The Bottom Line
Introduction, Pricing & Availability
MSI had one of the strongest line-ups of GeForce GTX 10 series cards, with a top-to-bottom range of cards that catered to each segment of the market. This stretched from the GTX 1050 right up to the GTX 1080, led by the GTX 1080 Gaming X series of cards.
The company recently launched its new QuickSilver line of graphics cards, which we're looking at today - the MSI GeForce GTX 1070 QuickSilver 8G OC. What does it offer over the already strong Gaming X range? A premium design, with a custom look - for those building a specifically themed gaming PC with a silver streak, the new GTX 1070 QuickSilver 8G OC is what you're after.
We already know MSI has some of the best cooling technology on the market for graphics cards, so it should come as no surprise that MSI deployed their Twin Frozr VI cooler on the GTX 1070 QuickSilver 8G OC. Throughout our testing - which involved countless hours of Overwatch, the card made no sound at all - only through our synthetic benchmarking which thrashes the card, did it begin to make just the slightest noise from its cooler.
MSI compliments the GeForce GTX 1070 QuickSilver 8G OC with its own MSI Z170A XPOWER Gaming Titanium motherboard, which has the same black/silver/titanium style.
Specs, Cooling Tech & Detailed Look
Specifications
How does the GTX 1070 QuickSilver 8G OC differ from the GTX 1070 Founders Edition, and GTX 1070 Gaming X? Let's talk clock speeds, then. We have the same 8GB of GDDR5 RAM, which is clocked at 8GHz for the most part - while in OC mode it's 100Mhz faster.
We have the same 3 x DisplayPort 1.4, 1 x HDMI 2.0, and 1 x DVI for display connectivity. The card has 1 x 8-pin, 1 x 6-pin PCIe power connector, drawing just 150W of power. There's no need for 500W+ PSUs with a fast card like this.
MSI has pushed the GTX 1070 QuickSilver 8G OC and its GP104 GPU to 1797MHz boost, in OC mode - but there are 3 modes.
GPU clocks:
- Silent Mode: 1506/1683MHz
- Gaming Mode: 1582/1771MHz
- OC Mode: 1607/1797MHz
VRAM clocks:
- Silent Mode: 8008MHz
- Gaming Mode: 8008MHz
- OC Mode: 8108MHz
Twin Frozr VI Still Kicks Ass
MSI has used its faithful Twin Frozr VI cooling technology on the GTX 1070 QuickSilver 8G OC, the same cooling tech used on its previous graphics cards in the GTX 10 series. There's nothing different here, other than the color scheme used.
Detailed Look
The big draw card of MSI's new GeForce GTX 1070 Quick Silver 8G OC is the style, which we're going to look at right now.
On the back of the card, we have MSI's signature Gaming Series dragon logo - something I love.
On top, MSI has used Quick Silver branding with some LEDs that will light up when the system is on.
Here we go: the MSI Quick Silver logo lit up with its LEDs.
Testing Methodology & Test Setup Configuration
Testing Method
The games with built-in benchmarks were run on Ultra (or their highest preset, but by another name) with AA (anti-aliasing) disabled. Overwatch and Battlefield 1 are run in real-time multiplayer matches, with their highest settings enabled and once again, AA disabled. We played two full-length games (5-10 minutes each) of Overwatch, while we played around 5 minutes of BF1 64-player matches in Conquest mode playing in one map with clear weather, and another map with dynamic weather and then averaged the results from these two runs.
This will provide us with enough variety, but I'm on the hunt for new benchmarks all the time. Now that both Deus Ex: Mankind Divided and Battlefield 1 are here, I've now revamped my entire graphics card review structure to include those games. Both of them work with DX12, so we can get a good look at the performance not just between DX11 and DX12, but the performance difference between AMD and NVIDIA in both DX11 and DX12.
Included in our changes of the games we play and test, is Overwatch. Overwatch is a great game to test to see how the mid-range cards like the GeForce GTX 1050 Ti, because it can easily hit 60FPS, and still be a great looking game that is incredibly fun, too. We run Overwatch in real-time matches with 12 players, with all of the intensity, explosions, energy beams and everything else happening - I have a really fun job.
