GPU Upgrade

[nasinclair]

Hi All,
New member here, looking to upgrade my GPU in the morning. Was going to get a GTX 680 but have noticed on most of the threads back in August you guys all reccomend the GTX 670 over it. Is this still the case or have the drivers made the gap widend as some were implying would happen in the threads. My current system is 768mb GTX460, FX8350 CPU, 4GB RAM.
Nathan

 

[SnW]

I don't see a great difference in the new drivers...
well a bit in F@H but that's just for me

Oo EDIT i have both(GTX670/680)...
and welcome of course!

Greetings, Ray...

 

[nasinclair]

So for normal 1 screen 1080 gaming is it worth paying the extra for the 680 or would you not bother. Will I be able to max settings and AA with the 670? Thanks for the swift reply

 

[YbrFinX]

I have a GTX 670 in my main rig and it has no problems at all playing BF3 with all the bells and whistles turned on So personally I wouldn't pay the extra for 680, but it's up to you mate.

 

[nasinclair]

Thanks for the replies! Is it worth considering the 660 Ti or is the performance drop not so good with the lesser memory bus thing? Just mentioning that as if that was able to play with max aa and settings could switch over to fully SSD system with the change

 

[dragoonk]

I think that the 670 is the best price/performance deal and I think you should stick with it.
And welcome to them forums.

 

[YbrFinX]

The 670 offers best possible price/performance ratio, but if you want to go that little notch down to a 660 Ti, it's still a good GPU. I was surprised that the memory bus didn't cut the performance that much after all... However, if you want to have solid maxed out performance @ 1920x1080, go for 670

 

[dragoonk]

I agree.
BUT!... you could also look at a 7950 which is also good... ( and get a couple of the latest games as a bonus )

 

[YbrFinX]

I agree.
BUT!... you could also look at a 7950 which is also good... ( and get a couple of the latest games as a bonus )

Do they still have that "Never Settle" program up and running? :huh:

 

[nasinclair]

The XFX HD7970 is actually £15 cheaper than the EVGA GTX 670 at Scan, is the 7970 a better card?

 

[dragoonk]

Rgh crap, I had a feeling that the promotional period will continue trough out January. I was wrong.

 

[nasinclair]

Promotion is still on at Scan for the 3 free games

 

[dragoonk]

The XFX HD7970 is actually £15 cheaper than the EVGA GTX 670 at Scan, is the 7970 a better card?

Yes it is the better card. If you have the resources I'd say go to either a 7950 or a 7970. Also keep in mind that the 7950 can be overclocked to be almost as capable as the 7970, but with the silicon lottery it's up to you to decide if it's worth the risk. If you decide that it is, maybe you would want to have a look at the Club3d 7950 Royal King version. I heard it overclocks very well. If you want to save yourself from the trouble of overclocking, get the 7970. Performance is guaranteed.

 

[dragoonk]

Promotion is still on at Scan for the 3 free games

Personally, I would go for it. In the end, you decide

 

[YbrFinX]

If that XFX is a reference card, you should not buy it as they run hotter, make more noise and might have notable coil whine... If it is something like DD edition, then you're all good to go and get that And what comes to 670 vs. 7970, the AMD card is most likely better and even better once overclocked, but the 670 is in many games almost as good as (if not even better in some titles) than 7970. That decision whether to buy and AMD or an nvidia card is yours to make, but all of those are excellent choices

 

[dragoonk]

If the XFX looks and is one ofTHESE , I think you will be fine. I heard these aren't as noisy as the reference coolers.
You could also take a look at the PowerColor or Sapphire 7970, they have custom cooling too.

 

[Deejeta]

It all depends on what res you are running. 1080p and below buy something cheap like a 660ti then crossfire later on down the track. Above 1080 you have to look at 670/79xx territory.

 

[nasinclair]

Thanks for the replys folks, I went with the GTX670 and am very happy with the results! Got the EVGA so I can stepup to the 770/80 if it comes out in the next 3 months using the stepup programme.

 

[JJ1217]

XFX 7970's with DD cooling seem to have lots of issues with broken fan bearings, and other issues. There are tons of people on Tom's Hardware that I have seen with XFX 7970's, ranging from constant bluescreens to extremely loud fans, and it has quite bad cooling compared to other non reference based coolers. That is why its probably cheaper, and I don't recommend it.

 

[Princeatom]

If I had the money, I'll buy the 680.