MSI GTX 960 4GB - same memory limitations as the GTX 970 4GB?

Hardware Hub GPU
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Hey all,
I had a XFX HD 6870 1GB, which died and made my computer unbootable.

So I bought a MSI GTX 960 2GB version a couple of months ago.

I couldn't afford a MSI GTX 980TI 6GB, and so I had to just buy what I could to fill the gap for now.
The MSI GTX 960 2GB is a big improvement over the XFX HD 6870 1GB, so I was looking forward to this little upgrade :>

Im currently going through the progress of having it returned and getting a refund for a few reasons.

The first reason is I get image distortion when the card is hooked up to my monitor via HDMI.
It happens on specific types of backgrounds (color related), stuttering moving refresh lines appear. It can be exaggerated when scrolling.

It looks the same as old CRT monitors look when filming them with a video camera, but way more subtle, but still noticeable and annoying.

It happens in games, while watching videos, scrolling on websites. The background color of the Steam store page for example, causes the lines to appear.

The other reason is coilwhine. Which is some of the worst I have heard from a card before.
MSI GTX 960 2GB is ment to be known for how quite it runs, but for me its not the case. I think the card even gets pretty loud under load without the fans spinning.

The coilwhine is worse in some games than others. I first noticed the card suffered from coilwhine in The Witcher 1, which I was able to cure with vsync.

The card also makes some horrible noise in The Witcher 3, it doesn't sound 100% like coilwhine (the sound isn't as high pitched and whiny, but still noisy) but I assume it is coilwhine, as the sound alters or even stops when navigate the games menus.

The worst game ive had Coilwhine in so far, is Dead Island. Its unbelievably bad in that game, very very loud, 100% fullproof case of coilwhine, its absolutely horrible, and to me unplayable. Its incurable with vsync.

I have tried searching online to see if this is a common problem with the GTX 960, and its seems coilwhine was more prevalent in the GTX 970. Ive read people saying that the GTX960 shouldnt really suffer from it. And alot of the threads no matter which card was being discussed, people would say to "send it back" "get a replacement or refund". Which is what ive decided to do.

And since im getting a refund, I was thinking of getting the GTX960 4GB version, since it really doesnt cost that much more.

My main question is, does the GTX 960 suffer from the same memory limitations as the GTX 970?
Thanks in advance.

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Post withdrawn?

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even if it does, it shouldn't effect it that much. it it mostly used for more permanent storage.

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ignore that i dont think the it is affected by it but if you have the chance get a 380/x powerful gpu and decent price

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Id like to give Nvidia ago, since my last card was AMD.

Also Nvidia runs cooler, uses less power and in this case, between The 960 and 380x there is very little difference between them apart from in specific games. But then that would just be a job of lower 1 graphic setting by a tiny bit.

This is just a "fill in card" until I can save up for a GTX 980TI 6GB.

But if the 960 doesn't have the same memory limitations as the 970, I might as well get the 4GB over the 2GB when my refund comes through :>

1 Like
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ah understand able

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Short answer, no. The GTX 960 is, basically, the die for the 980 cut cleanly in half, so there is no "jerry-rigging" with any of the resources.

It took a while for some reviewers to delve into the issue of whether the GTX 960's smaller 128-bit bus could even handle over 2gb of VRAM, but, it was done: http://www.gamersnexus.net/guides/1888-evga-supersc-4gb-960-benchmark-vs-2gb/Page-2

Long story short, unless the game is a horribly optimized piece of shit, having 4gb isn't going to provide much benefit. Where it does make the most difference is with higher resolutions that you generally want a beefier graphics card for anyway.

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I've installed an MSI 960 4GB in a friend's PC recently. Runs GTA5 perfectly fine at 1080p and near-ultra settings (where it uses nearly the full 4GB if GTA's video settings menu is to be believed). No stuttering and no coil whine whatsoever.
I have a pair of 4GB 770s in my own rig and not noticing any coilwhine there either.
No whine on my old MSI GTX550ti either.

You must have gotten a bad one. Even though there's technically nothing wrong with it, it shouldn't have passed quality control like that.

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No it's not, the 960 4GB uses all 4GB to to their full potential. I wouldn't recommend the 2GB version anymore, just recently the new Tomb Raider released on PC and when you go all out on the settings it uses 7,2 GB (!) of VRAM in 1080p, it just doesn't cost that much more to buy the 4GB and it makes the card a lot more future proof in my opinion

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it shouldn't.

I did see a post on reddit saying it does but I'm doubt full.

The 970 issue was caused because an L2 block was binned and the entire module wasn't disabled like it would be on previous gens. so the 970 has 3 full modules and a 1/2 module where each module would address 1gb of vram each.

the 960 has 2 binned modules, so it has 2 full modules and 2 dead ones, essentially its 1/2 a 980. it can address 2gb of vram no problem, but you can also double it up and make it address 4gb, kinda like 980ti vs titan X, same card, just 980ti has a few binned cores, but the titan they doubled up the memory modules.

tl:dr no it shouldn't.