Nvidia GeForce GTX 970 And 980 Review: Maximum Maxwell

[VincentP]

Surround is less flexible than eyefinity

Three monitors in portrait or landscape presented as a single display. What more do you want?

 

[smeezekitty]

Surround is less flexible than eyefinity

Three monitors in portrait or landscape presented as a single display. What more do you want?

Mixed resolutions and mixing portrait and landscape

 

[Danra]

I suppose Nvidia did not respond to AMD's R9 290X or R9 290. If it did, that meant those AMD cards were better than Nvidia's = AMD was better than Nvidia.

Nvidia did respond, first with price cuts then with Ti [which was basically an overclocked 770 or 780] to catch up. And, if you are going to throw out game fps quotes from "review" sites, I hope you know that some games are coded for Nvidia and some for AMD.

What a short memory you have.

The 780ti is not an overclocked 770. The 770 is a rebadged GTX 680. The 780ti is essentially a Titan black without the double precision feature.

You ignored the primary thrust of my comment regarding your previous post, "I suppose Nvidia did not respond to AMD's R9 290X or R9 290. If it did, that meant those AMD cards were better than Nvidia's = AMD was better than Nvidia." and focused on something entirely subordinate.

I should not have mentioned a 770 Ti, thank you for bringing that to my attention. However, you misunderstood what I was trying to say.

In any event the 770 and 780 Ti were "souped up" versions of previous cards. OK, so the 780Ti has a fully enabled GK-110 chip that has 2880 CUDA cores, versus the partially disabled GK-110 chip in the regular 780 that only has 2304 CUDA cores. That alone bumps theoretical performance up by roughly 20%, and there are a few more enhancements.

From Anand [an Nvidia fan]

Quote, "...GeForce GTX 780 Ti unabashedly a response to AMD’s Radeon R9 290X..."

http://www.anandtech.com/show/7492/the-geforce-gtx-780-ti-review

Some differences between the 680 and 770:
Increased GPU clock rate
Increased memory clock rate
more memory bandwidth on the 256 bit bus

So, the 770 is not exactly a rebranded 680, even though some "review" sites said so.

I think you already know this. And, please do not cut up my posts or take my comments out of context.

 

[TopLuca]

I am really disappointed that this discussion has turned out to be a versus battle with people bashing AMD and others praising Nvidia instead of focusing on the advantage we're now getting from direct competiton .

Why can't we just agree that each and every card has its own strength , its not only about noise and power consumption or Raw FPS improvement . Bare in mind that the market isn't only based in the US and UK as the pricing might really be significant in other places . If it were only about which card runs cooler and quieter while delivering same/marginally better or worse performance we'd have a clear winner by now and AMD wouldn't stand a chance but thankfully enough that's not the case.

For example myself , Where I live ( Egypt ) the price difference was really significant , for the people of USA paying $220 ( the difference where I live ) to get something hassle free might be worthwhile but for other people on a Budget or live in a poor region eg : India and the middle east , AMD offered something really phenomenal with amazing performance in the mid range cards and even the high end ones . At the time of my purchase I wasn't really ready to pay extra 1.5K to get something that delivered the same performance or to get Nvidia's physx ( R9 290 and GTX 780 ) or I'd have to sacrifice the extra performance of the 290 and get the 770 which doesn't make any sense .

Of course this is an individual case but I believe it applies to others on a budget too.

 

[rdc85]

I am really disappointed that this discussion has turned out to be a versus battle with people bashing AMD and others praising Nvidia instead of focusing on the advantage we're now getting from direct competiton .......

It's fanaticism that in everywhere sport's, politic, religion, etc, (there is also marketing teams that lurking around),
anyways usually the mods is the one that keep the discussion civilize, but yeah Tom's is kinda lax...

 

[Novuake]

I am really disappointed that this discussion has turned out to be a versus battle with people bashing AMD and others praising Nvidia instead of focusing on the advantage we're now getting from direct competiton .......

It's fanaticism that in everywhere sport's, politic, religion, etc, (there is also marketing teams that lurking around),
anyways usually the mods is the one that keep the discussion civilize, but yeah Tom's is kinda lax...

[/quotemsg]

Actually this is pretty calm, go check out some other forums...

Not to mention that complaining about a relatively mild bashing is just as annoying as the not-so-much flame-war itself.

 

[VincentP]

Surround is less flexible than eyefinity

Three monitors in portrait or landscape presented as a single display. What more do you want?

Mixed resolutions and mixing portrait and landscape

I hadn't seen this before, it is interesting.
If you mix resolutions with Nvidia 2D surround, it will use the same resolution for all three screens.
The AMD solution can manage different horizontal resolutions better but it still has to use a common vertical resolution, which means either black bars on the higher resolution monitors or "hidden" areas areas of your overall image.
Mixing portrait and landscape would only make sense where the horizontal resolution of one monitor (rotated to vertical) is similar to the vertical resolution of another monitor (e.g. 4K main screen and 1920x1080 portrait screens on the sides).
http://community.amd.com/community/amd-blogs/amd-gaming/blog/2014/05/30/mixed-resolution-eyefinity

Having different aspect ratio monitors with similar vertical resolution or mixing a 4K monitor with portrait 1920x1080 monitors are really the only situations where I see this mixed resolution functionality being useful.

