Did you find that you could overclock the SC2 as high as the FTW2 ?  

Yes it overclocked higher but it depends on the silicon lottery I guess. The FTW2 & 3 or absolutely gorgeous beastly cards. I just couldn't wait anymore and from my past experience with the FTW2 and the SC2 they both did the same job. I do prefer the 8+8 power delivery on the FTW models but like I said I couldn't tell the difference and that's what capacitors are for to sustain the voltage so the 6+8 worked fine. I think some of the other features are novelites that are just nice to have. Basically wating on a Gamers Nexus tear down and some in depth reviews on the FTW3.
 
The FTW2 was a little wider, has beautiful RGB, overclocked really about the same as my SC2 but I could push the GPU clock a little higher on the sc2 that I owned. It would sustain a higher clock during thermal throttling is what I am saying. So I guess it's all about preference, and I for one was not going to use the step up from my FTW2 to a GTX 1080ti FE. The FTW2 craftsmanship just looks a lot better than the stock TI even if it is a more powerful card, I just couldn't stare at another reference blower card again without modding it.
 
After finding out that I actually am a sucker for RGB now and confirming that the SC2 officially has RGB,  I didn't feel the need to get the FTW3 model although not to be a hypocrite here; I do think the ICX FTW3 it is the premiere GPU by EVGA.
 
Unless you really need a dual bios for custom profiles, 3 fans, probably better surface cooling on air(will see) there's not much more voltage from what I have been told that you can squeeze from the pascal architecture without actually modding the PC board. In the older days we could get away with crazy bios mods at your own risk LOL. When it comes to pushing pascal GPUs I beleieve liquid cooling is where it's at; there is some serious proof that these cards run much cooler temperatures from the hydro kits. I believe water cooling is where it's at, with a solid GPU. 
 
I am going to watch the Gamers Nexus in depth testing video again on the EVGA GTX 1080 SC2. It was fairly impressive
 

surfseattle
One of the reasons I'm looking to get the FTW3 over the SC is because of overclocking capability.  
 
 

My 1080 SC2 Overclocked higher than my 1080 FTW2, but I have no idea how much more the FTW3 will overclock vs the SC2 TI.
Gamers nexus suggested we have hit the overclocking wall on Pascal chips and unless you get lucky with a good piece of Silicon I think most the custom TI's will kick butt in their own right. Some say that they really don't need to be overclocked with the current generation of games, unless you are playing on some crazy UHD gaming settings. Bottom line is these cards are fast enough and we are looking for custom cards that can cool very efficiently well without liquid cooling.

raidersfan64

surfseattle
Yeah, I watched Steve Burke last night .... GREAT review !!
 
I actually wanted to donate a few bucks for the job those guys do.
 
But, I ended up throwing a couple bucks their way by buying one of their t-shirts for $20 instead.   
 
One thing about the silicon lottery is "binning" .... I keep hearing unsubstantiated rumor that EVGA is binning their FTW3 cards to only put the best chips on the FTW3.
 
If that's true it might be worth the extra few bucks.
 
But, I've never found out if that is true or not.

That would well be worth it if EVGA are cherry picking those GPU's, and yeah I saw those T-Shirts I am going to donate, thought they were cool. Ill send you a pm when I do some testing on my TI, and maybe you could do the same when you get your FTW3. I am really curious to see how they both perform.

 
sounds like a plan.
 
I don't know why but I get a kick out of watching Steve do his reviews, but I do.
 
What I really like is that he doesn't seem to give a damn about dissing a feature if they can't validate the value.
 
Like with the holes on the EVGA fan face plate or the "copper back" to the Aorus Xtreme.... both he says are just "marketing".
 
Sorta gives his whole deal more credibility.