great in every respect.

This is a good graphics card. Runs lots of games 60 Fps well. You can customize the LED light flash pattern of the graphics card. You can make it go to silent mode, gaming mode, and oc mode and it's very useful.

First some system specs so you know there are no bottlenecks: Motherboard: MSI Z97 G-45 Gaming Power Supply: Corsair CX750M Operating System: Windows 10-64Bit RAM: 4x8GB DDR3 HyperX Fury Red and Black, 32 GB total Storage: 1 Samsung 850 EVO 500 GB SSD, 1x1TB WD Blue Hard Drve CPU: i5-4690k Overclocked to 4.5 GHZ GPU: MSI GTX 980 Gaming 4G Overclocked to 1500 MHz Cooling: Corsair H110 GT AIO Cooler 2 Noctua NF-F12 iPPC 3000 RPM fans 2 Fractal 140 MM case Fans 2 Noctua NF-F12 iPPC 2000 RPM case Fans Overclocking Review: Now that's out of the way and you know I have no bottlenecks here's a review, this card takes overclocking with MSI Afterburner like a champ, with fans set to 100% its amazingly quiet, also each fan spins independently of each other. So in the overclock utility it is set to 100% but the second fan over the VRM won't kick on till its actually needed past a temperature of 60C even if you set fan speeds to 100% in MSI afterburner it only controls the fan over the GPU heat sink. Right now I have it overclocked @ 1500 MHz and the memory overclocked to an effective speed of 8000 MHZ although this is not necessary for other users its nice to know it can hit that reliably and stay stable in games. It's "military class" components and awesome cooling design definitely help there. This card takes voltage like no one else it is incredibly easy to overclock to 1500 MHZ(200-300 MHZ over stock boost) using simple YouTube guides and get a 1000 MHz increase memory overclock. It seriously increases the longevity of this card for future gaming, it hits well above 85 FPS in most games, that aren't capped of course, on very high and ultra settings. Also with good case ventilation I haven't seen this card go past 60 C once while overclocked! At idle depending on ambient temps its stayed between 26C-30C Stock: Stock this card still shines bright. I have found no AA or AAA title this card doesn't excel with, in no game I have played has it gone lower than 70-75 FPS except for where certain games are capped at 60 maximum, it is an amazing card that will last quite some time. Also important to note the card is dead silent and cool. It idles at near ambient temps at 25C and stayed between 45-55C in testing. So in conclusion: Pros: Beast of a card- can easily handle all games and future games for the next 2-3 years no problem on high, very high or ultra Stays cool regardless of overclocking or not Takes overclocking like a champ Hardcore components that allow overclocking longevity: HI C capacitors, solid capacitors and super ferrite chokes, mean it can take higher voltages and temps easily Super Quiet! Cons: Lacks a back plate- would like to see a ventilated back plate to help with rigidity, this card is quite long and heavy and the pcb has the slightest bend to it-not detrimental but would like to see one for at least aesthetic appeal Size-You must have a decent size case for this card, luckily the Fractal Define S handles it no problem, it's quite large due to that awesome twin frozr cooler and the lengthy thick PCB to help with overclocking and heat dissipation Reccomendations: MAKE SURE YOUR PSU HAS TWO 8 PIN PCI POWER CONNECTORS!!!!!-this card is factory overclocked and has some serious power requirements, I recommend at least a 80 PLUS Bronze or higher power supply with a 750 Watt rating, 500 watts as they recommend isn't enough headroom if you run a i5 like me or an i7. Case ventilation and size- this card is almost 11 inches long and 4.5-5 inches wide so make sure your case can accommodate it Also I recommend at least one intake fan with a filter pulling fresh cool air into the case towards the front of the GPU so it doesn't have to deal with higher case temps in the future. ALL IN ALL: This card is worth the money if you are looking for a long term gaming GPU and is worth the $500 price tag, however if you have the extra +$180 at the time of this review and want something that will last even longer a 980 Ti from MSI would be a good choice, for me when I bought this card the 980ti came out like a week after purchase but this was so worth the money

