GTX 970 or wait for AMD R9 300 series?

[AHMKHA97]

Right now I have an AMD Radeon HD 6870 and it's done, it can't keep up anymore. So I want to upgrade as soon as possible, and the GTX 970 seems like the perfect jump. But yesterday a friend told me that I should wait a couple of months until AMD releases their new GPU series which is supposed to be absolutely amazing, because they use a '20 nm' design. My question is: Should I wait for AMD's new GPU series or should I go ahead and buy a GTX 970 for Christmas? It would be heartbreaking if I dropped €350, and then seeing AMD unveil a glorious new GPU for the same price.

 

[loki1944]

It's true they are loud, fortunately I'm hard of hearing plus I get so focused on the games that I don't notice it...but yeah if I take a step away you'd think my 290X Xfire rig is going to lift off. And hot definitely, 94/95C under load is normal for me compared to 84-88C on my 780TI SLI rig. I think both companies make phenomenal cards, but right now the 290/290X is just too much of a better deal than the 970, unless as pointed out, you care about noise/heat/consumption. I mean an R9 290 for $250 is awesome.

 

[chenw]

That isn't relevant in any way. Regional pricing are always different and that cannot be considered a general factor. I can say the same thing if I lived in Europe where R9 290X are selling for cheap while Nvidia cards are excessively overpriced. I can say the same thing between Canada and US, where nvidia prices are way cheaper in US as they are discounted while AMD remains cheap across both countries.

Regional promotion and pricing isn't a general factor for argument when it depends on retailer as well. Some retailers offer on sale that AMD itself doesn't.

Regional pricing or not, unless he can avail of the pricings that arguments are based on, whatever one argues for one card or the other would not be relevant. I was stating that in my case, when I bought the GPU's, whatever arguments can be made in favor of 290x or 290's without taking price into account, I would not have bought them when I took price into account. Had I been living in the US, I would have at least seriously considered it.

My specific case is not relevant to OP yes, because we are worlds apart, but pricing is probably just as important as its raw performance (or else we wouldn't be arguing 970 vs 980, AMD vs nVidia etc).

 

[woozyman]

In my opinion, the video card upgrade should really be paired with a new G-sync / Free-sync monitor. Although the 970 seems like great value, the G-sync monitors certainly are not. Based on current monitor prices, I would imagine even if the 300 series had a 10 to 15% price premium than the Nvidia's 900 series, AMD would still be the winner. If power and heat (Noise) is not a big issue, I would consider the 290 / 290x and save the extra $$ toward a Free Sync monitor. For me, If the 300 series end up being expensive, and power hungry like it's predecessor, I'd likely suck it up and pay extra for the Nvidia / Gsync combo.

 

[Mindzor]

hi there my tought on this post is simple. If your curent gpu still works then wait until amd realeses their 300 series. You have nothing to lose. I planed to upgrade in the past but i decided to wait for something new amd good and i have hd 4870 yea realy old gpu.
Edit: sorry i havent noticed that this post was solved.

 

[MRH1996]

Right now I have an AMD Radeon HD 6870 and it's done, it can't keep up anymore. So I want to upgrade as soon as possible, and the GTX 970 seems like the perfect jump. But yesterday a friend told me that I should wait a couple of months until AMD releases their new GPU series which is supposed to be absolutely amazing, because they use a '20 nm' design. My question is: Should I wait for AMD's new GPU series or should I go ahead and buy a GTX 970 for Christmas? It would be heartbreaking if I dropped €350, and then seeing AMD unveil a glorious new GPU for the same price.

The new 300 series will have a new memory type known as HBM (Hyper Bandwidth Memory) . Its the next gen of graphics cards. Like GDDDR5 was the next gen to GDDR3. To top it of it is being said that the HBM is 9 times faster than the GDDR5. So I suggest that you wait.

 

[loki1944]

Right now I have an AMD Radeon HD 6870 and it's done, it can't keep up anymore. So I want to upgrade as soon as possible, and the GTX 970 seems like the perfect jump. But yesterday a friend told me that I should wait a couple of months until AMD releases their new GPU series which is supposed to be absolutely amazing, because they use a '20 nm' design. My question is: Should I wait for AMD's new GPU series or should I go ahead and buy a GTX 970 for Christmas? It would be heartbreaking if I dropped €350, and then seeing AMD unveil a glorious new GPU for the same price.

The new 300 series will have a new memory type known as HBM (Hyper Bandwidth Memory) . Its the next gen of graphics cards. Like GDDDR5 was the next gen to GDDR3. To top it of it is being said that the HBM is 9 times faster than the GDDR5. So I suggest that you wait.

I'm a little curious to see how good HBM will actually be, because if it's a GDDR5 killer then I'm surprised Nvidia 900 series didn't use it.

 

[loki1944]

Right now I have an AMD Radeon HD 6870 and it's done, it can't keep up anymore. So I want to upgrade as soon as possible, and the GTX 970 seems like the perfect jump. But yesterday a friend told me that I should wait a couple of months until AMD releases their new GPU series which is supposed to be absolutely amazing, because they use a '20 nm' design. My question is: Should I wait for AMD's new GPU series or should I go ahead and buy a GTX 970 for Christmas? It would be heartbreaking if I dropped €350, and then seeing AMD unveil a glorious new GPU for the same price.

