Hey guys, I purchased a GTX 980 FTW and I've been having some overclocking problems.
 
At the beginning I was able to get a stable overclock of 1550 Mhz but a few days later it would just give me a brown screen in game, so I lowered it to 1500 and it was stable again running benchmarks for over an hour but a few days later it would become unstable again so I would keep lowering it and getting the same results.
 
So now I can only get a stable clock of around 1400 Mhz, is it normal for GPU's to degrade over time like this?

I checked my asic quality and it's at 75% so I'm not sure why I can't hit over 1450Mhz any more.
 
P.s. I had a Galax 980 that was able to hit over 1500 and that had a lower asic.
 
I noticed when I run 3D mark at 1500 it instant brown screens but if I uninstall all the drivers then reinstall everything again it doesn't brown screen for a longer period of time.
 
Temps never go over 80 Degrees.
 
 
Thanks, Silentwalker.

JerkMan
I wouldn't call it "degrading." Your 1500MHz overclocks were never truly stable, it just took some time to manifest. 1400-1450 is no small feat on air, be happy, I can barely reach 1500 on my Classifieds. Overclocking, especially on air, is finicky. 80 degrees is pretty high for the 900 series, mine stay below 70. What are you trying to accomplish with these cards? Are you trying to bench or play games with a stable clock? Also, ASIC number isn't a steadfast rule. I'd be happy if I were you. You paid for a card that guarantees 1279MHz and you're getting 1400-1450. There are no problems as far as I can tell.

It's strange that it was fine for days but then decides to drop. I was actually playing a game at 1400 and it's doing it now again and I had to drop it even lower. I don't understand how it can stay at around 1530 mhz for a few days then can't even hold 1400mhz for an hour.
 
Bought the FTW version expecting to at least hit 1500, it really sucks especially when spending over $800 for it.
 
At this rate if it keeps failing I have to keep down clocking it's prob going to start failing at 1300 Mhz soon. :(
 
80 Degrees is normal where I live, I'm in Australia and it get hot down here. 
 
Edit: Even when playing somthing like WoW it happenes, blackscreen, gpu core drops and temps at around 55 degrees.

JerkMan
$800!!!??? Geez, my Classies were $700 apiece. No way can you reasonably expect 1500MHz from the FTW, you can barely expect that on air from the Classy for full-time gaming, and then only if you get really luck with the silicon lottery.

Yeah the GTX 900 series is around $700 to $800 in Australia, and more averaging $900 to $1000+

Ya i had the same issue on my first 980 i got, had a good OC i thought for days and then certain games triggered it and found out it was not so stable so just because it passes benches/stress testing/gaming, dont mean its stable. Even my classified 980 now was same but its been weeks now and think im finally stable at 1541 /knocks on wood.