Nvidia GTX980 Maxwell Review

tinytomlogan

The Guvnor
Staff member
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The next generation of nVidia GPUs, codenamed Maxwell, is upon us. Are they worth the upgrade? We find out.


Read more on the Nvidia GTX980 Maxwell Review
 
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Just skimming through the numbers on this awesome review it looks like 780 Ti owners are going to have to wait for something truly epic.
Apart from the energy efficiency the differences between the 780 Ti and 980 are miniscule.
 
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Just skimming through the numbers on this awesome review it looks like 780 Ti owners are going to have to wait for something truly epic.
Apart from the energy efficiency the difference between the 780 Ti and 980 is miniscule.


Read why....... Expecting the last card owners to upgrade everytime is a bit narrow minded IMHO
 
Rly this is nothing spectacular at all. For something that draws so little power I was expect the temps to be much better then they are currently and performance wise this gets edged out by the R9 290x and 780ti a lot.
 
Rly this is nothing spectacular at all. For something that draws so little power I was expect the temps to be much better then they are currently and performance wise this gets edged out by the R9 290x and 780ti a lot.

It's really just a taste of whats to come, Imagine the Maxwell GM200 part.
Full fat Maxwell, Now that will be epic :)
 
Excellent work Guvnor! Now to all those who asked the question "Should I upgrade my 600 series to the 700 series or should I wait for Maxwell".... the answer is clear! Get a 900 series. ;)
 
Great review as always Tom, barely slept tonight with the Scottish Vote, Maxwell and everything else. Doesn't take much to wreck my sleep pattern lol.

I'll be honest, I'm usually a fan/supporter of AMD but I think I'll move back to the Green Team now (Haven't been there since my dual 460s). I've made money recently buying and reselling a cheap R9 290 I found on ebay so I'm considering selling up and Going Nvidia now. That efficiency is just fantastic.
 
I wouldn't get too excited about power consumption numbers, since generally electricity is pretty cheap, here it's like €0.12/kWhr. The actual saving you'll make in the year with the number of hours I spend gaming in the week is miniscule, even if you compare the 290X to the 980.

Having said that though, the perf/W numbers are darn impressive. Here's waiting for what AMD have up their sleeves. Hopefully we'll have an exciting back and forth between Nvidia and AMD again, just like last year. ^_^

EDIT: To put numbers on my "miniscule" claim:

For me, the cost saving in using a 980 over a 290X is just €20/yr, I wasn't expecting it to be that low. :eek:

Time Spent in the Week Gaming = 20hrs max (usually) = 1040hrs anually
Difference in Power from the Wall = 504W-348W = 156W = 0.156kW
Electricity Cost = €0.12/kWhr
Cost Difference in the Year = 0.156 * 0.12 * 1040 = €19.47 /yr
 
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Well the 980 is looking pretty good, definitely the card to be getting if you want a Nvidia card and you are upgrading from an older lower performing card.

They aren't to badly priced for new cards either, well given the performance they wouldn't of been anyway. Still, with the prices that the 290/X are going for these days you are still getting a lot more for your buck, but the 970 is only £300 and not that much more than a 290.

I'm looking forward to seeing 20nm Maxwell, there is nothing left in 28nm and it is time for 20nm to bring in the real next gen.

EDIT: To put numbers on my "miniscule" claim:

For me, the cost saving in using a 980 over a 290X is just €20/yr, I wasn't expecting it to be that low. :eek:

People over exaggerate power usage far to much, as you have pointed out it is next to nothing a year on your electric bill :)
 
I wouldn't get too excited about power consumption numbers, since generally electricity is pretty cheap, here it's like €0.12/kWhr. The actual saving you'll make in the year with the number of hours I spend gaming in the week is miniscule, even if you compare the 290X to the 980.

Having said that though, the perf/W numbers are darn impressive. Here's waiting for what AMD have up their sleeves. Hopefully we'll have an exciting back and forth between Nvidia and AMD again, just like last year. ^_^

EDIT: To put numbers on my "miniscule" claim:

For me, the cost saving in using a 980 over a 290X is just €20/yr, I wasn't expecting it to be that low. :eek:

It's not about the money you save on electricity, that is such a closed minded view point. It's about the fact that power usage has been going up and up over the years, back in the day a 400W power supply could run a high end PC, now you need 600W to reliably run a GTX780 or R9 290 based system, 650-700 if you use an AMD FX8320 or higher CPU.

Don't you see that's a problem? the higher power usage gets the bigger the power supply we need, that means more components which means more expense which means slower development as manufacturers wait for technology to improve to get more power.

It also means less heat in PC to deal with, that means less likelyhood of getting into the exact same situation R9 290 cards are ALREADY in (i.e. getting to a point where without watercooling or a 5 slot thick heastsink cant even run at reference clock speeds (i have a MSI R9 290 and even with being the aftermarket cooled version which i have undervolted it goes into thermal protection and drops to 900MHz)).

Also the power savings actually aren't even that miniscule, a £20 saving now.. yeah sure, how about in 5 years if that saving was £100 a year, surely you arent going to tell me three whole AAA games (if bought via G2A for example) is a "miniscule" gain?
 
It's not about the money you save on electricity, that is such a closed minded view point. It's about the fact that power usage has been going up and up over the years, back in the day a 400W power supply could run a high end PC, now you need 600W to reliably run a GTX780 or R9 290 based system, 650-700 if you use an AMD FX8320 or higher CPU.

Don't you see that's a problem? the higher power usage gets the bigger the power supply we need, that means more components which means more expense which means slower development as manufacturers wait for technology to improve to get more power.

It also means less heat in PC to deal with, that means less likelyhood of getting into the exact same situation R9 290 cards are ALREADY in (i.e. getting to a point where without watercooling or a 5 slot thick heastsink cant even run at reference clock speeds (i have a MSI R9 290 and even with being the aftermarket cooled version which i have undervolted it goes into thermal protection and drops to 900MHz)).

Also the power savings actually aren't even that miniscule, a £20 saving now.. yeah sure, how about in 5 years if that saving was £100 a year, surely you arent going to tell me three whole AAA games (if bought via G2A for example) is a "miniscule" gain?

You're kind of twisting his words dude and calling someone close minded because they aren't that impressed with the "New Tech" is a little out of order.
Plus you have to remember we are talking about the card now not in 5 years time, Yes sure it will be great to see power consumption go down in the next 5 years hence saving us money but at the moment it's nothing to write home about but it is a step in the right direction :)
 
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