Most preferred vendor: Video cards

[ColoradoLeo76]

Round 2: Vid cards

My story: eVGA until the 500 series came out. I bought an MSI twin Frozr 560Ti on the release date, as EVGA didn't have an offering at the time. the fans died while under warranty, (thank goodness for IGP!) and the replacement was giving me artifacts more or less right off the bat in L4D2. They've since gone away, but I'm not sure I'd trust them next time around.
Bonus points to eVGA for their office literally being within a mile from my apartment when i lived in SoCal.

Forgive the lack of more choices.. but there's no room!

 

[T_Yamamoto]

Just make one thread. Jeez

 

[lehtv]

Hmm.. a multiple choice in this one, but not in the motherboard thread? Anyway, I tend to prefer whichever brand offers the best cooling. Asus, Gigabyte, MSI and Sapphire seem to be on top of the game. HIS has been showing some nice innovation with their custom blower style coolers that in reviews are on par with other brands' open coolers.

I don't like to judge brands or their SKUs on their overclockability, most of the overclockability is a result of the GPU itself. I.e. 7850 tend to overclock really well, 6970 not well at all. And with high overclocks, you will be hard pressed to find a cooler that isn't somewhat loud, and noise is something I like to avoid.

OT:
Yamamoto your posts have been a bit unwelcoming recently... Give the OP a chance. First off I think you're wrong, you can't keep something like this to a single thread, one thread doesn't allow multiple polls; and you shouldn't either, since discussion about motherboard and graphics card vendors doesn't really have much overlap.

Secondly, the OP is a new poster, or at least posts very rarely... This isn't some cult where people need to earn their way in, this is a public forum where experienced members such as yourself should be supportive.

 

[ColoradoLeo76]

Just make one thread. Jeez

Can't put multiple polls in a single thread. Or is that something else I overlooked?

 

[ColoradoLeo76]

Hmm.. a multiple choice in this one, but not in the motherboard thread?

Odd, I thought I had made the mobo poll a multiple choice. My mistake. Thanks.

 

[mfenn]

Odd, I thought I had made the mobo poll a multiple choice. My mistake. Thanks.

The other one seemed multiple choice to me yesterday. At least, I chose multiple options. Elite privilege? :awe:

Anyway, for this one I checked everybody but EVGA. The true answer is "whoever is the cheapest while still offering a reasonable multi-fan cooler". EVGA only seems to offer blowers for some inscrutable reason, so they're never on my list.

 

[fffblackmage]

I'm also with the "whoever is cheapest, but still offer good cooling" crowd.

I can go either way wrt open or closed cooling designs. My new HIS IceQ 7870 really impressed me with its decently quiet and oversized leaf blower.

 

[DaveSimmons]

It depends on the cooling and the price. I run at stock speed, but I care about quiet cooling.

I stay away from Palit and Zotac based on their history of poor customer reviews at Newegg, but other than them I have no strong preferences.

 

[T_Yamamoto]

I would just get whatever's cheapest

Leh, I do understand that, :/

 

[boom314]

Does warranty and support not matter to anyone? Who can you call at 2 am on a Saturday and speak to someone in the United States that speaks English as their primary language???

EVGA that's who.

 

[DaveSimmons]

Does warranty and support not matter to anyone? Who can you call at 2 am on a Saturday and speak to someone in the United States that speaks English as their primary language???

EVGA that's who.

Meh. I had 2 bad fans in a row with my EVGA GTX 560ti. It's nice that I could pay to ship it back to them but nicer still if I hadn't needed the RMA.

 

[mfenn]

Does warranty and support not matter to anyone? Who can you call at 2 am on a Saturday and speak to someone in the United States that speaks English as their primary language???

EVGA that's who.

Sure, you can talk to them. You can even pay to ship your card back to them. However, they'll happily send your same card back to you (or an equally broken one). Their validation procedure on RMA items is laughable.

I'd rather wait a day and send my card back to a company with spare pool that doesn't consist entirely of customer returns thrown on a shelf.

 

[harobikes333]

Sure, you can talk to them. You can even pay to ship your card back to them. However, they'll happily send your same card back to you (or an equally broken one). Their validation procedure on RMA items is laughable.

I'd rather wait a day and send my card back to a company with spare pool that doesn't consist entirely of customer returns thrown on a shelf.

Bad Experience... :O ?

 

[T_Yamamoto]

EVGA has nice cards but their QC and CS is bad (heard from owners). They did do that 680 trade up though...

 

[Skott]

I'm not exactly brand loyal but I do chose quality a lot so EVGA usually wins my money when I buy a nVidia card. Not always but 90% of the time. I have bought ASUS and Gigabyte too. When it comes to AMD cards I have no particular choice. I go by what is the best quality for that model. My choices for AMD seems to be all over the spectrum. I should also point out AMD cards only make up about 30% of my buying choice. nVidia gets the rest.

For the poll I voted EVGA since I buy more of them than anything else.

 

[Fallen Kell]

I do have to admit that EVGA isn't what it use to be, but then again, the same is true for all of the video card companies. I had multiple issues with my latest EVGA card, and it took a while to be resolved, but they did resolve it, eventually.

But I do have to agree that their RMA line needs some QA love. My first RMA had the same issue as my initial card, which led me to think it was something else in my system, and I installed the card in a completely different computer and it still had the same problem in that different computer. So it went back. Then the 2nd RMA had 2 screws rattling around in the packaging. I found where they were suppose to be, and screwed them back in, but when I tried to boot, it simply blue-screened on me. The 3rd RMA was a brand new card off their production line and worked (full shrink-wrapped retail box)...

That said, you can typically get in touch with them very quickly either on the phone or on the web.

No more lifetime warranty or double lifetime warranty anymore from anyone that I know of. The good old days of XFX and BFG are gone.

 

[Jaskalas]

I've had two EVGA cards, both unstable.

My Sapphire, OTOH, has been rock solid for years.

 

[1nf1d3l]

Sapphire for AMD or PNY for Nvidia. Pretty much the only 2 brands that haven't delivered a DOA or had some problems within a few weeks of arrival.

 

[lehtv]

I've had two EVGA cards, both unstable.

My Sapphire, OTOH, has been rock solid for years.

Too small a sample size to make any reliable conclusions about either brand.

 

[mfenn]

Bad Experience... :O ?

It's not an isolated occurrence, see Fallen Kell's post below. You can also do a quick search on this forum and find lots of posts about EVGA's horrendous QA on RMA boards. I'm honestly not sure if its a conscious cost-cutting decision on their part or if their RMA department is just run by clowns.

 

[mfenn]

The good old days of XFX and BFG are gone.

:'''(

Ain't that the truth.

 

[Maximilian]

The cheapest one?

I couldn't care less about the extra cooling crap, the thing will be obsolete in a year anyways.

 

[pandemonium]

People will need to take note that this poll needs some explanation, since EVGA, PNY, and ZOTAC only do nVIDIA cards.

 

[pandemonium]

The cheapest one?

I couldn't care less about the extra cooling crap, the thing will be obsolete in a year anyways.

And you still have a 5850? Wait, what? Good card, just sayin'.

 

[Maximilian]

And you still have a 5850? Wait, what? Good card, just sayin'.

Yup Didn't expect it to last anywhere near this long tbh.