Test System Configuration
Anthony's Video Card Test System Specifications
- Motherboard: ASUS Rampage V Extreme - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
- CPU: Intel Core i7 5960X - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
- Cooler: Corsair H110 - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
- Memory: Kingston 16GB (4x4GB) HyperX Predator DDR4 3000MHz - Buy from Amazon
- Storage #1: SanDisk Extreme II 240GB - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
- Storage #2: Intel 730 Series 480GB - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
- Case: Lian Li PC-T80 Open-Air - Buy from Amazon
- Power Supply: Corsair AX1500i - Buy from Amazon / Read our review
- OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Home 64-bit - Buy from Amazon
- Drivers: NVIDIA GeForce 375.57 and AMD Catalyst 16.10.2 hotfix
Benchmarks - Synthetic
3DMark Fire Strike - 1080p
3DMark has been a staple benchmark for years now, all the way back to when The Matrix was released and Futuremark had bullet time inspired benchmarks. 3DMark is the perfect tool to see if your system - most important, your CPU and GPU - is performing as it should. You can search results for your GPU, to see if it falls in line with other systems based on similar hardware.
3DMark Fire Strike - 1440p
3DMark has been a staple benchmark for years now, all the way back to when The Matrix was released and Futuremark had bullet time inspired benchmarks. 3DMark is the perfect tool to see if your system - most important, your CPU and GPU - is performing as it should. You can search results for your GPU, to see if it falls in line with other systems based on similar hardware.
3DMark Fire Strike - 4K
3DMark has been a staple benchmark for years now, all the way back to when The Matrix was released and Futuremark had bullet time inspired benchmarks. 3DMark is the perfect tool to see if your system - most important, your CPU and GPU - is performing as it should. You can search results for your GPU, to see if it falls in line with other systems based on similar hardware.
Heaven - 1080p
Heaven is an intensive GPU benchmark that really pushes your silicon to its limits. It's another favorite of ours as it has some great scaling for multi-GPU testing, and it's great for getting your GPU to 100% for power and noise testing.
Heaven - 1440p
Heaven is an intensive GPU benchmark that really pushes your silicon to its limits. It's another favorite of ours as it has some great scaling for multi-GPU testing, and it's great for getting your GPU to 100% for power and noise testing.
Heaven - 4K
Heaven is an intensive GPU benchmark that really pushes your silicon to its limits. It's another favorite of ours as it has some great scaling for multi-GPU testing, and it's great for getting your GPU to 100% for power and noise testing.
Benchmarks @ 1080p
1080p Benchmarks
Battlefield 1 is the latest and greatest first-person shooter from EA DICE, powered by the incredibly beautiful and high-end Frostbite engine. It has DX11 and DX12 support, so we test both - it's one of the games we run in real-time 64-player multiplayer matches.
You can buy Battlefield 1 at Amazon.
Far Cry Primal is a game built on the impressive Dunia Engine 2 with wide open, beautiful environments. It might look stunning, but the performance is actually quite good - but most cards will be stressed at 1440p, and especially so at 4K and beyond.
You can buy Far Cry Primal at Amazon.
We recently changed over to Metro: Last Light Redux, with developer 4A Games making the Redux version of Metro: Last Light the 'definitive' version of the game. Redux had a fresh coat of paint on the already impressive 4A Engine, and it really pushes our GPUs to their limits.
You can buy Metro: Last Light Redux at Amazon.
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor is one of the most graphically intensive games we test, with Monolith using their own Lithtech engine to power the game. When cranked up to maximum detail, it will chew through your GPU and its VRAM like it's nothing.
You can buy Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor at Amazon.
Tomb Raider is still such a gorgeous game, with developer Crystal Dynamics using their own 'Foundation' engine to build Lara Croft into the new world. One of the best parts about Tomb Raider is the absolutely stellar multi-GPU scaling, so this is an important test to see how well our NVIDIA GeForce SLI and AMD Radeon CrossFire setups scale.
You can buy Tomb Raider at Amazon.
Benchmarks @ 1440p
1440p Benchmarks
Battlefield 1 is the latest and greatest first-person shooter from EA DICE, powered by the incredibly beautiful and high-end Frostbite engine. It has DX11 and DX12 support, so we test both - it's one of the games we run in real-time 64-player multiplayer matches.
You can buy Battlefield 1 at Amazon.
Far Cry Primal is a game built on the impressive Dunia Engine 2 with wide open, beautiful environments. It might look stunning, but the performance is actually quite good - but most cards will be stressed at 1440p, and especially so at 4K and beyond.
You can buy Far Cry Primal at Amazon.
We recently changed over to Metro: Last Light Redux, with developer 4A Games making the Redux version of Metro: Last Light the 'definitive' version of the game. Redux had a fresh coat of paint on the already impressive 4A Engine, and it really pushes our GPUs to their limits.
You can buy Metro: Last Light Redux at Amazon.
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor is one of the most graphically intensive games we test, with Monolith using their own Lithtech engine to power the game. When cranked up to maximum detail, it will chew through your GPU and its VRAM like it's nothing.
You can buy Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor at Amazon.
