SC means that it is overclocked ever so slightly from the factory, through a bios option. If it wasn't stable at the prescribed overclock, it is dropped back to standard clocks, and sold as a standard card.

With that said, not every card is attempted, so that doesn't automatically mean the card didn't overclock well. If you like money buy the regular card and overclock it youeself. If you hate money and want it gone, buy the SC. I

I just bought 2 GTX980 from newegg 10 minutes ago.

badboy64
I just bought 2 GTX980 from newegg 10 minutes ago.

So, come on, be a bad boy! Please be so kind and post some benchies for us when you're ready with installation. Even outdated 3dMark 11 Performance would be highly interesting for me. And Unigine.
 
What draws me back to order right now is a red and blue pill from amd, if you know what I mean...
 

I can bet at least 20% of chips can't finish in Superclocked versions.
I'm glad EVGA keep tradition between 150-200MHz OC depend on model...
Classified and FTW version will be very close to 200MHz OC out of box.
For me is that most important, that's best feeling. I feel than as launched model even 10-15-20% stronger.
In this case GTX980 SC ACX 2.0 will be faster than ANY GTX780Ti on market, reference GTX980 not.

 
Yes, I can imagine as my first GTX 680 was a benchie leader for months here. Second was just middle-rate. What I want to avoid is a card that is overclocked but inefficient. I've owned a mediocre GTX570 SC version already, which I've changed for the stock version, which worked much better.  
 

SC means that it is overclocked ever so slightly from the factory, through a bios option. If it wasn't stable at the prescribed overclock, it is dropped back to standard clocks, and sold as a standard card.
With that said, not every card is attempted, so that doesn't automatically mean the card didn't overclock well. If you like money buy the regular card and overclock it yourself. If you hate money and want it gone, buy the SC. 

 
Nice to meet a guy from that far away. Reminds me of a guy from your country I've played GTA IV for a while. What the SC concerns it's not for the money but for the stability, reliability and silence in desktop-use. So obviously the SC-chips are chosen. 
Maybe there are some owners meanwhile which can share their experience with us.

comrade

badboy64
I just bought 2 GTX980 from newegg 10 minutes ago.

Your signature says that you have two EVGA GTX Titans.  Will the GTX 980's actually be a step upward for you?  I would have thought the Titans would be quicker than the 980's.
(I just ordered two EVGA GTX 980 Superclocked cards off of Newegg a few minutes ago, but I'm going up, (I hope), from SLI GTX 780 vanilla models.)

These are the first Titan's that came out. I had them for quite some time now. I always buy new hardware when available. I will sell these 2 Titan's once the GTX 980 come and see how they perform.

I got my EVGA GTX 980 SC from Scan UK yesterday as an upgrade to my 16 month old EVGA GTX 780.
 
I'm very pleased with the overall performance increase of around 25-30% in the games and benchmarks I've ran so far but I've encountered a few driver crashes while benchmarking unfortunately ("Driver has stopped responding and recovered" errors) which I never had on my GTX 780 unless I overclocked too far (I used a core offset of +100 MHz and a memory offset of +50 MHz). This SC model has a default core clock of 1,240 MHz according to GPU-Z v0.7.9 but does boost to 1,342-1,367 MHz during benchmarking. I have only been testing on the out of the box settings and have not overclocked anything (even my CPU is running at stock 3.5 GHz). I always do this to ensure everything is stable.
 
I was using the v344.11 WHQL drivers but I upgraded to the newer v344.16 beta ones yesterday evening. Also, because my PSU is modular I am using two separate 6+2 pin PCI-e leads to my GTX 980, which is how I had it set up for my GTX 780. Each lead does have two 6+2 pin connectors though so should I be using one and both connectors rather than two individual leads? I figured using two would spread the power load. Is that incorrect?
 
I normally play games with v-sync enabled so I am unlikely to be stressing my card to the extent I have during the benchmarking but I'm a bit concerned at the unstability issues at the moment. My previous GTX 780 has been 100% stable for the last year once I stopped overclocking it too much.
 
Advice?
 

Daz1967
I got my EVGA GTX 980 SC from Scan UK yesterday as an upgrade to my 16 month old EVGA GTX 780.
 
I'm very pleased with the overall performance increase of around 25-30% in the games and benchmarks I've ran so far but I've encountered a few driver crashes while benchmarking unfortunately ("Driver has stopped responding and recovered" errors) which I never had on my GTX 780 unless I overclocked too far (I used a core offset of +100 MHz and a memory offset of +50 MHz). This SC model has a default core clock of 1,240 MHz according to GPU-Z v0.7.9 but does boost to 1,342-1,367 MHz during benchmarking. I have only been testing on the out of the box settings and have not overclocked anything (even my CPU is running at stock 3.5 GHz). I always do this to ensure everything is stable.
 I was using the v344.11 WHQL drivers but I upgraded to the newer v344.16 beta ones yesterday evening. Also, because my PSU is modular I am using two separate 6+2 pin PCI-e leads to my GTX 980, which is how I had it set up for my GTX 780. Each lead does have two 6+2 pin connectors though so should I be using one and both connectors rather than two individual leads? I figured using two would spread the power load. Is that incorrect?
 I normally play games with v-sync enabled so I am unlikely to be stressing my card to the extent I have during the benchmarking but I'm a bit concerned at the unstability issues at the moment. My previous GTX 780 has been 100% stable for the last year once I stopped overclocking it too much.
 Advice?
 

 
That's a remarkable increase, Daz1967. Can you post your GPU-Z screenie? Is PCI-E 3.0 activated or still 2.0?
850 W should be enough. My 680's while intense gaming were near 650W to 700W. If you own a power meter would be interesting how much your 980's suck. If your crash is driver related the information is anyhow in the crash dump. Take Bluescreenview for example to find out the cause. As well the event viewer. If you want it more precise take WinDbg http://windbg.org/ and load the symbols from MS and open the actual crash dump and "analyze".
As there are only 2 drivers for GTX 980 is the first driver as well buggy? Otherwise you'll have to wait until EVGA office opens tomorrow and they will help you.
What your PSU concerns I'm not sure what you exactly mean. I'll take always two single 6(+2) PCI-e Connectors that why it's modular. 
Anyhow it's always a disturbing huzzle if you install new components at weekends if there are problems. I'll try to avoid that: never on weekends!

Scarlet-Tech
SC means that it is overclocked ever so slightly from the factory, through a bios option. If it wasn't stable at the prescribed overclock, it is dropped back to standard clocks, and sold as a standard card.

With that said, not every card is attempted, so that doesn't automatically mean the card didn't overclock well. If you like money buy the regular card and overclock it youeself. If you hate money and want it gone, buy the SC. I

 
Y, I think ref. is fine. I got one 980 ref card, and it can run benchmark @1520/2000 at stock voltage (1.206V). And I don't think every SC card can make it.

Slider6996
Ya from my experience it sadly seems that the SC edition of cards actually get worse OCs than reference models...Past 2 years i have bought SC versions and i get the worst OC with them, then i see ppl with reference get double the OC i can get so im going non SC this year when stock becomes avalible lol. 

Just got my second GTX980 ref card for SLI. It achieves much higher overclock result than my first card( 1520MHZ @ 1.206V ) and can run 3DMark Firestrike Extreme test @1565MHZ (still under stock voltage 1.206V). Really a beast.