Reference RX 480 ok if you're not overclocking?

[TJ Hooker]

I recently bought an RX 480 (MSI Armor 4G OC). I got a 4GB card because at the time I thought I'd be gaming at 1080p for the foreseeable future, and half the reason I got it was simply for the free Civ VI code.

Well, that purchase ended up spurring several other upgrades including a new 1440p monitor (HP Omen 32"), and now I'm worried I should have got an 8GB card. I've been checking out the used market both for selling my current card and getting an 8GB. Currently have someone willing to pay 240 CAD for mine, and can buy a 8GB reference card for 270 CAD. An extra $30 for double the VRAM seems reasonable to me. Cheapest non reference would be $320 for a used MSI Gaming X (hasn't responded to me yet, figure I could get him down to at least $300), or $315 for a new Gigabyte G1 Gaming.

I know reference cards have a bad rap, particularly regarding heat/noise (and PCIe slot power, but I always considered that a non issue). But my current card undervolts quite nicely, which seems consistent with other people's experience with the RX 480 (and recent AMD GPUs in general), and that really makes a difference for heat and therefore fan speed. I'm not really interested in overclocking, would much rather have a quiet card, do you think undervolting would do the trick for me and make a reference card a decent choice given the price.

 

[atljsf]

reference card usually comes with a cooler that doesn't do a good job

then you can't overclock them as hard as on other cards iwth same chipset but better cooling solutions

you can do alot with them but others will do alot more

one thing that not much people like about reference cards is the noise

most of them use a small fan that sounds like a turbine engine working hard

that is the real problem on some of the reference cards

other than that, it is ok to get them, not as excellent thermal control and not as excellent overclocking capacity and not as great noise control

the g1 gaming you mention, is that one with 6 gbs of vram? not sure if that model is meant to be used on 4k confortably

 

[TJ Hooker]

...Did you read the words "Reference RX 480" and nothing else in the title or post?

Also...

the g1 gaming you mention, is that one with 6 gbs of vram? not sure if that model is meant to be used on 4k confortably

There are no RX 480s with 6GB of VRAM, and I have a 1440p monitor, not 4K.

 

[atljsf]

no, the g1, nvidia gtx 1080, i didn't mentioned a amd card

http://www.gigabyte.com/Graphics-Card/GV-N1070G1-GAMING-8GD#kf

i don't know if there is a g1 with a amd gpu in it

 

[maxalge]

...Did you read the words "Reference RX 480" and nothing else in the title or post?

Also...

the g1 gaming you mention, is that one with 6 gbs of vram? not sure if that model is meant to be used on 4k confortably

There are no RX 480s with 6GB of VRAM, and I have a 1440p monitor, not 4K.

for 1440p you should be looking to get a gtx 1070


going from 4 gb to 8 gb is worthless on a 480

 

[TJ Hooker]

no, the g1, nvidia gtx 1080, i didn't mentioned a amd card
http://www.gigabyte.com/Graphics-Card/GV-N1070G1-GAMING-8GD#kf
i don't know if there is a g1 with a amd gpu in it

This thread is about RX 480s as per the title and OP, think it's reasonable to assume that's what I was talking about. Also, you say GTX 1080, link to a 1070, but I'm assuming you're talking about a 1060 as that would be the competition for an RX 480?
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=gigabyte+rx+480+g1+gaming

for 1440p you should be looking to get a gtx 1070
going from 4 gb to 8 gb is worthless on a 480

I'm not interested in spending double the price for a 1070, and I have a freesync monitor so I'd rather stick with AMD. Also, from what I've seen the 480 can manage at 1440p if you turn down a few settings. I don't play many super demanding games anyway.
There are some benchmarks showing the extra 4GB of VRAM making a difference for a 480 in a few titles, even at 1080p.

 

[TJ Hooker]

If noise is a concern, I would not get a reference card. They are noisy, regardless of if you are able to undervolt it a little bit. Why dont you just stick with the 4gb card until you run into problems? The 4gb will be fine at 1440p for most games.

Yeah, that's probably the smartest move. I'm just worried that if I wait and see how it goes with my current card the next generation of GPUs might come out in the meantime, causing the resale value of my card to take a hit in the event I do want to change to an 8GB card. Although I suppose the resale value of the 8GB cards would drop too in that situation...

 

[atljsf]

i wrote 1080 but was 1070, the g1 you mentioned, now, forget what i said, that attitude, fortunately there is a stop following thread link up there where you asked about reference card and you already got the information about it and why you shouldn't get them and on what resolutions is still viable the one you have

 

[TJ Hooker]

I ended up finding a great deal on an open box Gigabyte RX 480 G1 Gaming 8G on Newegg: 240 CAD ($258 after shipping and tax). Also have a sale lined up for my 4GB card tonight for $225, hopefully it doesn't fall through. So I'll probably end up spending about the same amount as if I had bought an 8GB card from the get go, maybe a little less. (I payed $280 + tax for my current card, and the cheapest 8GB at the time was at least $40 more IIRC)