Bought this card as an upgrade to a xfx 7970. I use a dell 4k monitor. I had problems with this monitor and sleep mode on the amd card so i moved to nvidia. Now the PC blue screens with a VIDEO_SCHEDULER_INTERNAL_ERROR in windows 10 about every 15-60 minutes. I put the old card back in and the system is fine. It's an MSI-7737 ver 1.1 system board. Every time the pc boots up the 4k monitor is split in two with the left on the right and the right on the left. it's very frustrating. Also there has been no performance gain in any game playing at 3840x2160 resolution. UPDATE: I've been working with MSI tech support. I'll sum it up. I opened a ticket explaining the situation, without reading my ticket they told me to try another video card. I explained to them that I had already done this and noted it in the original ticket. They then blamed my power supply saying it couldn't be a high enough wattage. Sent them a picture of the Corsair HX1050 watt psu in my system. They then blamed the system board saying it was not compatible. I then sent them a picture of the system board which was also noted in the original ticket. (MSI MS-7737 Big Bang II - a very expensive system board which is supported) They then told me to make sure it was the latest bios revision that was also stated in the original ticket. At this point I'm certain that there product doesn't work simply because they are illiterate and can't read. UPDATE 2: After providing more than the information in the pics they sent me a single line of Please RMA followed by a link to RMA the product. Now my extremely expensive brand new MSI card is being replaced by a crappy refurb without them explaining or troubleshooting anything. This will be the last MSI product we use. Sourcing a new company over this. No company's support should be this bad. I'm now using the $20 rebate card I recieved to help pay for the shipping to send this in for RMA. Update 3: Cost me more than the $20 rebate card. This was the biggest rip off I've ever dealth with. Purchased a brand new card only to have it replaced with a refurb 10 days after i couldn't return it to amazon. It's on it's way back to MSI though most other users I've talked to claim the issue is not going to be resolved by RMAing the card. Update 4: Recieved replacement card from MSI and installed. Same problem. Installed in secondary system with same issue. BSOD with VIDEO_SCHEDUELER_INTERNAL_ERROR. I've contact MSI support again so we will see what will happen now. I now tell everyone I know to stay far away from MSI.

Performance is acceptable and there is no significant difference between the 970 gtx

The fans won't turn on. I can't change the fans speed using msi afterburner. It works great but I can't overclock it because of fear it will overheat because fans don't work.

card is great, guys. I totally forgot about the 0db fan thing, so I freaked out a bit. I ran heaven benchmark, and the second fan began to spin at 65c. The card stayed between 65c-68c throughout the rest of the benchmark which is awesome. In idle, I get around 35-37c when fans are not spinning :D! The only way to control both fans with a fan speed is to DL their VGA fan control app from their site. I haven't tried it yet because I have no need to. The oc mode, and gaming mode, etc works great. Just a click here, and a click there and it's all set-up. This is my first MSI card because I normally go for EVGA, but I liked the design, color, and overall awesome temp control this card has. I do not overclock, or adjust voltages so i do not have a say on how well this card overclocks, but at stock overclock it's awesome. I'm sure it has even greater O.C potential because of the awesome temperatures. Obviously max's all games out on the market, and I will be picking up another one very soon. Also, MSI logo lights up white, the card is a bit thick because of the pipes, and has NO backplate. The PCB is black though, so the look with no back plate is not too bad. *Forgot to add, on the gaming app where you choose your OC mode, gaming mode, and silent mode, there is a "cool down" mode where fans spin at maximum speed to cool your GPU off even faster. It takes your high temp and brings it to idle temps within 40 seconds. You only do it every 5 minutes. I thought it was a cool feature :) ****UPDATE 1-23-15: I have had this card close to three months now it still performs beautifully. I bought another and now have SLI configured. The only GRIPE I have with these cards is that one of the damn fans spin at 800rpm, on both cards, every 15-20secs and then stops. I have read into this issue and people say it is a BIOS problem and I will have to update the cards BIOS. I am not going to do that because I may brick the card, and my cards are working fine as is. People have also said that reverting back to a specific driver will make it stop as well. Now I am not sure who the culprit is here: NVIDIA or MSI. All I know is that updating the BIOS seems to cure the issue. Just letting you guys know this ahead of time.

Got a lot of coil whine the first month that I owned it, now it is nice and quiet. Runs cool, even with a substantial overclock.