The new 300 series will have a new memory type known as HBM (Hyper Bandwidth Memory) . Its the next gen of graphics cards. Like GDDDR5 was the next gen to GDDR3. To top it of it is being said that the HBM is 9 times faster than the GDDR5. So I suggest that you wait.

I'm a little curious to see how good HBM will actually be, because if it's a GDDR5 killer then I'm surprised Nvidia 900 series didn't use it.

 

[renz496]

Right now I have an AMD Radeon HD 6870 and it's done, it can't keep up anymore. So I want to upgrade as soon as possible, and the GTX 970 seems like the perfect jump. But yesterday a friend told me that I should wait a couple of months until AMD releases their new GPU series which is supposed to be absolutely amazing, because they use a '20 nm' design. My question is: Should I wait for AMD's new GPU series or should I go ahead and buy a GTX 970 for Christmas? It would be heartbreaking if I dropped €350, and then seeing AMD unveil a glorious new GPU for the same price.

The new 300 series will have a new memory type known as HBM (Hyper Bandwidth Memory) . Its the next gen of graphics cards. Like GDDDR5 was the next gen to GDDR3. To top it of it is being said that the HBM is 9 times faster than the GDDR5. So I suggest that you wait.

I'm a little curious to see how good HBM will actually be, because if it's a GDDR5 killer then I'm surprised Nvidia 900 series didn't use it.

because HBM is not ready in 2014. it doesn't make sense to nvidia to release 900 series in mid to late 2015 just to wait for HBM. and by releasing 900 series they able to gain more market share from AMD more significantly. from 2012 nvidia market share was hovering around 62%-65%. but they never break 65%. right now they have 76% market share ever since 900 series release.

 

[denkoul]

hey guys, what i have to say here is that if he has a amd cpu, then amd gpu will work better with the amd cpu. if he has intel on the other hand, he should wait till news from amd come, and then compare those two cards.
dennis

 

[renz496]

hey guys, what i have to say here is that if he has a amd cpu, [bthen amd gpu will work better with the amd cpu[/b]. if he has intel on the other hand, he should wait till news from amd come, and then compare those two cards.
dennis

if he got something like 290X CF or 295x2 intel CPU probably will end up better choice than any AMD CPU.

 

[Sc00bi3]

Right now I have an AMD Radeon HD 6870 and it's done, it can't keep up anymore. So I want to upgrade as soon as possible, and the GTX 970 seems like the perfect jump. But yesterday a friend told me that I should wait a couple of months until AMD releases their new GPU series which is supposed to be absolutely amazing, because they use a '20 nm' design. My question is: Should I wait for AMD's new GPU series or should I go ahead and buy a GTX 970 for Christmas? It would be heartbreaking if I dropped €350, and then seeing AMD unveil a glorious new GPU for the same price.

that's the problem here right? then what about in the end you bought that 'amazing' AMD card and then nvidia counter them with another card with amazing performance and price as well? this is one of the problem when 'i want the absolute best deal' that not even future product can beat it. amd and nvidia will keep coming with this amazing deal from time to time so feel heartbreaking because of it in the end just useless because it will happen anyway.

as to wait or not that is your decision. right now there is many rumor floating around to certain extend some of it sounds too good to be true. but right now 970 for example will give you solid performance in games. the price isn't that bad either. same goes with those 290X and 290.

Just buy a 290X instead. Its cheaper than 970 and the performance is the same.

 

[Sc00bi3]

Funny. Nvidia will never compete in price. They cant even compete in performance compared to intel 4000 lmao. Nvidias are always. Always!!! 20% more money all year every year for same performance or less than amd. Theve never ever made anything better

 

[hasheem]

Wait for the r9 3xx series because you will have choice at that time and if the r9 3xx series really beat the nvidia 900's they will reduce the price in the upcoming year.then that would be real nvidia 9xx vs amd r9 3xx

 

[meat_loaf]

Funny. Nvidia will never compete in price. They cant even compete in performance compared to intel 4000 lmao. Nvidias are always. Always!!! 20% more money all year every year for same performance or less than amd. Theve never ever made anything better

Well, Nvidia did made some stuff better, but because they refuse to play together with other people it makes things harder to be compatible levels. Most of the problem reside with nvidia's proprietary software that generally makes things worse than necessary. For example, Gameworks and Physx are the 2 most problematic designs even compared to DX. Not to mention if games are made based on nvidia profiles, only nvidia cards will perform slightly better, To its competitors like AMD, games for AMD do not have bias of difference and generally AMD stuff tends to be free to the public and its developers to use like Mantle.

