R9 290 vs GTX 1060

[Joshua Price]

I can't find any direct articles relating this fact. I'm currently running an AMD R9 290, but am noticing that it's starting to age on newer games. Would it be worth upgrading to a 1060? Or is that pointless and I should shoot for the 1070?

 

[Evoke186]

it would be about 20-25% faster. in my opinion it would be better to go with a 1070.

 

[10tacle]

I'm going to assume you are running 1080p. A GTX 1060 (6GB variant) will be fine for that and save you a LOT of money over a 1070, especially if you get a factory overclocked one which can come within 10% of the performance of a standard 1070 (kind of like a 970 vs. a 980 from two years ago).

However, when you say "new games" don't expect even a 1070 to run the new Dues Ex at 60FPS at 1080p, because it won't unless you turn down quality and AA settings. Also, a lot depends on your CPU/motherboard which you don't reference. If you have a weaker chipset, that 1060 or 1070 can be bottlenecked.

 

[Joshua Price]

I'm going to assume you are running 1080p. A GTX 1060 (6GB variant) will be fine for that and save you a LOT of money over a 1070, especially if you get a factory overclocked one which can come within 10% of the performance of a standard 1070 (kind of like a 970 vs. a 980 from two years ago).

However, when you say "new games" don't expect even a 1070 to run the new Dues Ex at 60FPS at 1080p, because it won't unless you turn down quality and AA settings. Also, a lot depends on your CPU/motherboard which you don't reference. If you have a weaker chipset, that 1060 or 1070 can be bottlenecked.

Yeah I'm only running at 1080p. My CPU is the i5 4460.

 

[10tacle]

Yeah I'm only running at 1080p. My CPU is the i5 4460.

So no bottleneck then on a Haswell build. Now here's something else to consider: in some DX11 and DX12 games, the R9 290 is real close to a 1060 or even beats it, and the only upgrade in those game worthwhile would be going for a 1070. It may be earlier Nvidia driver issues, but in any event, here are two examples:

(Hitman DX12) http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/msi_geforce_gtx_1070_gaming_z_review,13.html

(Far Cry Primal DX11) http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/msi_geforce_gtx_1070_gaming_z_review,18.html

The question for you should be if you think the games you want to play are worth the extra $175-$200 going for a 1070 over a 6GB 1060 (US prices I'm referring to, not sure where you are).

 

[PlasticMatt]

I upgraded from a R9 290 to a GTX 1060, but I happened to upgrade my CPU from an FX-6350 to an i5-6600k at the same time. Obviously I experienced a huge bump in performance, although much of that could probably be attributed to the CPU upgrade/bottleneck. The reason why I moved from team red to team green was driver support. Anecdotally I can say that my friends who played new releases with their Nvidia cards had less stuttering than my AMD counterpart almost always. It took Radeon weeks and sometimes months to fix bugs with new releases. In one instance, their newest drivers broke a game and it still remains broken (Wolfenstein New Order).

 

[10tacle]

^^Exactly why I stopped buying AMD since the 4870. I got tired of stuttering problems and Catalyst driver issues. I'm due for an upgrade of my 970 SLI for 1440p, and will wait for the comparison of AMD's Volta answer to the 1080Ti. One of those two GPUs will be my next GPU. I am willing to give AMD a second chance if their high end actually beats the 1080Ti at the same or less price point.

The 1080Ti is going to be hard to top. AMD's last effort at taking out a high end Nvidia GPU, the 980Ti with a Fury X, was a general failure. In any event, I've had SLI builds since the Voodoo2 days of the late '90s, but the last several years of reduced game support for SLI (either not supported out of the gate and having to wait for a patch, or poor scaling, or just flat out no support at all), I'm done with dual GPU solutions.

 

[Phat Luong]

I really don't know what the hell you guys talking about
AMD drivers updates are phenomenal as of late
al most immediate game-ready driver, and Crimson Relive works wonders
"stuttering" may come from memory or CPU bottlenecking, not necessarily the card
I've been using both brands for years now and AMD drivers actually beating NV nowadays
please don't use the old days as your excuse and update your knowledge before making an assumption

 

[10tacle]

I really don't know what the hell you guys talking about
AMD drivers updates are phenomenal as of late /[snip]\.... please don't use the old days as your excuse and update your knowledge before making an assumption

So you just created an account today to come here and make a comment. Congratulations! I clearly stated why I stopped buying AMD in the past and there is no debate that 5-10 years ago Catalyst drivers were more problematic over Nvidia. The past is relevant in any discussion on any topic whether you like it or not. Why? Because it's a reminder to what can happen again.

With that said and on to your valid point about Nvidia, Nvidia stumbled out of the gate with DX12 drivers and games. They were well behind in performance of AMD GPUs. It took Nvidia two or three driver updates to get their cards up to their full performance capability in DX12 games. Currently, AMD's RX 480 8GB and Nvidia's GTX 1060 6GB trade blows in DX12 games. One GPU does better in one game, and the other does better in another game. Just like in DX11 games. As it's almost always been between the two different GPU makers.