Anyone have links to the best cards for OC'ing (3060/70 ti)?

[FishDog3]

Haven't been in the gaming/oc'ing scene for a long time and I think my forum account must have gotten deleted (used to be FishDog3). I'm sure it's staring me right in the face, but figured I'd reach out. I want to do some research and pick out a good GFX card for my price range. Probably a 3060/70. Want to make sure I get one that isn't locked and/or people have seen good OC'ing results. I haven't looked at hardware for a long time so I want to make sure I'm getting good bang/buck and have enough info to make any tradeoffs for my needs.

So if you have any good rollup reviews or forum posts you know off the top, point my blind *** in the right direction.

Thanks!

 

[BugFreak]

Welcome to the forum.

It isn't so much which ones overclock well but which one you can get these days. Stock is so tight you pretty much have to take what you can get. I haven't seen any big comparisons which is probably because no one can get multiple at once to review but I really haven't been looking for it. This site has a couple reviews that you could use to compare some cards though. Regardless of which card you get you will get a good bang for your buck because these cards perform fantastic. I use a 3070 in my son's computer and it plays pretty much everything maxed out with well over 60fps, generally closer to 100.

One thing to consider is with the power controls built into these cards there really isn't much headroom without big cooling and swapping the BIOS. Right now I think the MSI, ASUS Strix and eVGA XOC BIOS give the biggest power limits with the eVGA being the most. Cooling will still most likely be your limitation there though.

 

[FishDog3]

Welcome to the forum.

It isn't so much which ones overclock well but which one you can get these days. Stock is so tight you pretty much have to take what you can get. I haven't seen any big comparisons which is probably because no one can get multiple at once to review but I really haven't been looking for it. This site has a couple reviews that you could use to compare some cards though. Regardless of which card you get you will get a good bang for your buck because these cards perform fantastic. I use a 3070 in my son's computer and it plays pretty much everything maxed out with well over 60fps, generally closer to 100.

One thing to consider is with the power controls built into these cards there really isn't much headroom without big cooling and swapping the BIOS. Right now I think the MSI, ASUS Strix and eVGA XOC BIOS give the biggest power limits with the eVGA being the most. Cooling will still most likely be your limitation there though.

Great, thanks for catching me up!

 

[dfonda]

Rather than locked you would be looking for which have Hash limiters...Which I believe all new GPU's would have...No effect on gaming or even science projects like Folding at Home or Rosetta.

It effects ethereum mining. So you would want to get slightly older ones if you mine. At least until they find a work around.

 

[EarthDog]

I'm not sure this is for mining (OP didnt mention it)...typically people undervolt/clock for that not overclock??

Anyway, it's all a crapshoot as to which overclocks best/furthest. There may be some with higher power limits, but in general cards will overclock about the same.

 

[yoadknux]

Yep. And GPU overclocking is honestly a waste of time. It's a nice project to play with, but not for actual performance gains. We're talking roughly 7% over stock with an increased probability of crashing/artifacts. If you go water and do a lot of min/maxing with voltage curve, you could maybe get to 12% over stock, with potentially voiding your warranty (for example, my Palit 2080 Super had a warranty sticker on one of the screws that hold the heatsink in place)

 

[dfonda]

Yep. And GPU overclocking is honestly a waste of time. It's a nice project to play with, but not for actual performance gains. We're talking roughly 7% over stock with an increased probability of crashing/artifacts. If you go water and do a lot of min/maxing with voltage curve, you could maybe get to 12% over stock, with potentially voiding your warranty (for example, my Palit 2080 Super had a warranty sticker on one of the screws that hold the heatsink in place)

Maybe for gaming but you can get a nice stable OC for science project's and it is very useful.

 

[Janus67]

Yep. And GPU overclocking is honestly a waste of time. It's a nice project to play with, but not for actual performance gains. We're talking roughly 7% over stock with an increased probability of crashing/artifacts. If you go water and do a lot of min/maxing with voltage curve, you could maybe get to 12% over stock, with potentially voiding your warranty (for example, my Palit 2080 Super had a warranty sticker on one of the screws that hold the heatsink in place)

At least in the US there is right to repair and the stickers do not stop you from opening the card or can prevent a warranty claim as long as you did not damage the card yourself.

 

[yoadknux]

Maybe for gaming but you can get a nice stable OC for science project's and it is very useful.

In a sense yes, 10% more performance might be the difference, but at the same time I would worry that the overclock might compromise the integrity of the results. I did a lot of Mathematica calculations as part of my Ph.D, a lot of time you get results that you don't know how to explain directly and you start doubting things. I don't know what an unstable GPU overclock does to a GPU-based calculations though. If it gives a clear indication of an error and doesn't crash your software, then it's probably alright. If you spend the entire day working on something and the application crashes because you put +1300 into the memory, that's unfortunate

 

[dfonda]

In a sense yes, 10% more performance might be the difference, but at the same time I would worry that the overclock might compromise the integrity of the results. I did a lot of Mathematica calculations as part of my Ph.D, a lot of time you get results that you don't know how to explain directly and you start doubting things. I don't know what an unstable GPU overclock does to a GPU-based calculations though. If it gives a clear indication of an error and doesn't crash your software, then it's probably alright. If you spend the entire day working on something and the application crashes because you put +1300 into the memory, that's unfortunate

You can worry as much as you want the reality is most of us who run f@h have been OC'ing GPU's for 10 or more years and the science is done faster. First you test that you have a stable OC and than you use it....This is Overclockers after all...

 

[Woomack]

I feel like the best bet is ASUS TUF/Strix. All of them have solid power design, higher power limits, and quiet cooling. Every other brand depends on series like Gigabyte AORUS is good, every lower Gigabyte may have problems with power design, cooler quality, or something else. MSI has generally low power limits and they save on things they shouldn't like they give plastic backplates. EVGA seems pretty good.
Would be easier with Radeons as AMD forced good power design on every 6800/6900/XT and there are no problems on most cards, regardless of brand, and power limits are pretty high.

 

[FishDog3]

I feel like the best bet is ASUS TUF/Strix. All of them have solid power design, higher power limits, and quiet cooling. Every other brand depends on series like Gigabyte AORUS is good, every lower Gigabyte may have problems with power design, cooler quality, or something else. MSI has generally low power limits and they save on things they shouldn't like they give plastic backplates. EVGA seems pretty good.
Would be easier with Radeons as AMD forced good power design on every 6800/6900/XT and there are no problems on most cards, regardless of brand, and power limits are pretty high.

Thanks!

As to the other responses, I'm aware of the hash limiting in regards to mining. I'll keep an eye out for that. Don't plan to use this card to mine, but you never know I might play around with it when bored.