Battle of the Titans (GTX 970 and GTX 980)

[Amedinno]

Hello! I'm building my friend a gaming PC and I want to know;


3-way Zotac GTX 970 AMP! Extreme vs 2-way GTX 980 Classified

Which one is better?

And he's going to buy a surround (not virtual, real surround) headset, does he need a sound card?

 

[Dunlop0078]

Sli 980s will be better in most games. The classified is a waste of money if your not going to water cool and overclock them thats what the classified is for.

 

[Lannister in the North]

For multi GPU setups there are some serious diminishing returns.
I would never recommend going over 2 GPU's, beyond that point any extra GPU will simply not be worth it.
GTX 980 sli looks like the best option.

As for the headset it really depends on the headset and your motherboard of choosing;

 

[Dunlop0078]

Every decent motherboard out there is going to have built in sound so you dont need a sound card.

 

[dzsonni]

Not every motherboard has 7.1 or they are really crappy.

If you spend the money on a real surround headset a sound card shouldnt be too much of a stretch.

The general rule with new builds is, get the BEST card you can buy(single) and if there is no better one get another.

Regarding 3 way SLI the performance boost of the third card is around 30-40% of the original card, overall it gives about 10-20% extra for the system. From 100fps you will jump to 120-130fps.