 

[4745454b]

Three monitors in portrait or landscape presented as a single display. What more do you want?

How about five monitors? To my knowledge Nvidia's cards can't do this. (The new 9xx might be able to, I think I read somewhere they can. So they are catching up.) 5 in portrait is really something.

Some differences between the 680 and 770:
Increased GPU clock rate
Increased memory clock rate
more memory bandwidth on the 256 bit bus

You do realize the extra bandwidth is because of the increased memory clock right? The cards are the same OTHER then the clock speeds. It's the same case with the GTX450 and the GTX550. Same specs, just the 550 has the higher clocks.

I like what Nvidia did. Performance went up a bit, while power draw went WAY down. Great job.

 

[Onus]

The discussion has remained relatively civil, but I do think it ought to focus more clearly on the new cards, and not turn into an analysis of AMD's cards, a completely unrelated topic.

 

[logainofhades]

I said R9 290, not the 290x..... For the past few weeks the GTX 780 has been going for more than the R9 290. That might have changed with the recent GTX 970/980 release. I haven't really looked, as I have been recommending the GTX 970, anyway.

 

[mapesdhs]

Quote, "...GeForce GTX 780 Ti unabashedly a response to AMD’s Radeon R9 290X..."

Not in the sense one migh infer. As was said so often at the time, NVIDIA could have released
the 780 Ti months earlier, but they didn't have to.

One thing I'll say in definite praise of the 980, its price here is a heck of a lot less than the 780 Ti at launch,
though stock levels are very low. OTOH, that makes me wonder whether indeed a 980 Ti is not so far away,
since NVIDIA is no doubt aware there are plenty of gamers who are happy to pay quite a bit more for extra
speed, VRAM, etc. I'll be surprised if such a card doesn't come out before the xmas hoilday season.

Ian.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

Correct .... NVidia has been doing this since the 6xx series. It was widely rumored that the 680 we saw was originally planned as the 670 .... marketing impacts technology ion the sense that if a company has 4 SKUs in development, it's going to look something like ...

A costs $300 to make
B costs $350 to make
C costs $400 to make
D costs $450 to make

Which card gets targeted to which market will not so much depend on the company looking to showcase their best design but the one they can make the most money on. So if they plan to release D to prepare to compete with the competition's top $550 card .... and after that card is released they see that it fits between their B and C options, then C gets released and D sits on a shelf in case it's needed.

Granted the comparisons may be uncomfortable if you're a fan, but being a "hardware whore" myself (loyalty be damned, best numbers on what I am doing gets my $$) the 970 is a very unique product in that it 1) has the biggest leap generation to generation we have seen in a long tome, 2) OC's and 3) scales like nothing we have seen in the modern era.

Will this act as a spur to innovation and similar leaps from both sides ?

Is it too much of a leap to expect AMD to respond in the next generation and if they can, can they make money doing it ?

What's with the 970s pricing ? ..... not exactly 670 , 770 like ...... Is the 970's pricing "predatory" ?

I don't think any of these subject are "inappropriate" in response to the news of this release.


As fort he eyefinty / surround discussion. One thing that could be big for AMD is if the include Display Port 1.3 They will eliminate the eyefinity limitation of not being able to hands three 144 Hz monitors.

 

[VincentP]

As fort he eyefinty / surround discussion. One thing that could be big for AMD is if the include Display Port 1.3 They will eliminate the eyefinity limitation of not being able to hands three 144 Hz monitors.

There are some driver issues, but this should already be possible using two DVI-D outputs and a single Displayport 1.2 output.
They could allow this for three Displayport monitors by providing three Displayport 1.2 outputs as Nvidia has done on the GTX 980.

 

[Acidfix]

I don't see how that's true when you say Nvidia is ahead of AMD. The AMD R9 290 is still a beast. And Nvidia is doing what AMD did. Release a great GPU for a great price.

The 290 beats the 970 and 980. But it's not really about that.

Nvidia just needed a GPU that would at least be as good as the AMD 290 and that's what they did. If anything I would be pissed at Nvidia just because they charge so much for the 780 then release these cards that run games in the range of a 290 or 780ti.

They are good GPU's but I wouldn't buy one just because there will soon be a ti version. And if you already have a 290 or 780ti then it's more of s downgrade to go with a 970/980. But if you haven't upgraded for a few years then either get this or wait for AMD to release there GPU. Unless you're a Nvidia fanboy.

 

[4745454b]

The 290 beats the 970 and 980.

In what universe? The 290X has troubles keeping up with the 970. The 980 is faster then anything AMD has save the 295. And it uses less power. And is cheaper.

 

[logainofhades]

The 290 doesn't beat the 970 or 980.

 

[Novuake]

I don't see how that's true when you say Nvidia is ahead of AMD. The AMD R9 290 is still a beast. And Nvidia is doing what AMD did. Release a great GPU for a great price.

