ASUS GeForce GTX 1070 STRIX Gaming review

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Conclusion

Conclusion

ASUS once again has a terrific product at hand with the STRIX. ASUS certainly does tick the proper boxes. In terms of design, looks, Aura RGB and factory tweak, it's all good. Two HDMI and two DP are a bit of a miss though, I know it is for VR reasons, but I would have liked to see 3x DP. We do admit that the price performance ratio of the GTX 1070 so much better then what the GTX 1080 offers at its sales price. At face value things seem right though the GPU might have been castrated a notch, the GeForce GTX 1070 overall offers simply really good performance. These cards (especially the factory tweaked ones) are battling (and winning from) the GTX 980 Ti and Titan X cards out there. The combo of the GPU with GDDR5 memory at 8 Gbps still offers plenty of horsepower. The Pascal GP104 architecture is interesting, as in aside from a few changes in the pipeline, it looks VERY similar to Maxwell. Make no mistake there have been changes, but it shares a very similar structure. So the biggest benefit for Nvidia was 16 nm, as it allows them to drive their products to incredible clock frequencies whilst they can use less voltage, and that results in power consumption way under the 200 Watt marker. Though not that exquisite GDDR5X memory, the 1070 uses GDDR5 graphics memory, still it's effectively running at a nice data-rate of 8 Gbps which brings in a very nice memory performance boost compared to the last gen products, in fact it tweaks rather easily over 9 Gbps as well. That fact armed with new color compression technologies effectively boosts the memory bandwidth a notch upwards compared to the GeForce GTX 970 and 980. These cards are faster compared to a GTX 980 and roughly as fast as a 980 Ti. Next to that I have got to say, 8 GB 256-bit GDDR5 graphics memory also feels like an excellent and well-balanced amount of graphics memory anno 2016. Would you ever use 8 GB of memory? Well, not anytime soon. The largest number we ever measured as like 5 or 6 GB. But hey, who knows with titles like The Division / GTA5 and technologies like Ultra HD and / or DSR versus performance and VRAM what you find valid, or not. High up there in the enthusiast space there certainly is a market for cards like these. That makes these 8 GB models relevant for gaming. 


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Aesthetics

I already mentioned it throughout the review and in the above chapter, but the card look terrific and offers a bit of customization with the AURA LED system. I can understand that ASUS loves it LEDs all over the place, but I also understand that many of the end-users will dislike it and probably choose another graphics card just for that over-branding logo fetish. As far as Aura goes (RGB LED lighting control) you can switch it on/off or to any color and animation you prefer, the choice is yours. Cool dibs is that back-plate, however it lacks openings at the GPU hotspot area for venting. The VRM area has proper vents/gaps though. As you can see, I remain skeptical about back-plates, they potentially can trap heat and thus warm up the PCB. The STRIX reached 65 Degrees C with three fans, that is pretty good though. Back-plates do look much better, make the PCB more sturdy (bends less or not at all) and can protect your PCB and components from damage. Consumer demand is always decisive, and you guys clearly like graphics cards with back plates. 

Cooling & Noise Levels

The reference design (Founder Editions) of the GTX 1070  are set at an offset threshold of 80 degrees C. Once the GPU gets warmer the card will clock down / lower its voltage etc to try and keep the card cooler, that's throttling and it part of the design. ASUS however throws in a cooler that manages roughly 500 to 600W of cooling performance. It is a good one, so good that up-to a degree or 60 on the GPU, this card remains passive and thus inaudible. Once the fans kick in, you can expect to hover at the 65 Degrees C marker, with seriously demanding games. Please do note that you will need proper ventilation inside your chassis to achieve that number as most heat is vented inside your chassis. But they shaved off a good 10 Degrees C over reference (founders). Once overclocked with added voltage we always do recommend a little more fan RPM, this does increase noise a tiny bit, but it's nothing dramatic by any standard. We heard no coil-noise. The fans did make a tiny bit of a whirl noise when they spin up - nothing dramatic in the background. In fact housed inside a closed chassis we doubt you would ever notice it. 

Power Consumption

Any GP104 Pascal GPU and thus GP104 based graphics card is rated as having a 160~180 Watt TDP under full stress, our measurements back that up albeit a notch higher due to the faster clocks and thus voltage usage. We noticed that the 1070 did consume a bit more power due to its tweaks and design, it was just roughly 180 Watts under full stress. That's still very OK though. Here again keep in mind we measure peak power consumption, the average power consumption is a good notch lower depending on GPU utilization. Also, if you plan to overclock the CPU/memory and/or GPU with added voltage, please do purchase a power supply with enough reserve. People often underestimate it, but if you tweak all three aforementioned variables, you can easily add 200 Watts to your peak power consumption budget as increasing voltages and clocks increases your power consumption.

