Best Graphics Cards For The Money: October 2014 (Archive)

[adamovera]

We talk about the new GeForce GTX 970 and 980 in this months update, and see how these disruptive products have changed the price landscape. We also talkn about the GeForce GTX 970M, 980M, and discuss rumors of upcoming products.

Best Graphics Cards For The Money: October 2014 : Read more

 

[adamovera]

Archived comments are found here: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-2557769/graphics-cards-money-october-2014.html

 

[jl0329]

Is 970 an overkill in any game if my monitor only supports up to 1080p?

 

[Macky6]

why don't you keep the old lists? It would be useful to look at them and compare IMO.

 

[Kridian]

Staying patient for Q2 releases.

 

[rmpumper]

Is 970 an overkill in any game if my monitor only supports up to 1080p?

At the moment, yes, but only if you don't use high AA settings. But it won't be in a few months after GTA5, Witcher 3, Star Citizen, Arkham Knight, etc. will be released. I would say, get it for the peace of mind for the future and because it's still one of the best bang for your buck cards (or wait a bit for R9 300 series to compare if you have something decent for now).

 

[MeteorsRaining]

The $180-300 segment GPUs are "Enthusiast" and $300+ are "High-End"? Seems like a typo.

 

[Grognak]

So the 280 doesn't deserve a spot because its power consumption is higher than the 960, but the 290X is tied with the 970 despite having the same issue?

 

[monkeymonk]

"previously would have taken two or three previous-gen boards" sounds kind of redundant

 

[PaulBags]

I'd like to start seeing typical idle wattage listed as well as max tdp, and not just for graphics.

 

[Pirx73]

What about R9 285? I was looking to purchase this one

 

[cdrkf]

I think a 285 or a 280 is a much safer bet long term than the gtx 960. That card has a pitiful 128 bit memory bus which I can't see being sufficient moving forward. The 280 would be my pick of the three given its substantially better memory subsystem (3gb over a 384bit bus).

 

[davide445]

Still no performance chart for integrated Intel GPU? You are paid to do that?

 

[Cryio]

They should adjust the chart a bit. The 290X smokes the 780 Ti nowadays, yet it's a step higher.

 

[NinjaNerd56]

I think a 285 or a 280 is a much safer bet long term than the gtx 960. That card has a pitiful 128 bit memory bus which I can't see being sufficient moving forward. The 280 would be my pick of the three given its substantially better memory subsystem (3gb over a 384bit bus).

I 'only' have a 27inch IPS monitor, 1080p, and the EVGA SSC 960.

I was a little put off by the tiny bus, but in actual use, this card screams...very quietly.

I'm getting 160-180FPS in World Of Warplanes at max settings. In a 30 person furball, that's awesome.

No complaints.

 

[Sakkura]

The R9 285 is cheaper than the GTX 960, so your recommendation there does not make sense.

 

[xenol]

I think a 285 or a 280 is a much safer bet long term than the gtx 960. That card has a pitiful 128 bit memory bus which I can't see being sufficient moving forward. The 280 would be my pick of the three given its substantially better memory subsystem (3gb over a 384bit bus).

1. Maxwell 2's architecture has optimized how much bandwidth it needs, so it doesn't need that wide of a channel to get similar performance.
2. Memory bandwidth doesn't matter anyway if your GPU can't handle the load, if you were suggesting that the card would be better suited for something like 4K. Memory performance only really matters if you're doing something like MSAA.

 

[cdrkf]

I think a 285 or a 280 is a much safer bet long term than the gtx 960. That card has a pitiful 128 bit memory bus which I can't see being sufficient moving forward. The 280 would be my pick of the three given its substantially better memory subsystem (3gb over a 384bit bus).

1. Maxwell 2's architecture has optimized how much bandwidth it needs, so it doesn't need that wide of a channel to get similar performance.
2. Memory bandwidth doesn't matter anyway if your GPU can't handle the load, if you were suggesting that the card would be better suited for something like 4K. Memory performance only really matters if you're doing something like MSAA.

That is the point though, the R9 280, 285 and GTX 960 are all roughly equal on shader power. The 960 is power efficient, I'll give it that, however I'm certain if you put the three up against each other in a detailed set of benchies and pushed different settings (e.g. higher resolution, higher levels of AA and so on) that the AMD cards will pull in front. A 128 bit bus has no place in a card at that price point imo.

