The EVGA GeForce GTX 1070 Ti FTW2 Review: iCX Brings the Lights and Sensors

Final Words

Wrapping up this review, it’s safe to say that we’re in a bind about what kind of conclusion is possible right now. The EVGA GeForce GTX 1070 Ti FTW2 exists in a time of video card oblivion, where any mid-range and above desktop GPU is worth its weight in Ethereum. On a purely hardware level, the card implements the iCX solution as expected, operates quietly, and has RGB blinkies. When manually overclocked, it can perform near or at the level of a GTX 1080.

These were hardly areas of concerns to begin with: iCX has featured in Pascal GeForces for some time now, while GTX 1070 Ti design can reuse tried-and-true GTX 1080 and 1070 coolers and PCBs. iCX itself traces back to the overheating issues with the ACX 3.0 cooler on GTX 1080 and 1070 FTWs, eventually bringing about a VBIOS update and free thermal mod kit. And the iCX cooler was not a radical departure from EVGA's ACX design in the first place.

Unfortunately, the success and popularity of all GTX 1070 Ti boards was going to be based on pricing. Squeezing in the price window between the GTX 1080 and 1070 to block out the Radeon RX Vega 56, the GTX 1070 Ti’s standardized clocks kept performance from threatening GTX 1080s. Given the November release date, now would have been the perfect time to see how the GTX 1080/1070 Ti/1070 fared in practice, if not for cryptomining demand. Of course, with this level of demand across all vendors, the GTX 1070 Ti no longer threatens anything.

Refocusing on the GTX 1070 Ti FTW2, the iCX functionality and Precision XOC’s XOC Scanner go well together in featuring a factory-guided overclock that is almost as straightforward as it gets. While going the manual route still allows for reasonable overclocks. The possibility was mentioned that the single-step XOC Scanner could be extended to more products, though it would be interesting to see if the idea of reference clock only GPUs is related to this.

On the other hand, the GTX 1070 Ti FTW2 seems to have a split focus. The casual click-and-play user would dabble with LEDs and opt for the XOC Scanner factory-guided overclock, but would find less value in the detailed sensor data, asynchronous fan control, Dual BIOS, and power system; features that they may not use at all. An overclocking-inclined user would prefer to ignore XOC Scanner and use all the iCX features, but in that case, what would be appealing about the clock-standardized GTX 1070 Ti except for the price? And as a quiet card, there exists the alternate option of the GTX 1070 Ti FTW Ultra Silent. Not to mention the GTX 1080 and 1070 options.

Pricing would normally be the arbiter of these scenarios. At its $500 MSRP, the GTX 1070 Ti FTW2 is near-cost with cheaper GTX 1080s, rather than a straightforward proportional option like the Founders Edition. Tentatively speaking, the FTW2 iCX featureset may be more valuable to you than the performance difference, which might be recouped with some luck and manual overclocking.

But today, our regular turn of phrase, ‘there’s no such thing as a bad card, only bad prices’ takes on new shades of meaning. The EVGA GeForce GTX 1070 Ti FTW2 is not a bad card by any means – indeed it's quite a good card, as is usually the case with EVGA. However even though it is well-built and has good features, can good cards even exist when all prices are this bad? At least on a relative basis, if you can either pick up a GTX 1070 Ti FTW2 at or near MSRP, or if you can part with the extra cash at current market prices, then it's a compelling enough option.

However on an absolute basis, the market price of the card will give anyone a good reason to do a double-take. A buyer's market it is not, which is not EVGA's fault, but a reality we must all live with. Meanwhile we're getting increasingly worried that by the time the GPU market has normalized, it might already be time for the next generation of consumer graphics cards.