Asus Preparing Gold Edition Nvidia GeForce GTX 980 Matrix

Asus is teasing a new 20th anniversary ROG Matrix Golden Edition Nvidia GeForce GTX 980 graphics carte with a nonetheless unannounced but undoubtedly eye-wateringly high clock speed and a price to lucifer.

Asus GTX 980 Gold Edition return by VCZ

Frankly I'g slightly surprised that Asus is attempting to brand an even college end version of their established super faster Repulic of Gamers GTX 980 Matrix Platinum. After all a new GM200 powered monster that's allegedly faster and cheaper than the GTX TItan X is on the horizon. In fact according to our adept friends from Sweclockers.com the GTX 980 Ti is coming this summer.

Asus Preparing Gold Edition Nvidia GeForce GTX 980 Matrix

Asus teased its fans on its facebook page, asking "how fast do you retrieve our GTX 980 is ?"

How fast do y'all think our new GTX 980 is?
Stock GTX 980: 1126MHz
Matrix Platinum GTX 980: 1342MHz
20th Ceremony Edition GTX 980: ?

If I had to approximate I'd say very fast... The original GTX 980 Matrix Platinum boosts to a baking clock speed of 1342Mhz. That'due south a meaning leap from the reference 1216Mhz making the Matrix Platinum one of the fastest, and coolest, air cooled GTX 980 cards out at that place.

Asus did not cease there they accept as well published a teaser image of the new graphics card. Asking their fans to "guess" the core clock speed.
ASUS-ROG-GTX-980

Why Such Cards Don't Make Much Sense For Most Gamers

This is all well and skillful but frankly speaking the established GTX 980 Matrix Platinum already carries a hefty price tag of $639. That's just $sixty shy of the R9 295X2 which is more than than l% faster on average and still the fastest graphics card in the world. $639 is likewise $90 over the MSRP of the standard GTX 980 which is already too expensive compared to the significantly more pop $330 GTX 970. There's a number of fantastic custom cooled GTX 970 options for $330-$340 right at present. The MSI Gaming and the Gigabyte G1 Gaming for instance can be overclocked past 1500Mhz without too much effort.

And then I personally tin can't meet how I'd justify paying double the price for the 980 Matrix, or fifty-fifty $220 more than over the GTX 970 cards mentioned above for the standard GTX 980. All only to get a 15% operation improvement. The value suggestion looks especially disappointing when you consider that the GTX 980 Ti with 3072 CUDA cores and the R9 390X with 4096 GCN cores are allegedly just a few months away. And volition undoubtedly be introduced at a price point that'south significantly below the GTX Titan X making the GTX 980 an even harder sell.

Even for higher resolutions where the GTX 970 may need to admission its slower 0.5GB retention segment I'd still be hesitant to recommend the GTX 980. In that case I'd consider looking at the R9 290X from AMD. Which tin can be had for as low as $309 and is just 6% behind the GTX 980 in 4K gaming. And if you feel particularly adventurous nearly taking your 4K gaming experience to the next level. 8GB R9 290X cards tin can also be had for $409, $140 less than the standard GTX 980.

All in all, while I do appreciate the effort companies similar Asus, EVGA and MSI put into the top end cards. I'd actually like to see more love thrown at the more popular blindside for cadet graphics cards like the GTX 970. Which to a nifty extent MSI has in fact payed attention to. They released the 100ME GTX 970 and the Gold Edition GTX 970. My promise is to run into other companies follow adapt and concentrate on the cards that make the most sense for the gamer.