Inno3D iChill X3 Ultra GeForce GTX 980Ti Graphics Card Review

Final Thoughts

Price

The Inno3D x3 Ultra GTX 980Ti is currently available from OverclockersUK for £529.99. In the US, it is not available from our recommended retailers, but it is poised to be around $625.

Overview

I was a bit confused getting this card, it looked like something 15-year-old me would have jumped at the first sight of it due to the sharp lines and massive cooling design that resembles something alien. Yet this actually appealed to my more hands-on side thanks to the ability to take it apart and clean it.

Aesthetically speaking, it’s a very acquired taste; the sharp lines are enough to put some off, especially with some of the shroud covering the fans. I personally really like the colour combination, this could fit in really well with a steampunk themed build thanks to the bronze metal cover. One thing that I really like about this is the fact that you can almost fully strip it down and clean the dust out of the nooks and crannies. Okay, some other manufacturers offer removable fans, but this is a whole new level of removal.

Thanks to the iChill x3 cooling design, it is a little on the long side at 300mm and tall at 3 slots, but by it does the job and does it well. It kept the temperatures down and the audio performance is one of the best I’ve recorded.

The performance was good, no better than good, it was amazing! It trumped the reference Titan X easily in all of the tests and then went on to dominate once overclocked. That power does come at a price though, this card is rated at 280W TDP at factory, so once overclocked that would be increased; this shone through with some of the highest ever Maxwell recorded temperatures here at eTeknix.

Now all products have faults, no matter how good they are, this graphics card in particular is extremely heavy and because the weight is distributed way past the PCIe slot; it could prove problematic for some builds.

Pros

• Extremely quiet
• Great cooling
• DX12 compliant
• Low price for a non-reference design card

Cons

• Acquired taste for the cooling design
• More power hungry than other models

“Huge graphics performance, huge cooling design, huge heat threshold for a not so huge price; the Inno3D iChill x3 Ultra GTX980Ti ticks all of the right boxes.“

Thank you to Inno3D for providing this review sample.