I agree it works fine according to benchmarks in current games, however what happens when you crank it up a notch to 1200, 1440, or even 1600p. Everyone thinks it's 1080 or 4k, however there are actually quite a few steps in-between. Remember the 280 is actually AMD's last gen high end GPU (a HD 7950 boost to be specific) and as such inherits the wide memory bus and such. Those cards were built for higher than 1080p and I'm certain a 280 can still achieve that, whilst the 960?

I also rate the 280 over the 285 for the same reason (despite the core enhancements to the 285). I mean if I was shopping for an nVidia card in this price segment I'd be looking to the 700 series instead. All the reviews pointed out the 960 *didn't offer any advantage performance wise over what it was replacing*. I mean it's not even like the 960 will have better API support, DX12 is coming to all nVidia cards post Fermi, and all AMD cards back to GCN 1.0.

 

[hammerstrike]

The article mentioned issues with Titan X / GM200 in SLI, but didn't describe what they are. this is the first I have heard of that. Does anyone know what they are referencing and/or have a link to the topic?

 

[wb0607]

As of 4/11/15, the gtx 960 2gb GDDR5 is only $199.99 at newegg, with cards in stock. Best Buy price-matched this for me today. Hope someone can use this info =D

 

[FormulaicWays]

I'm very grateful for these "Best" articles. However, for months now the Amazon link you provide for the R9 290X is incorrect, especially if that's where you're sourcing your price info. The link goes to an R9 290: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HJOXUKC/?tag=bom_tomshardware-20&ascsubtag=[site|thaus[cat|[art|[pid|B00HJOXUKC[tid|14287747897329983[bbc|LEPRIX

The Sapphire 290X is significantly more expensive than the 290 counterpart.

 

[Durandul]

Is 970 an overkill in any game if my monitor only supports up to 1080p?

Is 970 an overkill in any game if my monitor only supports up to 1080p?

At the moment, yes, but only if you don't use high AA settings. But it won't be in a few months after GTA5, Witcher 3, Star Citizen, Arkham Knight, etc. will be released. I would say, get it for the peace of mind for the future and because it's still one of the best bang for your buck cards (or wait a bit for R9 300 series to compare if you have something decent for now).

Is 970 an overkill in any game if my monitor only supports up to 1080p?

At the moment, yes, but only if you don't use high AA settings. But it won't be in a few months after GTA5, Witcher 3, Star Citizen, Arkham Knight, etc. will be released. I would say, get it for the peace of mind for the future and because it's still one of the best bang for your buck cards (or wait a bit for R9 300 series to compare if you have something decent for now).

If you have a >60hz monitor, it's worth it now. That being said, if you have anything more powerful than a 660 / 7850, I'd wait at least one more gen. The performance difference while staggering, doesn't mean much at 1080p. Notable exceptions are Arma 3 at ultra, and Star Citizen.

 

[friskiest]

I understand how a lot of people seems to prefer the 280/280X over the 960 which is understandable, the AMD cards have a wider bus and not to mention a GB more of RAM which should help when using AA. However, in countries where the electricity is more expensive, the power saving from a GTX 960 is more than adequate to warrant a solid recommendation. I'm happy to see Toms giving weight to efficiency aside from raw power.

 

[Sakkura]

2. Memory bandwidth doesn't matter anyway if your GPU can't handle the load, if you were suggesting that the card would be better suited for something like 4K. Memory performance only really matters if you're doing something like MSAA.

Benchmarking at multiple resolutions demonstrates that the GTX 960 is more bandwidth-bottlenecked than the R9 285.

At 900p the 285 and 960 are tied. At 1080p the 285 takes a tiny lead of 3 percentage points. As you go up to 1440p and 2160p, the gap grows to 7 and then 11 percentage points, though 2160p really isn't relevant for cards of this caliber (and even 1440p is pushing it).

But I wouldn't say the GTX 960 is crippled by it. It does extremely well for a 128-bit card. It just needs to cost $20 less to be compelling; right now it's more expensive than the R9 285 that offers slightly better performance at only a moderately higher power consumption (50-60W more, or as little as 20W more in torture tests).

 

[maratc]

No data for R9-270, GTX960, R9-280X, R9-290X on the "performance per dollar" page.