EzikMezik wroteSince opening the case helped with the temps my guess would be an airflow issue, what fans are you using in your case?
However it still shouldn't run that hot... Have you overclocked it or changed any parameters in softwares like afterburner/precision X? And what exactly do you mean by struggling to keep it under 80? What temperatures are we talking about?
TjMax for cards like the 970 is 95 degrees, anything below that will not throttle the card.
The exhaust fan is a cooler master fan, and the intake is a Thermaltake.
The case is a mid tower cooler master
Temps I'm talking about are 77~80C , It doesn't go above 80 because that's the temp limit I set in afterburner, it throttles when it goes over that.
I know that anything below 95 is "safe" but still like you said it shouldn't go up to 80C without me OC'ing it.