It is possible to break 200w barrier with 970 but you need 8+6 or 8+8 pin model for that. 6+6 pin and 8-pin models are limited lower. Gigabyte G1 is one example of a card that is normally never power limited.
I still think bluebox has a little bit overoptimistic UPS. It is possible to gain nice power savings without losing too much performance with these cards but those number are too low. I might be wrong though.
Bluebox, try mem speed of 4000MHz or even higher, you should be really close to 22MH.
970's of any brand aren't spec'd to pull more than 145W max (as are mine), likely with with clocks and fans maxed, so I don't see how you could "break 200W"
http://www.geforce.com/hardware/desktop-gpus/geforce-gtx-970/specificationsNumber of pins/connectors used doesn't change the amount of power it requires in operation, it's only how power is drawn from the ps.
I don't have an "overly optimistic UPS" (APC backups 1500), it reads watts, volts and amperage on a continuous basis better than a "kill-o-watt" meter. Sheesh — I'm an electrical engineer and operate a 1700-core HPC cluster in my day job... Like I said, the mobo, ps, drives etc. draw about 70W during operation, and the cards each can be monitored for %TDP in software (afterburner, precisionX, etc). The numbers add up to what the UPS is reading out, I have no doubt it's correct particularly when modifying clocks and observing power changes.
4000MHz is too unstable, the miner reports bad nonce values from the GPU. Backing down to 3700 solved all issues.