The 290 beats the 970 and 980. But it's not really about that.

Nvidia just needed a GPU that would at least be as good as the AMD 290 and that's what they did. If anything I would be pissed at Nvidia just because they charge so much for the 780 then release these cards that run games in the range of a 290 or 780ti.

They are good GPU's but I wouldn't buy one just because there will soon be a ti version. And if you already have a 290 or 780ti then it's more of s downgrade to go with a 970/980. But if you haven't upgraded for a few years then either get this or wait for AMD to release there GPU. Unless you're a Nvidia fanboy.

You just said that in the comment section of a review that proves your own statement wrong.
That is FUNNY!

:lol:

 

[JackNaylorPE]

There are some driver issues, but this should already be possible using two DVI-D outputs and a single Displayport 1.2 output.
They could allow this for three Displayport monitors by providing three Displayport 1.2 outputs as Nvidia has done on the GTX 980.

No. AMD can not currently do 144 Hz on 3 screens. Each 144 Hz monitor uses 46% of the Display Port's (1.2) bandwidth. 3 x 46% = 138% > 100% NG. It's not a driver issue but a Display Port limitation.

http://forums.amd.com/game/messageview.cfm?catid=474&threadid=172226

One final note, It takes roughly 46% of the alloted bandwidth of a displayport 1.2 in order to run 1 vg248qe monitor at 1920x1080p@144hz which is roughly 12.5 gbps out of a totall 28.7 gbps that the displayport 1.2 is capable of outputting so you can run all 3 monitors using evga displayport hub but you will be stuck in 60hz unless you only connect two fo them. this can be verified in the new 14.2 drivers as they have a meter on them when you are connected using MST technology that tells you the current usage of bandwidth per monitor using your Displayport.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

The 290 beats the 970 and 980.

In what universe? The 290X has troubles keeping up with the 970. The 980 is faster then anything AMD has save the 295. And it uses less power. And is cheaper.

Perhaps if ya pick ya test conditions,the 290 might come close to the 970 in something but no test I have seen so far shows that. The 970 (in the box) beats the 780 (in the box) by about 12% .... that difference changes big time when overclocked to about 25% ....

Now, the 290x is aggressively overclocked right outta the box. Putting them on equal terms (both overclocked as far as they can go) , the 290x falls in behind even the 780....See 8:40 mark in link below ....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djvZaHHU4I8

.... so take a 780 which is already faster than the 290x which is in turn faster than the 290 .... and then top that by 25% , I just don't see how the 290 can be consider equivalent to the 970 when the 290x can't even catch the 780 (at resolutions up to 1560 x 1600)

And before we get into the reference cooler / custom cooler discussion .... don't go there. The 780 series improves more when water cooler than the R290s do

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=RqaHh-y51us

 

[smeezekitty]

Basically the 970 = 290X

The 980 beats everything save dual GPU cards

 

[JackNaylorPE]

Basically the 970 = 290X

How ?.... certainly not at 1920 x 1080. And how much depends on how you use it

- In stock configuration, the 960s 98% does not equal the 290x's 91%

- The 290x is incapable of 25% overclocks.... the 780 overclocked beats the 290x overclocked and the 970 is 12% faster than the 780 and the 780 increases that lead under water....the 970 is 12% faster than the 780 outta the box and overclocks better.

-The 290x is incapable of scaling 88% in CF as the 9xx series does in SLI

- The $329 - $349 970 price does not equal the $470 - $580 price of the 290x.

MSI 970 = $350
MSI 290x = $470

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/EVGA/GTX_970_SC_ACX_Cooler/30.html

The GTX 970's real kicker is definitely its pricing. Reference boards can be found at an incredible $329, with EVGA's overclocked GTX 970 SC ACX retailing at $339, a very reasonable price increase. This makes the card cheaper than AMD's R9 290X and R9 290, and both are slower, draw more power and producing more noise. Personally I would have expected the GTX 970 to retail for well above $400, matching the GTX 780's current pricing. But it looks as though NVIDIA is looking to torpedo AMD's whole product stack, and I say they did so successfully.

 

[smeezekitty]

If you average it over all resolutions it is pretty darn close. Also if you look at the actual individual framerate
you will see there isn't that big of discrepancy

- The $329 - $349 970 price does not equal the $470 - $580 price of the 290x.

MSI 970 = $350
MSI 290x = $470

I didn't mean price. There is no denying that the 970 and 980 are by FAR the best performance per dollar available right now

 

[ubercake]

A single 980's performance is close to that of the dual gpu 690. That's pretty awesome.

Pair it with a G-sync monitor and it's heavenly.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

If you average it over all resolutions it is pretty darn close. Also if you look at the actual individual framerate you will see there isn't that big of discrepancy

Certainly the R9s shine a bit at 4K and higher but the installed base for those is limited and will be for some time..... at 2560 and below, I don't think the 290x is in the race.

 

[Onus]

The past couple of days comments on multi-display configurations were certainly interesting, but entirely off-topic for this thread, and have been deleted. I would encourage one of the participants to start a new discussion thread on that topic.