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seafire01

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Dec 25, 2012
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My best friend has entrusted me in spending his money on a gaming pc. He plays World of Tanks heavily, BF3 heavily, and Far Cry 3 heavily. He only has been able to play BF3 and FC3 on PS3 but he says that he is not using a console any more.


Approximate Purchase Date: e.g.: In about 2 weeks
Budget Range: $2300 - 2500
System Usage from Most to Least Important: Gaming, Youtube, Graphic Arts (Photoshop, etc.)
Are you buying a monitor: No
Parts to Buy: ALL other than monitor, mouse and keyboard
Do you need to buy OS: No
Preferred Website(s) for Parts: Newegg and Amazon
Location: USA, specifically South Carolina
Parts Preferences: He doesn't care that much, but he's always preferred Intel and Nvidia.
Overclocking: Probably
SLI or Crossfire: Yes, now or in the future
Your Monitor Resolution: 1920x1080
Additional Comments: BF3, FC3, Skyrim, World of Tanks. He says that he wants all emphasis on the GPU(S)
And Most Importantly, Why Are You Upgrading: His computer is weak and he wants to upgrade.

He wants to have the same case as mine: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811146073&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_sp=&AID=10446076&PID=3938566&SID=
 
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You brought it up, lol, I simply said I recommended the 500watt build series psu, some dude in another thread said it was bad, I linked that it had a 60% 5* which is pretty good, I don't know why you keep talking about the 430, the other dude in the other thread I quoted actually said the 500watt psu with 60% 5* was junk, and the only good builder series psu is the 430, which you seem to claim is really bad further proving that man's misinformation; You say the update was huge, I agree it was huge for amd, so find me a benchmark on 660vs7870, everyone I have seen the 660 wins, on the benchmarks, on the drivers, and on the price; I would like to get an fx but the single core performance is just too bad for me to tolerate I think, though that 8350 is tempting, we'll see what steamroller comes out with; They could catch up as intel is going for the tablet/laptop market with haswell, so I doubt it will be any different performance wise, to the 3570k.
 
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I never said being new wasn't important, just that unless you provide sources, the 660 wins with what I have seen. 660 seems to be handling itself pretty damn well there, I don't mind it losing by 5 fps in some games, at 1920x1200 and winning in others even at the oddboll resoltuion of 1920x1200. It's funny they dont benchmark the 1920x1080, seeing as that is 85% of the marketplace.

Just looking it over, it wins in 6/10 of those graphs, and is cheaper. I am not counting that odd 7870 special edition or something, a typical stock 660 vs a typical stock 7870 even at 1920x1200(if this was 1920x1080 the 7870 wouldn't even have 4 wins) simply wins. And it's cheaper, and has better drivers/optimizations for future games with physx support, + handles micro-stuttering better, as best performance for the money is SLI 660s. I think you've proved my point good sir.

-Prax :sol:
 
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^ I think they prefer the 16:10, same for their 1280x800 and 1680x1050
I would buy a 1200p screen if they weren't so much more expensive just to get more vertical space 😛

Well those benchmarks you posted only had the 660 matching the 7870 or beating it by 10+ fps in 2 cases but both cards were at or above 60fps avg. The 7870 was handling itself pretty well back there too. Now the 660 trails only by a bit for the most part or with only 2 games having AMD win by 10+fps


 
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The graphs I linked were +10-20 fps higher, or it broke even. In these benchmarks the 7870 looses by 10-20 fps or wins by 5-10. And it wins in 4/10 graphs. It also took 8months for it to even do that lol. Keep in mind both benchmarks, mine and yours, are not 1920x1080(But instead use this 1920x1200) if they were, the 660 would win everytime.

Arkham City: 660=68.5 7870=67.9; .6 fps difference 660 favored

BF3: 660=49.7 7870=53.8; 4.1 fps difference, 7870 favored

Borderlands 2: 660=88.6 vs 7870=74.8; 13.8 fps difference, 660 favored

Crysis 2: 660=46.1 vs 7870=48.6; 2.5 fps difference, 7870 favored

Diablo 3: 660=111.9 vs 7870=102.5; 9.4 fps difference, 660 favored

Max Payne 3: 660=51.1 vs 7870=58.9; 7.9 fps difference, 7870 favored

Metro 2033: 660=21.7 vs 7870=23.4; 1.7 fps difference, 7870 favored

Star Craft II: 660=166.8 vs 7870=150; 16.8 fps difference, 660 favored

Shogun 2: 660=41 vs 7870=38; 3 fps difference, 660 favored

Skyrim: 660=59.1 vs 7870=68.9; 9.8 fps difference, 7870 favored

So technically they are equal, but the 660 is cheaper and has better drivers/sli scaling/handling of micro-stuttering/won't take 8 months to get best performance out of new games, I know what I want lol and if you could believe it, I am a huge AMD fanboy, but this 6870 setup will be nvidia sli 660 soon enough.

-Prax :sol:

 
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Once you consider all games, the 7870 comes out ahead
There is a 10% diff in pixels from 1200p to 1080p, and this does show effects of the memory bottleneck on 660 which will only be more apparent as you SLI on higehr resolutions
drivers is the only weak AMD link IMO, all issues they have can be traced to that bu they have been improving

The 660 may be a better price/perf buy now but not for SLI/CF IMO but I would not say they are equal, the 7870 has more performance

perfrel_1920.gif
 
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It isn't; They trade blows in things that matter, relative performance graphs lol; And AMD has the better hardware on paper but when it gets into games, ESPECIALLY NEW ONES, they are terrible and take a while to catch up, and their micro-stuttering is more severe. I have been on both sides of the fence, and nvidia is superior. Anyway, I am going to go watch star trek,

-Prax :sol:
 
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So we agree, there are outliers that skew your relative performance benchmarks. We also agree that its best to compare benchmarks of games separately to avoid these skewed results :pt1cable:

-Prax :kaola:
 
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I don't get it, can you explain it with dragons? 😗
 
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