Nvidia’s Geforce GTX 980 seems to be one of the most overclocking suitable cards on the market. After Swedish overclocker, Elmor set the world record for the highest overclocking frequency hit by a single GPU core using an Asus Strix GTX 980 card, another skilled overclocker going by the name of Vince “K|NGP|N” Lucido has managed to break the 3DMark FireStrike benchmark world record, by employing a 4-way SLI setup featuring four EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Classified ACX 2.0 4GB graphics cards, with each GPU pushed at 2GHz core speed and 8400MHz memory frequency. K|NGP|N has set in place a monster of a rig for this test. The PC was fueled by an Intel Core i7-5960X processor clocked at 5.6GHz, an EVGA X99 mainboard, and 16GB of 3.30GHz DDR4 memory. Naturally, a custom liquid nitrogen cooling (LN2) was included in the equation, being crucial in an overclocking test of this amplitude.
The setup proved ideal, as K|NGP|N managed to set three 3DMark FireStrike world records:
- 3DMark Fire Strike (4-way) = 40,338
- 3DMark Fire Strike Extreme (4-way) = 28,059
- 3DMark Fire Strike Ultra (4-way) = 16,243
K|NGP|N has also set a few records in single-GPU mode pushing the core of the EVGA GTX 980 Classified to 2.1 GHz, while the memory frequency to 8800MHz. Here are the scores:
- 3DMark Fire Strike (single card) = 19,811
- 3DMark Fire Strike Extreme (single card) = 9,617
- 3DMark Fire Strike Ultra (single card) = 5,007
EVGA’s “Compromise is for losers” motto seems to reflect in their latest Maxwell releases as well. The EVGA GTX 980 Classified ACX 2.0 4GB is most certainly one of the highest performers on the market, as it features enhanced core speeds (1291MHz base clock and 1405MHz boost clock), showcasing high overclocking capabilities. Vince “K|NGP|N” Lucido shared the following: “The improved VRM and memory design really let Nvidia’s GTX 980 GPU stretch its wings. This card has achieved clock-speeds of 2200MHz core and 8500MHz memory single card and nearly 2100MHz core in 4-way SLI, it’s really amazing.” The GTX 980 sets a new world record yet again. How far can this card be pushed?