780 vs 980...questions and experience

[testudoAubreii]

Hello,


I was just wondering a bit about the 780 (Gigabyte GTX 780 GHz Edition to be exact) and the 980 (EVGA GTX 980 SC). I know that most of the thoughts out there the same: it is definitely not worth the money for the upgrade. However, I would like to know why and what the difference is in performance.


Now, I am not too knowledgeable or technical in this area, so please forgive my ignorance. I have the 780 that was described above. I bought the 980 listed above, just to test it out. I figured that if there is a big enough of a difference to me, I would try to sell my 780. If not, I am within my return window for a full refund. I don't know, but I can tell a difference in performance, but maybe that is just me not knowing what exactly "performance" is...if that makes sense. All I know is that I was not able to totally max out games like Far Cry 4, AC: Unity, Total War, Battlefield 4 and Dying Light, to name a few. What I mean is there were always settings that I would have to tone down to get a smooth, stutter-free session of gameplay. I notice with the 980 that I can max out everything, with the exception of using higher AA settings and Nvidia DSR settings. And, for the most part it is smooth.


Without counting and monitoring FPS and all of that technical stuff, games with the 980 just "feel" better to me. I don't know if it is the placebo effect or what, but they do.


I guess I am wondering what the difference is between the two and way so many feel that it is not a viable upgrade.


Thank you in advance for all of your responses!

 

[HEXiT]

its not really a viable upgrade because both cards will max out pretty much everything you throw at it and still give a minimum of 60 fps.
@1080p your looking at maybe 10% performance difference. more or less depending on the game. go up to 4k and theres more of a difference due to more efficient architecture on the 980 but even then its not really big enough to warrant the swap for the outlay.
overall compute performance is pretty similar.
when it comes down to it the only real difference that separates them is power consumption.
price to perfomance actually makes the 780 a better buy but if you want the best then the 980 is as good as it gets atm.

 

[Casper Traberg-Larsen]

I upgraded from a MSi 780 3gb OC to the MSi 980 4gb OC.. There is a LOT of difference in power consumption, heat and noise. My 980 never reaches even 65 C, and the fan does only start spinning VERY slow (silent) when playing demanding games lile Battlefield 4 and Dying light.. However, both my 780 and 980 maxed out every game i threw at it. In pure performance, i guess the 980 is 15-20% faster than the 780 - but the main feature where the 980 excels, is the performance/power ratio and the heat and noise reduction that it gives.