Inno3D GeForce GTX 980Ti X3 Ultra DHS Review

Final Thoughts

Price

The Inno3D GeForce GTX 980Ti X3 Ultra DHS is currently available from Overclockers UK for £569.99 plus shipping. However, forum members with 100 posts in a 12 month period or 250 posts within 90 days can access DPD next day delivery at no additional cost. In terms of value, the GTX 980Ti is an expensive proposition but there are very few cards on the market which can compete especially when the end-user is powering a 4K display. At the time of writing, the cheapest GTX 980Ti from Overclockers UK costs £499.99. This means the Inno3D GeForce GTX 980Ti X3 Ultra DHS costs £70 more and might be difficult for some users to justify. However, to be fair, the cheaper Zotac option has a core clock of 1051MHZ, boost of 1140MHz and memory of 7010MHz.

Overview

Selecting a suitable graphics card which provides the required performance while matching your system’s colour scheme can be problematic especially when certain users alter their build’s theme every so often via RGB illumination. Inno3D’s changeable cover plates are a novel idea and adds a great deal of flexibility by altering the GPU’s physical appearance in a matter of seconds. As previously mentioned, I particularly enjoy the gleaming white finish which contrasts superbly against the dark black triple fan cooling solution. Obviously, visual preference is always down to a person’s taste, and it’s difficult to gauge the general reception of a particular product’s design. Personally, I quite like the GPU’s striking lines and industrial style.

Another major talking point is the superb cooling apparatus which allows the GPU’s core to remain cool and exceptionally quiet. This is impressive considering the factory overclock on the core, boost and memory clocks. Even when you apply a manual overclock, the GPU maintains almost silent running and never exceeds 70 degrees Celsius. The only real downside to Inno3D’s beefy cooling setup is the triple slot design which might prove restrictive in certain chassis configurations. On the other hand, this is a very high-end GPU, and I can only presume the majority of customers considering it will have a good case capable of accommodating a large GPUs.

In terms of performance, the Inno3D GeForce GTX 980Ti X3 Ultra DHS smashed almost every benchmark we threw at it and managed to reign supreme by a large margin. This is emphasized by the results in 3DMark, and Valley which makes the Titan X superfluous unless you suddenly need 12GB VRAM. The graphics card also came into its own during game testing, and consistently pulled ahead by around 4-10 FPS compared to the reference model. On another note, the GPU has a great deal of overclocking headroom despite already being factory overclocked, and capable of setting some very impressive bench scores. With a patient approach, and luck (due to the silicon lottery), you should be able to enhance the performance even further. The most vital aspect you have to take into account is the frames-per-second increase compared to the reference model. In every case, there was a major difference, and this might just be enough to encourage you to spend that extra £70.

Pros

• Changeable cover plates add some visual customization
• Class-leading performance at 1080p, 1440p, and 4K
• Excellent stock results due to high factory overclock
• Fantastic temperatures
• Impressive overclocking headroom
• Superb synthetic results
• Unbelievably quiet

Cons

• £70 price premium might deter users compared to cheaper models

“The Inno3D GeForce GTX 980Ti X3 Ultra DHS is capable of delivering astonishing performance which surpasses the Titan X and reference GTX 980Ti by a substantial margin. Not only that, it achieves this feat while being completely silent and featuring remarkably cool load temperatures.”

Inno3D GeForce GTX 980Ti X3 Ultra DHS 6144MB GDDR5 Graphics Card Review

Thank you Inno3D for providing us with this review sample