 

[nascareddie8]

I ain't nobody to listen too but i wouldn't support intel in any way because they hold restrictions on everybody else that in the same market or product so the !!!! with nvidia(intel)

 

[Sc00bi3]

lmffao!!! @ Meat_Head, you talk about prejeduce towards amd yet you ridicule one of the top 2 amd most efficient video cards (xfx) will remain the best in my opinion, no ive never had a sapphire, but xfx are probally the quietest and least heat producing cards ive ever had, barely noisy with a full load and almost silent no matter what, they keep cooler than msi, asus, gigabyte, and club, but I do know that sapphire are almost twice as much as xfx so they had better be better lol

 

[meat_loaf]

lmffao!!! @ Meat_Head, you talk about prejeduce towards amd yet you ridicule one of the top 2 amd most efficient video cards (xfx) will remain the best in my opinion, no ive never had a sapphire, but xfx are probally the quietest and least heat producing cards ive ever had, barely noisy with a full load and almost silent no matter what, they keep cooler than msi, asus, gigabyte, and club, but I do know that sapphire are almost twice as much as xfx so they had better be better lol

You are obviously illiterate.

 

[renz496]

probably mod should close this thread.

 

[Aiden Warren]

690 looks to have the better numbers
http://gpuboss.com/gpus/GeForce-GTX-970-vs-GeForce-GTX-690

 

[tk3600]

The answer to your question is that the 970 IS absolutely amazing for its price. I doubt AMD can pull a rabbit out of a hat that can beat the 970 in terms of efficiency. It is rare to have a card that is such good value for money. I would buy the card now, and leave the waiting for the birds.

290 is already on the same level of price to performance, and even better with a discount. [strike]380X is a slightly improved 290X[/strike], it is a new card, not a rebrand 290X, it is around 960 level.

 

[USAdystopia]

After having 2 flawlessly performing XFX 7970s...will purchase the XFX300 series.

 

[Ivan Isaacs]

So glad that I saw this thread as I am having the same dilemma as AHMKHA97. Actually, looking around and gathering information about the AMD R9 290(x) cards and the GTX 970 but also looking to the future and seeing the R9 300 cards on the horizon.

My concern stems from an article that clearly shows the Radeon cards having trouble with DX11 while the GTX cards have not. (see article: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2015-why-directx-12-is-a-gamechanger)

So, in essence this is what concerns me: Most games current and older games operate using DX11 or older in combination with the suboptimal drivers by AMD which will cause games to under perform on R9 cards while this problem isn't evident on GTX cards depending on the CPU used. Although Mantle and DX12 solves a lot of issues. Games will only benefit from this when they are optimized for use with DX12 so ruling most current games out of the equation and most if not all older games.

Should I buy a GTX 970 which will perform equally or better than a R9 290 on current OSes with DX11 and older installed or wait for the release of Windows 10 with DX12 and buy me a R9 380x or another R9 3... card within the price range of the current R9 290 and hope the extra power will mitigate the unoptimized drivers of AMD on older DX11 games...

 

[NightAntilli]

The AMD drivers might not be optimal, but performance is still good enough. And with DX12, these driver issues are pretty much guaranteed to be well optimized. Doesn't really need optimization from developers, since the API itself is what will allow AMD to flourish for a change. But it's up to you what you want.

I for one won't support a brand that repeatedly engages in false advertising.

 

[stavros58]

Hi I'm running an MSI 970 gtx if over clocked it will match a stock 980 and they are excellent cards to OC. Prior to that I had 2 MSI OC 7870 in crossfire the single 970 without an additional OC was about 30% faster than the 2 7870's and less than half the power usage. My 970 cost £270 as I bought it before all this stuff about the 4 gig memory I contacted Amazon and they gave me £60 compensation so the card cost £210 I am more than happy. I may find in the future that the memory config is a problem but in all honesty by then I will have updated I dont want a 4K monitor yet as I have a 144hz one which is brilliant and I dont think any reasonable priced GPU will run a 4K fast enough yet. When I do update I'll move the 970 to my other occasional games machine when friends come. I did have 2 970 gtx for a week and and ran them in sli the increase was about 30% whereas with the 7870's I saw approx 100% for games and benchmarks optimized for crossfire. So the sensible choice would be a 980 with proper 4 gig rather than 2 970's. Any new card from AMD will be priced according to its performance advantage, which is why the 970 is such a bargain and why there is always a catch the 3.5 memory but in real terms it doesn't effect performance eg the last game I bought Project Cars runs brilliantly as does COD advanced and BF4. i would go for a 970 rather than wait unless you are super patient and are prepared to pay for the new AMD Technology. Personally I have used both AMD and NVIDIA cards and they are both excellent products NVIDIA does sometimes have the edge on drivers but AMD are getting better and I still think AMD look slightly better but that's personal preference.

 

[-Taine-]

The answer to your question is that the 970 IS absolutely amazing for its price. I doubt AMD can pull a rabbit out of a hat that can beat the 970 in terms of efficiency. It is rare to have a card that is such good value for money. I would buy the card now, and leave the waiting for the birds.

People need to consider the problems with Nvidia's Gtx 970. While the 3.5gb problem has very little effect at 1080p on most games, it ramps up to the majority of games having freezing and frame drops at 1440p. the amd r9 290 (x) offer good value for money for future games and the newer AAA titles because many of them use over 3.5 gb. and AMD already has pulled a winner out of its hat with the HBM technology used with the r9 390x. this gives the card much higher bandwidth and more capacity for 4k gaming