[SOLVED] (Solved) Switching MSI GTX 980 Gaming 4GB to XFX R9 390X Black Edition 8GB

[OfficeMatti]

Hello!
Headline pretty much says everything, is it an upgrade if I switch my MSI GTX 980 Gaming 4GB to XFX R9 390X Black Edition 8GB? Ofcourse there would be vram upgrade, but Im wondering the overall benefits of this switch. R9 would cost me 100€ and someone wants to buy my GTX 980 125€ so there would be no losses considering money.
Thanks in advance!

 

[DSzymborski]

At best it's a sidegrade.

https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-radeon-r9-390x-r9-380-r7-370,4178-6.html

I personally wouldn't bother. The VRAM doesn't matter as much as one might think on a card such as this; the deltas in games of 1060 6 GB vs. the slower 1060 3 GB haven't increased since release, which you'd expect if it mattered on cards like this. This is a 1080p card.

And even in the edge cases where the VRAM matters enough for the 390X to make up some of the 10-20% FPS gap, when looking at two roughly comparable old GPUs, there's a real reliability concern when choosing the much more power-hungry, inefficient one. There's a reason you can get old BMWs for a song.

There's also the issue that you know how your card has been used and you don't know how your replacement card has been used. The mystery in how the card was treated is an additional demerit to the idea.

 

[OfficeMatti]

At best it's a sidegrade.

https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/amd-radeon-r9-390x-r9-380-r7-370,4178-6.html

I personally wouldn't bother. The VRAM doesn't matter as much as one might think on a card such as this; the deltas in games of 1060 6 GB vs. the slower 1060 3 GB haven't increased since release, which you'd expect if it mattered on cards like this. This is a 1080p card.

And even in the edge cases where the VRAM matters enough for the 390X to make up some of the 10-20% FPS gap, when looking at two roughly comparable old GPUs, there's a real reliability concern when choosing the much more power-hungry, inefficient one. There's a reason you can get old BMWs for a song.

There's also the issue that you know how your card has been used and you don't know how your replacement card has been used. The mystery in how the card was treated is an additional demerit to the idea.

Thank you alot for your answer! I think Ill just keep my trust worthy 980, also saves me 130KM driving trip.
Question is solved! 👍🏻

 

[DSzymborski]

Thank you alot for your answer! I think Ill just keep my trust worthy 980, also saves me 130KM driving trip.
Question is solved! 👍🏻

Best of luck to you! There's still a lot of life left in this GPU at 1080p. And at some point, when the market stabilizes and the availability of lower-end GPUs in the new series become more regular, you'll start to see things more worthy of an upgrade, such as a 1070 Ti, start to be available in the sub-$200 range on the used market.

 

[Karadjgne]

The 390x is only good for 1 thing, warming your toes. Otherwise there's very little benefit.