Which Brand/Maker of Nvidia is best???

[MaddMutt]

Let me first start off by apologizing if this has been asked and answered before...

Now let me begin or explain my question I have benched many ATI/AMD Video Cards from the HD-5xxx to R9-290x series. From this collection, MSI was the best over-all for ease of overclocking. ASUS cards were limited to ASUS GPU-Tweak overclocking software, which IMO is sub-par to AB. XFX was the worst over-all as they lacked voltage control.
I'm looking to increase my NVidia Video Card library. My Brands/Makers are limited to what you can buy on E-Bay - USA site, so no Special Edition or Collector Editions please.
I currently have many EVGA cards, specifically from the GTX-480 to GTX-680. <- These cards (GTX-580 to GTX-1080(Ti) include a connector for EVGA's EVBOT controllor.
Is this controller necessary for max voltage under Dice??? What is max voltage with LN2 BIOS??? Should I look again to MSI for my NVidia Cards???
I'm looking for the easiest brand to Soft-Mod=Highest Overclock through software.
This would include GTX-X-60, X-70, along with the X-80 Series for overclocking/benching.

Thank You For Your Time
In Reading And Replaying

 

[EarthDog]

Moved to the benchmarking section since this is all under the guise of benchmarking and overclocking.

 

[Alaric]

I've only had two Green cards, both 1070s. One reference (Asus) and my Galax. The Galax will hit 2265 MHz with a simple BIOS flash (The Limited Edition HOF BIOS from Galax's lineup) and it's never gone over 72C with the stock cooler at those speeds (vRAM at +500 to 4500 MHz). Based on my results and what I've seen around the web my HOF is a beast.

 

[caddi daddi]

the best clocking cards that i have owned have been MSI, I still have the best pair of 980's for clocking under sli.
For the most part I prefer EVGA cards for day to day use, I have popped to many of them pushing them to the limits.
My Asus cards tend to be right behind my MSI cards when clocking.

 

[Woomack]

In general, EVGA is the best. Pretty much every card is good (there were exceptions with some coolers, but they replaced faulty units quick). They also have well-binned higher series gfx cards with better memory chips. Support is simply the best, and you don't lose the warranty when you remove the cooler.

I have mixed experience with ASUS, Gigabyte, MSI, Zotac, or Galax, and this is why:
ASUS - some cards are great, but mostly from ROG series, some cards have problems with overclocking or overvolting like even top series are not really binned, some needed special mods (even those from ROG series)
Gigabyte - some cards have problems with the design, some are great but never OC much above reference cards, recently many cards have warranty stickers and depend on the country where you live you may lose warranty when you remove the cooler
MSI - warranty stickers on everything, even Lightning series, top cards are overclocking about as good as a reference, I had 5 or 6 Lightnings, and all were overclocking worse than reference cards that OC team members had so let's say I won't recommend them
Galax - top cards overclock well, but somehow I'm not convinced as all their HOF cards that I was testing, had so loud coil whine that I couldn't stand it, cards went on sale as soon as I got bored of them, non-HOF series cards have really mixed reviews around the web from problems with coolers to problems with power design, some, of course, have good reviews
Zotac - problems with power design in some cards, even top series have sometimes locked voltages or other things which cause problems with overclocking (and I mean cards advertised as top OC series with better power section which was useless when the card could barely OC), matter of card model and PCB design

A lot depends on the gfx card series as some brands made pretty good older cards while new series are meh. The same some brands made great OC series cards while anything cheaper was meh. EVGA simply keeps the best quality for years and delivers top series for overclockers. Not the cheapest but those who buy them know why they pay more.

 

[MaddMutt]

@ Woomack
I Thank You for the great info. This was what I was hoping for

While looking and researching which GTX-780Ti, 980, & 980Ti I should be saving for, I ran across this program The program will allow Voltage Control of GTX-680's and up.. I have tested it on my GTX-680 Classified and GTX-780Ti KPE . The software will allow a Max Voltage of 1.6v for these cards. I was only able to test to 1.225v-1.250v as I was using AIR Cooling only.
THIS IA A 3rd PARTY SOFTWARE. It is independent of AB or Precision X OC Software BUT the VGPU can be read in GPU-Z.
I TAKE no responsibility in the damaging of your card for improperly using or cooling of your card.

https://xdevs.com/doc/_PC_HW/EVGA/KPE180/sw/Classified.exe

Here is the link to what the software can fully do
https://xdevs.com/guide/1080ti_kpe/#swvtune

 

[MaddMutt]

Here is a Screenshot of it with my MSI GTX-680 Lightning 2GB and EVGA GTX-680 Classy 4GB @ 1.250v. I ran GPUPI to try and MAX the Power

 

[Johan45]

For benching the best cards in any series are the ones you can easily remove all of NVidia's restrictions from and this will vary from series. My ASUS 1080Ti has the right BIOS with no limits and can modify the voltage with a simple script. KPE cards are always quite good for that as well. Matrix and lightnings are in that front as well. If buying (or thinking of) do some research and see how easily things can be modded software and hardware wise before you pull the trigger on something.

 

[MaddMutt]

For benching the best cards in any series are the ones you can easily remove all of NVidia's restrictions from and this will vary from series. My ASUS 1080Ti has the right BIOS with no limits and can modify the voltage with a simple script. KPE cards are always quite good for that as well. Matrix and lightnings are in that front as well. If buying (or thinking of) do some research and see how easily things can be modded software and hardware wise before you pull the trigger on something.

I had been reading to try and keep it to software only. Galaxy/Galax looked the best for hard mods. On the back of their cards, they have listed where to place the VGPU, VMEM, +3v, +5v, GND, and others. If I could play with an iron, that would be all I would buy
This new program that I found looks promising on EVGA FTW and better cards. I still need to test it with my GTX-980 and 980Ti.
Unless ASUS changed between AMD and NVidia, The Matrix cards required GPU-Tweak to control their voltage

 

[RJARRRPCGP]

What about Asus Strix GeForce GTX 970s? I have one on my socket 1366 rig.

 

[Woomack]

I had no GTX970 but GTX980 DC2OC required special BIOS and some mods to unlock voltages and OC higher. At least my card was not overclocking better than reference cards. Just my experience but some users had really good results on these cards. On dry ice my card was overclocking about 100MHz worse than some guys had on a single stage cooling (dice had about 20°C lower temps). I also had 2x GTX780 DC from ASUS and both were worse than reference cards for OC. I remember that my result on single stage was as good as that made by some team members on EVGA Classifieds on air. My card was additionally modded and EVGA was out of the box without any adjustments.
Better don't compare my luck to ASUS cards to the market's average as it looks really bad ... for example I had Radeon 290X Matrix, top series, first was DOA, 2nd died after 2h of benching, 3rd was sold without even unpacking.