Tomb Raider is still such a gorgeous game, with developer Crystal Dynamics using their own 'Foundation' engine to build Lara Croft into the new world. One of the best parts about Tomb Raider is the absolutely stellar multi-GPU scaling, so this is an important test to see how well our NVIDIA GeForce SLI and AMD Radeon CrossFire setups scale.
You can buy Tomb Raider at Amazon.
Benchmarks @ 4K
4K Benchmarks
Battlefield 1 is the latest and greatest first-person shooter from EA DICE, powered by the incredibly beautiful and high-end Frostbite engine. It has DX11 and DX12 support, so we test both - it's one of the games we run in real-time 64-player multiplayer matches.
You can buy Battlefield 1 at Amazon.
Far Cry Primal is a game built on the impressive Dunia Engine 2 with wide open, beautiful environments. It might look stunning, but the performance is actually quite good - but most cards will be stressed at 1440p, and especially so at 4K and beyond.
You can buy Far Cry Primal at Amazon.
We recently changed over to Metro: Last Light Redux, with developer 4A Games making the Redux version of Metro: Last Light the 'definitive' version of the game. Redux had a fresh coat of paint on the already impressive 4A Engine, and it really pushes our GPUs to their limits.
You can buy Metro: Last Light Redux at Amazon.
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor is one of the most graphically intensive games we test, with Monolith using their own Lithtech engine to power the game. When cranked up to maximum detail, it will chew through your GPU and its VRAM like it's nothing.
You can buy Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor at Amazon.
Tomb Raider is still such a gorgeous game, with developer Crystal Dynamics using their own 'Foundation' engine to build Lara Croft into the new world. One of the best parts about Tomb Raider is the absolutely stellar multi-GPU scaling, so this is an important test to see how well our NVIDIA GeForce SLI and AMD Radeon CrossFire setups scale.
You can buy Tomb Raider at Amazon.
Performance Summary & Final Thoughts
Performance Summary
We all know what the performance was going to be right out of the gate: slightly better than NVIDIA's own GeForce GTX 1070 Founders Edition and MSI's own GeForce GTX 1070 Gaming X 8G. People wanting to buy the GTX 1070 Quick Silver 8G OC are buying it for the specific style, for a specific gaming PC.
It's an incredible card - as are nearly all GTX 1070s, but MSI has put some special touches on the GTX 1070 when it comes to the physical look. The performance is what we expected, 1080p/1440p 60FPS gaming is no problem for the MSI GeForce GTX 1070 Quick Silver 8G OC, as well as 4K gaming - tone some details down, and you'll hit 60FPS easily.
Final Thoughts
MSI hits yet another home run with the GeForce GTX 1070 Quick Silver 8G OC, as expected. It truly is a beautiful graphics card, something that I need to push MSI for - I need to keep the Quick Silver graphics card and use their new Z270 motherboards for a silver/black themed gaming PC. MSI, this isn't my fault - it's your fault for making such a great looking graphics card.
This is something I really admire about MSI as a company: there's no need for the GTX 1070 Quick Silver 8G OC, as they already have multiple GTX 1070s in their arsenal. MSI does this for the fans, for new markets, for emerging markets, for specifically targeted markets - like PC gamers who want to build a black/silver themed PC with the GTX 1070 Quick Silver 8G OC graphics card.
If you're in the market to build a new gaming PC, or even have a black/silver theme, the MSI GeForce GTX 1070 Quick Silver 8G OC graphics card is the perfect choice. If I had to be pushing you, two of these in SLI would not only look great, but the performance would be out of this world.
Performance (overclocking, power) | 95% |
Quality (build, design, cooling) | 100% |
General Features (display outputs, etc) | 95% |
Bundle, Packaging & Software | 95% |
Value for Money | 95% |
Overall | 96% |
The Bottom Line: MSI provides a sleek graphics card for a silver/black/titanium themed PC with its GeForce GTX 1070 Quick Silver 8G OC, mix it with the MSI Z170A XPOWER Gaming Titanium motherboard for a potent, but stylish gaming PC.
PRICING: You can find products similar to this one for sale below.
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Canada: Find other tech and computer products like this over at Amazon.ca
Deutschland: Finde andere Technik- und Computerprodukte wie dieses auf Amazon.de
What's in Anthony's PC?
- CPU: Intel Core i5-12600K
- MOTHERBOARD: GIGABYTE Z690 AERO-G
- RAM: Corsair 32GB DDR4-3200
- GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 24GB
- SSD: Sabrent 4TB Rocket 4 Plus
- OS: Windows 11 Pro
- CASE: Lian Li O11 Dynamic XL
- PSU: ASUS ROG Strix 850W
- KEYBOARD: Logitech G915 Wireless
- MOUSE: Logitech G502X Wireless
- MONITOR: LG C3 48-inch OLED TV 4K 120Hz
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