Question Old GPUs

[ThePersian]

hi there, is it wise to buy a 7 years old gpu now in 2024? i was looking for a RX 580 (tight budget), i know about performance and age of it, but the concerning thing is does it last any longer? i mean suppose its been used in best conditions, how much longer does it gonna live? 7 years is kinda high for a electronic unit to live let alone few years more, am i wrong?

 

[Lutfij]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

Simple answer, nope. Best go with a brand new GPU provided your platform can handle it.

For us to gain some understanding/context to what you're dealing with, please list the specs to your build like so:
CPU:
CPU cooler:
Motherboard:
Ram:
SSD/HDD:
GPU:
PSU:
Chassis:
OS:
Monitor:
include the age of the PSU apart from it's make and model. BIOS version for your motherboard at this moment of time.

Following that, please mention where you're located and why you're looking for a GPU purchase, to help us suggest a better alternative.

 

[NedSmelly]

hi there, is it wise to buy a 7 years old gpu now in 2024? i was looking for a RX 580 (tight budget), i know about performance and age of it, but the concerning thing is does it last any longer? i mean suppose its been used in best conditions, how much longer does it gonna live? 7 years is kinda high for a electronic unit to live let alone few years more, am i wrong?

A lot of used RX580s are old crypto mining cards. Then there are the "RX580 2048SP" Chinese market ones that are actually RX570s, but sellers hide the fact. AMD has also stopped supporting them in their driver releases. So yeah, IMHO they're not a good buy anymore.

 

[ThePersian]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

Simple answer, nope. Best go with a brand new GPU provided your platform can handle it.

For us to gain some understanding/context to what you're dealing with, please list the specs to your build like so:
CPU:
CPU cooler:
Motherboard:
Ram:
SSD/HDD:
GPU:
PSU:
Chassis:
OS:
Monitor:
include the age of the PSU apart from it's make and model. BIOS version for your motherboard at this moment of time.

Following that, please mention where you're located and why you're looking for a GPU purchase, to help us suggest a better alternative.

Core i5 11400
a 160w TDP cooler 4 pipe (the brand is not known to other countries) link
ASUS TUF B560 PLUS WIFI
16GB DDR4 3200MHz (2x8)
512GB m.2 NVMe Lexar pci3 + 256GB crucial SATA ssd
Antec NEG750 (first release September 24, 2022)
Lian li O11 Air mini
windows 11
24'' Dell 1920x1080 60Hz
latest BIOS
im in Iran, and looking for a gpu for average gaming (1080p on 60FPS) there is also a second hand Sapphire RX 6600XT Nitro+ for 3x price of rx580...

 

[NedSmelly]

If going for a used GPU... can you stretch to a used RTX2060 or RTX2060 Super? They are pretty solid cards, and work with DLSS. I'd be interested to hear what they're priced in Iran, compared to an RX580.

 

[ThePersian]

If going for a used GPU... can you stretch to a used RTX2060 or RTX2060 Super? They are pretty solid cards, and work with DLSS. I'd be interested to hear what they're priced in Iran, compared to an RX580.

yep forgot to mention, def going for used ones.
they are mostly Palit 2060s or 2060, could find one EVGA 2060 but the price is almost same as that 6600xt nitro+
6600xt = 165$
2060s super = 160$
2060 = 138$
rx580 = 50$

(here the Nvidia is more expensive for literally no reason)

 

[NedSmelly]

(here the Nvidia is more expensive for literally no reason)

Same here and pretty much everywhere else. Yeah unfortunately the GPU market is awful, even for low end used ones.

Don't be turned off by the Palit brand though - they manufacture a lot of the OEM cards (for Dell, HP etc). I have one that I bought used (Palit Dual RTX2060S), and it's been reliable if somewhat plain.

GTX1660 variants can still play Cyberpunk 2077 at 1080p high settings 50fps or so. So that's another option I suppose.

 

[CactusBuilder]

NVidia has DLSS that any of the AMD cards do not. My personal opinion, but I only buy NVidia GPUs for the past 10+ years. AMD in general tries to brute force performance via hardware as their software side is not nearly as good (particularly partnerships with game engines and game decelopers).

Given your monitor is 1080p @ 60hz, it will depend on the game, but a 2060 should be able to max out almost everything even without the software addons. In games that support the additional NV features you should be able to run them all on Ultra quality. Palit is a fine brand, not sold everywhere but I don't think an EVGA is worth twice the price (coming from someone with 3 EVGA cards in different computers).

