Have you tried powering your computer from a UPS, and see if that eliminates/lessens the noise? Get a big UPS like a 1000 or 1500 and run it from battery - perhaps something in the electrical line is introducing a 3rd or 5th harmonic that is making the cards squeal...? I'm no expert, so if someone else has any input on this, please provide!

Dingo07
Have you tried powering your computer from a UPS, and see if that eliminates/lessens the noise? Get a big UPS like a 1000 or 1500 and run it from battery - perhaps something in the electrical line is introducing a 3rd or 5th harmonic that is making the cards squeal...? I'm no expert, so if someone else has any input on this, please provide!

No, but I'm done with the wild goose chase as EVGA seemingly offered a refund. They said to keep an eye out for a follow up ticket which I never found, but I got an e-mail for another RMA which stated it was for a refund. So I guess I'm mostly out the time and effort I wasted during these months on this (and hopefully nothing more), but I still need a video card.
 
Unfortunately, I am unwilling to try EVGA again anytime soon after this experience. That I got dragged through such a wild goose chase for so long and am still without an answer to my video card needs on what, from my end, SEEMS to be because of something at least partly on the end of the product means I wont be looking at EVGA, and probably the GeForce GTX 970 as a whole just to be more safe.
 
Hopefully whatever I try next isn't more of the same, and IF it is, hopefully it's not another four and a half month wasted effort...

Awesome! I'm glad you got that sorted, especially as it was your first experience. I probably would have sworn off this if this was my first experience.
 
I hope this really isn't a bad phase for the graphics card industry because there's another recent thread saying the GeForce GTX 960 may have this issue too. I don't know why some people don't have it and some do, but I'm not versed in the matter to say other than from my own experience, something seems to have changed with the way they are handling that part of the video card and it's seemingly not as good. These are relatively low power draw cards, and cards with similar power draw did not have this issue before like this. Something changed...

My card would buzz when GPU usage was low. Once it hit 70-99% usage it was dead silent. Thought that was weird considering coil whine usually is said to happen under a high load.

phryxsos
I emailed the EVGA_Tech in this forum, but do you guys think I should just run back to Best Buy and exchange it for another model...again...or go through the RMA process?

Honestly, if you're not already locked into EVGA's mercy through having gotten involved with their RMA, just return it to the place of purchase for a refund and look elsewhere for an answer (probably avoiding the GeForce GTX 970 as a whole). The lesson I leaned is that I wish I would had done that from the start, and that's not to say the support was terrible (they even stepped me up a model seeing if that'd help my situation), but that didn't save a sub-par product and months of wasted time and money.