Gaming performance

If you plan to upgrade my biggest advice to you is this, you'll need to look at your monitor first and foremost. A GeForce GTX 1070 would be perfect for Wide Quad HD Gaming at 2560x1440. It has plenty power and has the graphics memory to deal with games for years to come, even with the best quality settings and some niche AA levels. Price performance wise one should also take SLI into deliberation. We'll test it at one point but two GeForce GTX 1070 cards setup in SLI might be a true sweet-spot for Ultra HD gamers or the ones that like to go a little dirteeh with DSR and of course the latest gaming titles. Performance wise, really there's not one game that won't run seriously good at the very best image quality settings at 2560x1440. And sure, the cool factor remains you get the advantages of an 8 GB framebuffer. As such we feel the card is rather future proof. We mentioned SLI already, but starting with Pascal the primary focus for Nvidia in terms of multi-GPU setups is that they will support 2-way SLI, but really that's it and all. For those of you that want to run 3 and 4-way configuration, it's going to be difficult but remains possible as the game needs to support and you will need to obtain a driver key from the Nvidia website. Do not expect Nvidia to enhance drivers for it, they'll just open up the floodgate and have you deal with the rest. Some of you might be disappointed about this news. Me personally, I am fine with the choice to focus on proper 2-way SLI opposed to all the arbitrary configurations that less then 0.01% of the end-users uses.


Overclocking

Due to the many limiters and hardware protections Nvidia has built in all and any cards will hover roughly at or just over the 2 GHz on the Boost marker. That frequency will differ per game/application. On 3DMark Firestrike for example it may hover at ~2050 MHz, while in Rise of the Tomb Raider (2016) you will be closer towards 2.1 GHz. The reality is that Nvidia monitors and adapts to hardware specific loads, e.g. an application that is nearly viral like on the GPU will have the effect of the GPU protecting itself by lowering clocks and voltages. The opposite applies here as well, if a game does not try & fry that GPU, it'll clock a bit faster within the tweaked thresholds at your disposal. Tweaking is fun, but definitely more complicated anno 2016. The memory can reach just over 9.0 Gbps effectively. Pascal GPUs do like their memory bandwidth though, so if you can find a high enough stable tweak, definitely go or it if you are seeking that last bit of extra performance. For the ASUS we reached a stable maximum measured ~2,100 MHz on the boost frequency and a terrific effective data-rate) of 9.2 GHz on the memory. The product is tweaked really well already straight out of the box, we recommend you to leave it at that as you'll be covered by a three year warranty that way. 

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Concluding

The ROG Strix GTX 1070 is just terrific! The Strix ticks all the right boxes from factory tweak to looks, to the nice RGB LED system up-to the cooling levels. Noise wise, you will be able to slightly hear the fans under full load temperatures but it's still in what I call a silent product. It's fast, is future proof with 8 GB of GDDR5 memory and it just looks terrific (but taste is a subjective matter of course). All 1070 cards will be close to each other on performance aside from some anomalies here and there. Nvidia's limiters kick in harsh and hard, normalizing performance with a variance of a few frames per second here and there. That thesis remains more or less the same with tweaking. The 1070 remains to be a sweet product though, as the GeForce GTX 1080 is the card we all want but cannot afford. That makes the the GeForce GTX 1070 the next best thing, and it a terrific card really. In fact, it offers more than plenty for any PC gamer out there that plays his or her games up-to the WQHD domain and 2560x1440 ('ish). The 1070 is a nice upgrade if you come from the GeForce GTX 960/970 range. Seen from GTX 980 and higher, not so much of course. Added benefits over a founders edition card are the better looks, the better cooling, and a much more silent product. The STRIX comes factory tweaked for you, 127 MHz over reference, that is a very nice tweak already. You'll notice games boosting in the 1.9 GHz range. Tweaking wise you'll get her up-to 2.1 GHz on the boost frequency. Basically Nvidia is in control of what your maximum overclock is with a few exceptions here and there. So yes, all cards from any vendor are going to hover in the 2.0~2.1 GHz range max with an exception here and there. I'll state that again, ALL cards from any manufacturer. So really, you need to focus at the extras like design, cooling, price, LED system, warranties and after-sales. The ROG Strix GeForce GTX 1070 is one of the top-tier GTX 1070 cards your money can get you. It will not be cheap with the current street prices though, we spotted the lowest price to hover at the € 529,- marker. It does however come with terrific aesthetics, a three year warranty and a that lovely RGB LED lighting system. Overall highly recommended!

 - H

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