Upgrade my GPU with my new monitor?

[Jonathanese]

Ok, so my current GPU is the GTX 970 STRIX. I created and flashed an overclock so it is only a percent or two behind the 980. Which has been far more than enough power for my 1080p 60Hz monitor.

However, two things have happened since then. My younger brother got a core i7 6700 system with 12 GB of RAM and....integrated graphics. And at the same time, I got the ASUS ROG Swift monitor, so I went from 1080x60p to 1440x144p with G-Sync, which gives me a lot of room to use a better GPU with a larger frame buffer.

So anyway, I was thinking of selling my brother my 970 for $200, so he can actually play ACU and Far Cry 4 like he has wanted, and I can put that money towards a GTX 1070.

Do you think it is worth the upgrade? Do you think I should push harder and wait for the 1080? Or should I basically sit on this card until the next generation?

 

[Trafalgar747]

The GTX 970 can handle games extremely well at 1080p, but since you are going to be playing at 1440p now a GTX 1070 upgrade will be a huge difference. Also if i was your brother i wouldn't purchase a used GTX 970 for $200, He would be better off waiting for RX 480 which will launch in 10 days and have the power of a GTX 980 at a price of $200, just saying...

 

[Jonathanese]

Yeah, sure. But he doesn't keep up with GPU tech.

Plus, close enough.

 

[Trafalgar747]

One more thing, before you upgrade to the 1070 you should use your new monitor and see how well it performs, the GTX 970 is still a very powerful gpu. What games are you playing with it? If you do sell your GTX 970 now before the RX Series rolls out you should also get more for it since there no reason for anyone to buy previous gen cpu with the new architecture performance gain.

 

[Jonathanese]

Yeah, I've been using the monitor. Did lots of tests. G-Sync is pretty amazing, especially at making lower frame rates look better.

But yeah, Crysis 3 struggles a bit, getting around 30FPS when it used to hover around 50. I haven't tried Far Cry 4 yet on the new monitor, but for whatever reason, it really seemed to struggle at 1080p. Perhaps it was some of the settings like soft shadows. Or maybe it is the CPU. It is a 3570K running at 4.6GHz. Never had a problem with it being much of a bottleneck.

You guys will probably laugh, but one game that uses my GPU quite a bit is Minecraft. I use Buildcraft and customized Sonic-Ether shaders, and it eats right through the GPU buffer. Seems to run well enough, though. the 40-50fps I get looks pretty good with G-Sync. The game as a whole may run really well at low specs, but with mods and shaders, it quickly becomes VERY resource intensive, especially with the RAM and CPU.

Unreal Tournament is a different story. I used to frame-lock at 60FPS. That basically dropped to half. It is one of the two games I would really upgrade for. The other being Mass Effect: Andromeda.

Other than that, I cannot see myself upgrading for quite some time after a 1070. I don't game like I used to. the 970 was a rush buy, and the intent was to have it hold me over until Pascal. It was a struggle between the 970 and R9 390. I went with the 970 because I thought I was going to be sticking with 1080x60p gaming.