I say that because it's preference for me and I have good airflow and don't care about a couple degree difference.
Still doesn't compete with one. If you want a single card you obviously know what you already are getting. The only reasons these are considered for Xfire is there price and in the cases where it won't work, is still very capable. People are willing to spend that money for the cases where it does work because they know it's still capable alone. And in the end if this cooler is more than capable of keeping it cool and allowing for a lot of OC room and still be quiet. Then it doesn't really matter. AIBs will only make it more quiet and cool and probably won't effect maximum OCs
So you don't care about the couple degrees difference? Then why aren't you getting reference cards? Or are you saying that you want to get the Nitro only because it looks better, not because it performs better? A little confused.
"It doesn't compete because i say so". The setup costs 1070 money and it performs in the 1070-1080 category. That's competition.
The xfire performance is the main selling point of this card in the enthusiast market right now, if you want 1070-1080 performance and you pay 1070 money you aren't going to be fine when xfire doesn't work because the single card is still capable, i certainly wouldn't be okay with knowing that half of my investment is idling.
I don't care about maximum OCs, i care about silence and low temps, something non reference cards are better at than reference cards. That is an advantage the 1070 has over 480CF for the time where the 480 will be reference only, which happens to align with the timeframe i am in the market for a 1070 or two 480s.
1070 pros:
Cooler
Quieter
No multi GPU issues
Less power consumption
480CF pros:
Probably better performance
Maybe better price/performance
I never had a multi GPU setup and want to experience the horror first hand
You see how this would be a closer call if the 480 wasn't reference only? I've already delayed the upgrade because i wanted to see what AMD is offering and because i don't really want a FE card. I'm not willing to add another month to that just to wait for the aftermarket 480s.
Regardless of all of that, i don't think there's much to argue about reference only releases being stupid and AMD being the ones who have suffered from making that decision in the past and hence should've learned a lesson.