660 TI or 7950 or 670

[d00mdragon]

I am new to the forums and new to computer builds. I am building a mid level rig. Here is what I have so far.

amd 8350 vishera

Western Digital WD Black WD1002FAEX 1TB

CORSAIR HX Series HX750 750W

G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) came with the mother board

ASUS SABERTOOTH 990FX R2.0 AM3+ AMD 990FX

COUGAR Solution Black Steel ATX Mid

not sure what gpu to get I was originally looking at the
EVGA 02G-P4-3664-KR GeForce GTX 660 Ti FTW Signature2 2GB
or
EVGA 02G-P4-3667-KR GeForce GTX 660 Ti FTW 2GB(couldnt figure out the difference between the two except price)

But I then was reading about the 192 bit memory limitations with the 660 ti especially when dealing with anti aliasing.
That lead me to the 7950
GIGABYTE GV-R795WF3-3GD Radeon HD 7950 3GB 384-bit

However I am more a fan of nvidia and so by toms hardware review of the best 670s I was looking at
GIGABYTE GV-N670OC-2GD GeForce GTX 670 2GB 256-bit

I would like to stay at $300 range but I am ok with the $400 range if that is what is best for my build.

 

[d00mdragon]

Yeah this is the best, a 7970 beats a GTX670 but is the same price.

I like nvidia better but which 7970 would you get. I forget which one the review says to get.

 

[darkspartenwarrior]

Sapphire or MSi(Lightning). The MSi is expensive but it has a custom PCB for even better overclocking and factory overclocks, both have great cooling solutions.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-7970-overclock-review,3186.html

 

[d00mdragon]

Sapphire or MSi(Lightning). The MSi is expensive but it has a custom PCB for even better overclocking and factory overclocks, both have great cooling solutions.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-7970-overclock-review,3186.html

both the 7970 msi(lightning)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127677
and the sapphire
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202008
are more expensive than the 670
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125423
and I am more a fan of nvidia I think they make better quality.
so my question to every one is which is the best and why? also price is a big point.

 

[darkspartenwarrior]

both the 7970 msi(lightning)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127677
and the sapphire
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202008
are more expensive than the 670
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125423
and I am more a fan of nvidia I think they make better quality.
so my question to every one is which is the best and why? also price is a big point.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131468

7970 is faster overall and for 3D applications such as rendering or designing it will perform better due to better directcompute and OpenCL(Nvidia opencl SUCKS). The build quality is also better because AMD stock design has more stock VRMs and higher quality stock capacitors(although depending on who you buy from the quality may vary), also the 7970 consumes less power and produces less heat at idle(at load it's the other way around).

670 is slower and build quality depends on the specific model you get, if you get one with a custom PCB/Chips then the build quality may vary(Asus/EVGA FTW among others)

Again I'd reccomend a 7970

 

[d00mdragon]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131468

7970 is faster overall and for 3D applications such as rendering or designing it will perform better due to better directcompute and OpenCL(Nvidia opencl SUCKS). The build quality is also better because AMD stock design has more stock VRMs and higher quality stock capacitors(although depending on who you buy from the quality may vary), also the 7970 consumes less power and produces less heat at idle(at load it's the other way around).

670 is slower and build quality depends on the specific model you get, if you get one with a custom PCB/Chips then the build quality may vary(Asus/EVGA FTW among others)

Again I'd reccomend a 7970

ok well with that in mind I was looking at the sappire you suggested it looks really nice I wish I could get the msi but it is too much. Would you go for the sappire or the power color. I like what I read on the sappire. plus like you said it is easy to over clock.

 

[d00mdragon]

The 670 I was looking at was a gigabyte windforce 3x which got toms hardware award recommend buy of 2012. but it still has a smaller memory bandwidth which is a lot of the reasons the 670 and especially the 660ti are slower than there competitors under heavy load.

 

[swilczak]

The AMD fx 8350 is a good CPU. Some games just aren't optimized to work well with AMD's new arcitecture like Skyrim. I bet in the future game developers will be making games that work better with AMD, especially if the next generation consoles have AMD cpu's like they are suppose to.

 

[darkspartenwarrior]

They are both mostly stock cards however the Sapphire cools better but on the flip side it is a 3 slot so it is less compatible with future CF, it depends on whether you want performance now or expandability later.

 

[d00mdragon]

I think I am going to go with the sapphire.

 

[d00mdragon]

do you know if I need to get a video card bracket for the sapphire.

 

[Guest]

Yes GTX 670 is better than the 7950, but it also costs $50+ more. Personally I would get the GTX 670 if you have the money to do so, It's a great card and nvidia offers some good extra features over AMD (adaptive vsync, physx, 3d vision, and so on).

Try $80 more the new 7950 boost's that are coming out are every bit as good as the gtx 670's.MSI 7950 twin frozr is clocked at 960 mhz and runs neck and neck with a gtx 670 for $80 less.I miht be in the minoroty here but no question for me it would be the 7950 and not even close.

 

[d00mdragon]

so was doing research and learned about the ghz editions of the 7970 is it worth getting? the one that I found was a giga byte version.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125439
I am probably going to just get the sapphire 7970 today.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125439

Has anyone seen a better price?

 

[burntpizza]

HD 7970 ghz is HD 7970 operating at a core speed of 1 ghz. They are the exact same card

You can either overclock your HD 7970 to 1 ghz or some people had luck flashing the bios to a ghz edition

 

[jimbaladin]

You can't beat 7950's for value, overclocked they are incredible.

 

[Guest]

Only reason to get a GHZ edition is if you do not overclock otherwize any 7970 at 1 ghz will have the exact same performance.

 

[d00mdragon]

ok thanks every one I am going to be buying the sapphire 7970