 

[ThePersian]

Same here and pretty much everywhere else. Yeah unfortunately the GPU market is awful, even for low end used ones.

Don't be turned off by the Palit brand though - they manufacture a lot of the OEM cards (for Dell, HP etc). I have one that I bought used (Palit Dual RTX2060S), and it's been reliable if somewhat plain.

GTX1660 variants can still play Cyberpunk 2077 at 1080p high settings 50fps or so. So that's another option I suppose.

thank you so much for the info <3

NVidia has DLSS that any of the AMD cards do not. My personal opinion, but I only buy NVidia GPUs for the past 10+ years. AMD in general tries to brute force performance via hardware as their software side is not nearly as good (particularly partnerships with game engines and game decelopers).

Given your monitor is 1080p @ 60hz, it will depend on the game, but a 2060 should be able to max out almost everything even without the software addons. In games that support the additional NV features you should be able to run them all on Ultra quality. Palit is a fine brand, not sold everywhere but I don't think an EVGA is worth twice the price (coming from someone with 3 EVGA cards in different computers).

the normal 2060 or 2060 super???

 

[Imperat0r]

Hello.
From my humble experience i would like to share some info with you regarding RX580's.
Most of the cards available on the market are either a chinese rebranded version or an ex miner.
Since i own more then 50 rx580 cards different manufacturers, i can affirm that those cards were made for long term running.
As @NedSmelly said earlier, you can buy some miners.
Either you obtain them at a ridiculous price to worth the risk or you go directly to a newer generation card like you are looking now (Nvidia 2060).
Good luck mate!

 

[jlake3]

yep forgot to mention, def going for used ones.
they are mostly Palit 2060s or 2060, could find one EVGA 2060 but the price is almost same as that 6600xt nitro+
6600xt = 165$
2060s super = 160$
2060 = 138$
rx580 = 50$

(here the Nvidia is more expensive for literally no reason)

My call would be to go for the 6600XT if it's the same money as the 2060S.

The launch review here has it about 18% ahead of the 2060 Super. TechPowerUp has the 6600XT ahead of the 2060S by 11%.

Nvidia cards do get DLSS, which would allow you to close that gap with upscaling if the game supports it... but AMD cards can do upscaling too through FSR, which needs a larger base image for the same quality output and thus can't boost performance quite as much, but they do support upscaling and the visuals aren't bad in "Quality" mode. I play in 1440p with FSR Quality and it's hard to tell that upscaling is on.

Nvidia's ray tracing is better, but both the 2060S and the 6600XT perform so poorly in RT that it doesn't really matter.

Depending on when it was sold, the 6600XT might have some warranty left, and likely less hours on the fan bearings and fresher thermal paste and less wear.

As others have said, the RX 580 isn't getting game-ready driver updates, the market contains a lot of "2048SP" models that are actually RX 570s, and a lot of those cards were mined on and you're trusting the seller's word and maybe a 30-day buyer protection policy that the miners actually took decent care of them. They're cheap, but I'd avoid them unless you know what you're getting into.

 

[Joseph_138]

If you have a decent power supply, and insist on AMD, then it is possible to find Vega 56 cards in the same price range as RX 580 and 590 cards. There are still a lot of Polaris cards coming on the market ever since Etherium mining crashed, so you're taking a risk that you'll be buying a card froma mining farm. Vega's initial higher price, and power consumption, made it less profitable to use for mining.

I think the biggest risk with Vega 56, is the likelihood of a bad flash rendering the faster switch setting unusable. There are so many horror stories in tech forums where people bricked the high power switch, and weren't able to recover it, that I've seen. I picked one up, cheap, with a bad flash, but I bought it to use in a Mac Pro, so the low power switch was always going to be the only one that I was ever going to use, so I didn't care.

Vega is also not going to be on the latest drivers, the same as Polaris, though, and Vega is broken in games that use mesh rendering, like Alan Wake 2. You'll probably want at least something from the RDNA2 generation, for the latest games.

 

[ohio_buckeye]

Of the cards mentioned, 6600xt hands down. If I recall I think it’s about as fast as the old gtx 1080, has 8gb vram.

Vega and the 580 are too old at this point.