Advice for buying a new graphics card.

[snakehelah]

Hey guys.
I would just like some opinions on what graphics card I should buy, as I am looking to upgrade for gaming. I'll try to provide as much info without writing too much.

First of all, I am probably going to buy it in 1 month or during the month. My budget is around 300$ (I am converting this to $ as I am european, also the prices may vary from region to region I guess)
Obviously I am going to be gaming with this card. I am not a "graphics whore" so my attitude isn't "Omg this isn't max settings with 60fps won't play". Usually I play RTS and RPG games, league, dota, mass effect, that sort of stuff. But from time to time I do like to play the occasional Battlefield 3 and Skyrim. Most of the time I will play big titles that come out (GTA , Skyrim, Etc) so obviously I need something that would run new stuff at high or medium.

I currently have a lowtier crap card nvidia geforce 440GT 2gb version. When I built my PC I didn't have money to crank in a fancy graphics card so I just used my old one. (That's why I'm uprading now) My other specs are as follows:
Power supply: 500W Corsair CX500 (http://)
CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition
Ram: 4 GB (I can upgrade to more though as ram are pretty cheap)

I do not prefer some specific brand or whatever, I am all open to ideas. Thanks!

 

[RazerZ]

Which country are you located at? Also what is the ram frequency

 

[kirilmatthew]

My recommendation is the radeon 7970. It costs $280 in NA. It play games at ultra at 1080p. However, I recommend waiting for the next-gen radeon cards coming out in October. The 9950 will replace the 7970 and will probably be a bit better. It might be a good option too. hope this helps!

 

[swilczak]

The Radeon 7950 would be a good choice, with it's recent price drop to around $220 you can't go wrong because it's a high end card and will run anything you throw at it smoothly with maxed out settings other than Crysis 3. It also comes with some free games.

 

[beta212]

Wait at least until the new AMD R-200 launches, prices will probably drop in general. And since everything below the Gtx 770 and the 770 itself is a rebrand (the 770 is a rebrand of the 680), and from amd every thing below the R9 290 is rumored to be (not including 290) a rebrand(of 7xxx cards), buying old cards should be okay.

 

[snakehelah]

Which country are you located at? Also what is the ram frequency

I am Lithuanian. RAM is DDR3 PC3-10600 (1333MHz) (Corsair 4GB stick) Also A bit concerned about bottlenecks as people are suggesting 7970s. Lol.

 

[nokiddingboss]

go with a 7970 if your budget can allow it, otherwise stick with either a gtx760 or an hd 7950. that is all there is to it buddy.

 

[snakehelah]

Well, for some reason the cards you guys listed cost 150 $ more in eu than in US.

 

[nokiddingboss]

Well, for some reason the cards you guys listed cost 150 $ more in eu than in US.

then i guess you are stuck with either a 7870 or a 660. maybe dip into 650ti boost/7850 territory if the price fluctuation is too severe.

 

[snakehelah]

Well, for some reason the cards you guys listed cost 150 $ more in eu than in US.

then i guess you are stuck with either a 7870 or a 660. maybe dip into 650ti boost/7850 territory if the price fluctuation is too severe.

Hmm, the 7870 costs 250$. You think I should go for it or are there some other alternatives? The 650TI costs 200$, which one has the better performance though?

 

[swilczak]

7870 is better than the 650ti and it's even slightly better than the 660. It's a good card go for it.

 

[snakehelah]

7870 is better than the 650ti and it's even slightly better than the 660. It's a good card go for it.

Thanks. I will probably go for the 7870... Unless there are any other alternatives I should look at?