Graphics card upgrade

[rcfant89]

I am looking to upgrade my graphics card and would like suggestions. I have read a few articles and it seems to me that the GTX 970 would be the card for me at my price range (around $300). I have read about the 3.5GB + .5GB thing but it still seems the performance is better than any other card at that price.

I will be running everything on 1920x1200 resolution with the pc in the signature. I also read that some people were having issues so I would like to know if this card will work ok with my pc. Thanks for your thoughts.

 

[nucolos]

umm, i dont see your system on your signature. but it doesnt matter, the 970 is a great card, even with that memory problem, and at 1200p you wont even use all of the ram, (except with a heavily modded skyrim),
Personally i would wait until amd releases the new line up at the end of the month. But according to rumours they will not release a brand new gpu for $300, but rather re brand the 290x into a 380x and lower its price.

 

[Azn Cracker]

Err well an AMD 290x is actually better performance for the price (besides on a few games like project cars). $280 after rebate. Downside is it consumes more power. This will equal to a couple dollars more electricity each year depending on where you live and how much you use it (~$10)

The 3.5 gb debacle should not matter much at 1920 resolutions.

 

[WildCard999]

Theres also the R9 290X.

 

[misinformedman]

At a $300 ceiling, That sounds like a great card for your build. 3-4gb of VRAM should be just fine at 1080p for the foreseeable future. There are three things that affect how much VRAM your game is using. 1. Resolution, 2. Texture Quality and 3. Anti-Aliasing. The reason we're starting to see cards with even more than 4gb of ram is to cover people running dual monitors or 4k displays. 1080p is so far below 4k, that if you stick there you should be just fine keeping the texture quality and AA at max or close in anything that comes out in the next few years.

As for recommendations, I feel like you've hit the nail on the head with the 970. You could get an AMD card in that range, like the 290x, but I feel like the power efficiency benefits of Maxwell, and NVidia's stronger drivers outweigh AMD's offering.

Have you considered buying from a source like Amazon Warehouse Deals? I see cards 20-30% off there all the time.

 

[Azn Cracker]

At a $300 ceiling, That sounds like a great card for your build. 3-4gb of VRAM should be just fine at 1080p for the foreseeable future. There are three things that affect how much VRAM your game is using. 1. Resolution, 2. Texture Quality and 3. Anti-Aliasing. The reason we're starting to see cards with even more than 4gb of ram is to cover people running dual monitors or 4k displays. 1080p is so far below 4k, that if you stick there you should be just fine keeping the texture quality and AA at max or close in anything that comes out in the next few years.

As for recommendations, I feel like you've hit the nail on the head with the 970. You could get an AMD card in that range, like the 290x, but I feel like the power efficiency benefits of Maxwell, and NVidia's stronger drivers outweigh AMD's offering.

Have you considered buying from a source like Amazon Warehouse Deals? I see cards 20-30% off there all the time.

I don't really understand the whole power efficiency thing. Unless you live in hawaii or something, power in the US is cheap so it will only be a couple dollars a year more for electricity. The 970 costs $50-$60 more.

Kinda ironic, you should get a hawaii gpu in hawaii lol.

---

I guess having a more effiicient gpu will allow you to get a cheaper psu. In that case it will equalize the cost.

--
Also directx 12 is coming in a month or 2 and it should benefit amd cards more than nvidia cards.

 

[misinformedman]

At a $300 ceiling, That sounds like a great card for your build. 3-4gb of VRAM should be just fine at 1080p for the foreseeable future. There are three things that affect how much VRAM your game is using. 1. Resolution, 2. Texture Quality and 3. Anti-Aliasing. The reason we're starting to see cards with even more than 4gb of ram is to cover people running dual monitors or 4k displays. 1080p is so far below 4k, that if you stick there you should be just fine keeping the texture quality and AA at max or close in anything that comes out in the next few years.

As for recommendations, I feel like you've hit the nail on the head with the 970. You could get an AMD card in that range, like the 290x, but I feel like the power efficiency benefits of Maxwell, and NVidia's stronger drivers outweigh AMD's offering.

Have you considered buying from a source like Amazon Warehouse Deals? I see cards 20-30% off there all the time.

I don't really understand the whole power efficiency thing. Unless you live in hawaii or something, power in the US is cheap so it will only be a couple dollars a year more for electricity. The 970 costs $50-$60 more.

Kinda ironic, you should get a hawaii gpu in hawaii lol.

---

I guess having a more effiicient gpu will allow you to get a cheaper psu. In that case it will equalize the cost a bit.

Truth be told it's not a major issue, hence why so many people still buy AMD offerings. In my experience, less power means less heat generated, which means less aggressive cooling is needed, leading to quieter fans.

This can be seen in that the 970 runs at 37 dbA at load whereas the 290X runs at 50 dbA per load (according to techpowerup) which significantly and noticeably louder. Not only that but if you live in a little apartment or a small dorm room, that can actually make a difference in the temperature of your room with extended gaming sessions.

 

[Azn Cracker]

At a $300 ceiling, That sounds like a great card for your build. 3-4gb of VRAM should be just fine at 1080p for the foreseeable future. There are three things that affect how much VRAM your game is using. 1. Resolution, 2. Texture Quality and 3. Anti-Aliasing. The reason we're starting to see cards with even more than 4gb of ram is to cover people running dual monitors or 4k displays. 1080p is so far below 4k, that if you stick there you should be just fine keeping the texture quality and AA at max or close in anything that comes out in the next few years.

As for recommendations, I feel like you've hit the nail on the head with the 970. You could get an AMD card in that range, like the 290x, but I feel like the power efficiency benefits of Maxwell, and NVidia's stronger drivers outweigh AMD's offering.

Have you considered buying from a source like Amazon Warehouse Deals? I see cards 20-30% off there all the time.

I don't really understand the whole power efficiency thing. Unless you live in hawaii or something, power in the US is cheap so it will only be a couple dollars a year more for electricity. The 970 costs $50-$60 more.

Kinda ironic, you should get a hawaii gpu in hawaii lol.

---

I guess having a more effiicient gpu will allow you to get a cheaper psu. In that case it will equalize the cost a bit.

Truth be told it's not a major issue, hence why so many people still buy AMD offerings. In my experience, less power means less heat generated, which means less aggressive cooling is needed, leading to quieter fans.

This can be seen in that the 970 runs at 37 dbA at load whereas the 290X runs at 50 dbA per load (according to techpowerup) which significantly and noticeably louder. Not only that but if you live in a little apartment or a small dorm room, that can actually make a difference in the temperature of your room with extended gaming sessions.

Yea I see your point about the noise. I just never noticed it since all my other fans are spinning and drowning it out. Not to mention when one is gaming, the sound it on and you will not even notice your pc noise. Idle noise is not noticeable.

The only scenario I can think of that this will be a problem is if someone is a silent gamer, or is using headphones and don't want to wake up a roomate.

 

[rcfant89]

umm, i dont see your system on your signature

Oops, looks like I must have deleted it a while back, my bad.

My pc is: i7-2600k, gigabyte z68x-ud3h-b3, ssd and hdd storage (irrelevant), kingston hyper x ram (had 16g but removed 8 as I never used that much), gigabyte gtx570, corsair tx-750 bronze.

I think that's about all the relevant info. I was wondering if that motherboard would give me any issues with the newer GPU? Thanks for all the replies guys.