Worried about next graphics upgrade

gamer1291

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Sep 22, 2008
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Hello everyone i am very worried about my next gpu upgrade because of following reasons which i saw in many forums.

Here are my current system specs:-


1.Cooler Master 750w gx(not a good psu for crossfire)
2.Phenom II x4 965 oced to 4.02 ghz with cooler master hyper N620 fan (still worried about bottlenecks for future crossfire)
3.gskill 2x2 1600 mhz(4 gb ram)
4.Cooler Master 932 case
5.single 500 gb seagate hard disk
6.single toxic sapphire radeon 5850.
7.gigabyte 890fx UD-7 motherboard

I am planning to upgrade to radeon 7xxx series when it arrives but,
I was just seeing if its possible to get 6970 crossfire but my psu is very bad and cant keep up with crossfire i guess right?.

The thing is my rig is just a year old and i dont want to spend money on upgrading psu,mobo or cpu.
I just want to have a powerful gpu either two mid-range crossfire cards,single high end card or if necessary dual high end cards for my native resolution.

I only have a single 24 inch benq monitor 1920x1080 and dont plan to play on any higher resolution yet.
But i want to max out all games with all eye candy available and get 60 fps.

Can anyone advice me for future of my pc?
 

pro-gamer

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you have two options.
1: get sli gtx 560 ti it would be fine with your system. or even get single gtx 570 can maxed every game trust me.
2: if you want to cf 6970 then your system will bottleneck your both cards.
 
I don't think your PSU is as bad as you think, Cooler master PSU's are what i would consider second tier PSU's but are not rubbish units.
It has the connections for two cards which while might be a worry with power hungry cards wont be an issue with the new 7xxxx cards. I'm making an assumption here that there will be cards that are more powerful but will need less power because of the shrink down to 28nm.
This happened with the 40nm cards, it enabled people to go to a new level of power with out the need to upgrade the PSU.
I see no reason for this shrink to be any different.

So I would wait for the 7 series cards before upgrading. Realistically you would be throwing money away if you upgraded to dual 6970's now and still wanted to upgrade to the 7 series cards.
Sit tight and see what the new cards bring is my advice.
Are you seriously struggling for performance right now ?
I know what the upgrade itch is like but that way lies madness, if its a need then fair enough but if its just a "Want/would really like" thing then sit on your hands and wait a little longer.

Mactronix :)
 



I don't know for sure but I would not be so sure about "bottlenecking " Do you have any links to support this view ?
I have links that show a 5970 having no issues with a 955 clocked at 3.7 GHZ. As you no doubt know a 5970 is after all a dual card and while the 6970's would easily be more powerful any bottleneck would be theoretical in my opinion.

I'm quite happy to be wrong but in my experience people throw "Bottlenecking around with out really understanding the term and just think "Oh fast cards two of then wow that's got to be an issue". Not saying you are just saying i like to be careful and temper things a little when this subject raises its head.

Mactronix :)
 
op might need a new motherboard for the new pcie 3.0 hd 7xxx so that he can take full advantage of the cards.
as for dual 6970s bottlenecking cpu - it might happen in 1440p or higher res, i can't support that with anything right now. all i've heard are people saying amd's lower clockspeed will holds back the gfx cards at high resolutions or in multi-monitor eyefinity setups.
however, i think it's quite possible for the phii to bottleneck the dual 6970s in a multiplayer gaming scenario or in a game where the player has to face a lot or npcs at once. it could be an rts or mmorpg. again, i cannot back up this claim.
op's current setup doesn't look too bad, imo he'll benefit more from the newer hd 7xxx cards if he upgrades to a piledriver/trinity/ivy bridge system in q3 or q4 2012.
 



I'm not getting into it with you the chart is useless for the reason I already stated. As I said im not 100% sure im right just don't think its a real issue, you disagree. That's fine there does not need to be a wrong and right two differing opinions is fine.

Take a read of this if you have not seen it. It all points to the "Bottlenecking" issue being blown up well out of proportion.
The front page has a link to the other 3 parts of the series.

Mactronix :)

 

gamer1291

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Sep 22, 2008
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Thanks for all the replys everyone but here is what i can say about upgrading.

If i want i can sell my current mobo and processor and buy a lga 1155 mobo and a core i5 2500k which everyone says is best for gaming but if i buy these 2 things i have to postpone upgrading my gpu to even later next year which i dont want cause i really want to max out upcoming new games.

If i buy a 7xxx card then i cannot upgrade my mobo and processor now.

I think you all may know this my mobo is a premium one meaning an expensive board UD-7 it costed me 339.49 $ and i dont feel like selling such high end mobo so early is it really worth it to sell?

I bought this board mainly for the reason i can crossfire 2 gpu`s in 16 x 16 and get full scaling.

And for those giving suggestions about nvidia cards i am sorry but my current mobo doesnt support sli only crossfirex is supported so i cannot go green unless if i want only 1 gpu but then i cant add another if i want.

Right now i am happy with my current build i am able to play BF 3 with 30-45 fps in multi all ultra with latest drivers and so far i never had any issues with amd drivers like bsod`s,bad driver install,crashes,gray lines,100% gpu usage on idle i never got these issues yet.
 

if you don't have any problem with your current system, keep using it for a while, wait till the new stuff have come out, revised, matured - then decide if it's time to upgrade or not. who knows, you might end up saving some money by upgraging later (if you choose to).
an lga 1155 system might perform better but imo it might not be worth the hassle of selling your current system, setting it up and do all the work. it will be a sidegrade for gaming. and sb supports only 16 lanes with cpu and another 8 with the pch (z68). for x16+x16 you'll have to get a costly motherboard with an nf2000 chip or something like that. another intel option would be to buy an sb-e system that offers 40 pcie 3.0 lanes through cpu. both intel alternatives will cost you.
 

gamer1291

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Sep 22, 2008
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Just one more question to all of you which i find confusing.

This 570gtx has really caught my eye for upgrading but the only thing i dont like about 570 gtx is low vram 1280 mb???.

I know a 2 gb version is also available but its not in my country so i cant do anything but check only 1280 mb one.

But 6970 has 2 gb vram which is good for future gaming needs and even when i crossfire i get full 2gb vram right?.

If you sli 2 570 gtx you only get 1280 mb vram???.

I know 570 gtx is a bit faster than 6970 and i would consider it if only it had more vram.
 
imo the extra vram will come into play when you raise visual fx or raise gaming resolution. this is where the 570 kinda falls short. its gpu is more powerful than the 6970 but the 6970's full 2 gb ram helps it in higher resolution.
for single card setups or single 1080p display both cards are enough.
when you combine two gfx cards the both cards work in tandem to render frames, so despite having two cards the effective vram is of a single card. the main advantage is using two gpus to process data.