Video Card Advice

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twizzops

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I have a XFX 6870 that I've had for the last 4 years. I am considering upgrading to a nVidia 970. I usually upgrade every 4 to 5 years as the games become more taxing on my system. On most games I usually need to put the graphics on normal/medium. If I go high or ultra I do notice that the system lags pretty bad. I have also been disappointed with my Radeon card due to some of the bugs with the software releases they have had during the time I've had the card. This has made me only really focus on nVidia as an upgrade.

I have 3 questions:

1. Does the brand of nVidia make any real difference? (Asus, Gigabyte, MSI, etc). If so who do you recommend and why?

2. Should I look at a different card other than the 970? The 980 looks like it's intended for 4K gaming, which I probably won't do for 4 or 5 years, however I found one on Newegg for $409.99 after rebate:

MSI GeForce GTX 980 DirectX 12 GTX 980 GAMING 4G 4GB 256-Bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support G-SYNC Support Video Card - Newegg.com

The comparable 970 card is currently $299.99 after rebate. Looks like the main difference is 1920x1080 and one less display port, which is fine by me. I only want to have 2 monitors on my desk anyways.

MSI GeForce GTX 970 DirectX 12 GTX 970 GAMING 4G 4GB 256-Bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support G-SYNC Support Video Card - Newegg.com

3. I also noticed that some of the 980s have 6GB and 384-Bit GDDR5 vs 4GB 256-Bit GDDR5. Is the the performance of the Card more in the memory or the Core Clock speed?

Thanks again for any answers/opinions.
 
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I've been quite happy with my 970 and have had no issues from it for the last 10 months.
 
970 is the best bang for the buck. I have been very happy with mine
 
eltai said:
I've been quite happy with my 970 and have had no issues from it for the last 10 months.
Click to expand...

Which card brand/manufactor did you go with and why? (Asus, Gigabyte, MSI, etc). They all seem to be near the same price, but it looks like they all do cooling a bit different.
 
jarori43 said:
IMO for the money unless you got 800 bux US to spend on a 980ti.. This one:


EVGA GeForce GTX 970 04G-P4-3975-KR 4GB SSC GAMING w/ACX 2.0+, Whisper Silent Cooling Graphics Card - Newegg.com

970 is the best bang for the buck.. IMO

Also Jays2cents has got some really good revies on Deh U-Tubes on most all of the newest GPU's see him here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k9cKZiJw6Pk
Click to expand...

The Youtube video was pretty good. It seems like he's recommending the AMD390 over the GTX790. I've just had so many driver issues with my AMD video cards I kind of want to try the GTXs for now. I will look through some of his other videos to see if he answers some of the questions that I had.

Thanks again for the information.
 
I would add another voice for the GTX 970. The Brand doesn't matter a lot as long as you stay with a reputable one. EVGA has a good warranty and I haven't had problems getting them to honor it in the past when I had a problem with an EVGA card (not the 970, was AMD 4870x2 from a few years ago). I'd stay with EVGA, Asus, or Gigabyte personally and in that order most likely.

The GTX 970 is a great card for the money. It runs cool, has a low power usage, and I haven't found any games that can push it in 1080p gaming. I'm like you and won't be concerned with 4k gaming for a while. For one I have 3 x 27 inch 1080p monitors... that is a costly upgrade to go to 4k lol.

I will likely never buy another AMD card for personal use. All to often they have driver issues, their cards almost always run hotter, and they draw more power than the equivalent Nvidia. Also there is that bit about them lying about the number of cores on their CPUs that has me questioning their practices (If you haven't heard about it, their 8 core CPUs aren't truly 8 cores. It's more like a quad core hyper-threaded Intel. Each physical core on the AMD has two threads but can only process one of those threads at a time).

I can't comment much on the GTX 980 since I haven't used one. At $406 it's a lot cheaper than when I bought my GTX 970. I think I paid like $320 for my GTX 970 and at the time the cheapest GTX 980 was over $500. If the one at $406 is a good one, that might be close enough in price point to go ahead and put in the little extra for the GTX 980 and the extra power it gives (even though you likely won't use it lol).
 
devestator said:
I would add another voice for the GTX 970. The Brand doesn't matter a lot as long as you stay with a reputable one. EVGA has a good warranty and I haven't had problems getting them to honor it in the past when I had a problem with an EVGA card (not the 970, was AMD 4870x2 from a few years ago). I'd stay with EVGA, Asus, or Gigabyte personally and in that order most likely.

The GTX 970 is a great card for the money. It runs cool, has a low power usage, and I haven't found any games that can push it in 1080p gaming. I'm like you and won't be concerned with 4k gaming for a while. For one I have 3 x 27 inch 1080p monitors... that is a costly upgrade to go to 4k lol.

I will likely never buy another AMD card for personal use. All to often they have driver issues, their cards almost always run hotter, and they draw more power than the equivalent Nvidia. Also there is that bit about them lying about the number of cores on their CPUs that has me questioning their practices (If you haven't heard about it, their 8 core CPUs aren't truly 8 cores. It's more like a quad core hyper-threaded Intel. Each physical core on the AMD has two threads but can only process one of those threads at a time).

I can't comment much on the GTX 980 since I haven't used one. At $406 it's a lot cheaper than when I bought my GTX 970. I think I paid like $320 for my GTX 970 and at the time the cheapest GTX 980 was over $500. If the one at $406 is a good one, that might be close enough in price point to go ahead and put in the little extra for the GTX 980 and the extra power it gives (even though you likely won't use it lol).
Click to expand...

Thanks for the excellent post. Looking forward to finding a good deal over the next few days.
 
if gaming at 1080p a 970 or 290x anything above that you will need a 980+
 
Carbja23 said:
Lol, I just did all my research to buy a new video card that arrived today... and now I see this post.

I already bought a 970 :)

Amazon.com: EVGA GeForce GTX 970 4GB SC GAMING ACX 2.0, 26% Cooler and 36% Quieter Cooling Graphics Card 04G-P4-2974-KR: Computers & Accessories

If you use a CHASE FREEDOM card you get 10% cash back on 309.99
Click to expand...

Thanks for the tip on the Chase Freedom card. I have it, but thought it was only 5% until I saw the special promotional period for 10%.
 
twizzops said:
Carbja23 said:
Lol, I just did all my research to buy a new video card that arrived today... and now I see this post.

I already bought a 970 :)

Amazon.com: EVGA GeForce GTX 970 4GB SC GAMING ACX 2.0, 26% Cooler and 36% Quieter Cooling Graphics Card 04G-P4-2974-KR: Computers & Accessories

If you use a CHASE FREEDOM card you get 10% cash back on 309.99
Click to expand...

Thanks for the tip on the Chase Freedom card. I have it, but thought it was only 5% until I saw the special promotional period for 10%.
Click to expand...

You bet, not only did they have the lowest price I could find, the extra 10% back was a nice little bonus.

Best of luck,
C
 
Nvidia is going to have a new video card coming out on a 16nm process early next year. I'm hearing it will be the high end version so it won't be cheap, the lower models of the 16nm process are still awhile away. Currently, since AMD cards are such shit and still using 28nm process still, they have no reason to release anything as they hold a monopoly in this market.
 
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