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New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Hi everyone, looking for a bit of advice.
Just recently finished building an i5-3570k gig with 8GB Ram, 128GB SSD, P8Z77-V Motherboard but have yet to buy a graphics card.
I have £300 budget however i have an xbox as well and use that quite a bit.
What GPU would you recommend for me within my budget? I would probably be a casual gamer but would like to occasionally play new DX11 games on high/ultra settings such as BF3, Fifa 13 (lol), Civ 5, CS: GO.
At first i was thinking a ASUS GTX560TI (watched some BF3 vids on YouTube) but thats old tech now right?
Not too sure about AMD cards as i've read ppl having a lot of problems with drivers.
So...do you reckon I go 660 Ti and Non Ti, 670, 7950 or something totally different? Cheers
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Well the 7950 can be OCd to match the 670 and 670 can OC to match 7970. I believe the 7950 offers better bang for buck though. In the end it might come down to features such as physhx for nvidia. Personally I'd go with the 7950 as it will handle games at max without an issue so the extra money for a 670 wouldn't be worth it
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Well BF3 and Civ 5 are both games that run well on Nvidia hardware, BF3 especially.
It depends upon whether you are happy to spend the whole budget, or just enough to get good performance?
Prices on the GTX 660 Ti are starting to drop and will provide excellent performance in BF3 and Civ 5.
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-m...-1344-2x-dl-dv
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-g...hz-cores-1344-
Are both pretty good deals.
A 7950 isn't as good value on BF3/Civ5 although it *may* be better on other games that you buy in the future.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Also 7950 will have 3gb memory which will be better for the future and the 660ti only has 192bit memory which will struggle with supersampling AA
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3gb-m...ni-displayport
It's simpy a better card than the 660ti for the same price :)
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Depends how on the price and what resolution you're playing at.
At 1080p I don't see much point in getting a 670.
Apparently the card to get at the mo is the 7950 as it's a better card than the 660 Ti and overclocks well, but I've had poor experiences with AMD cards (or more accurately, their drivers) so personally am inclined to stay clear of them.
I got a 660Ti. It was an EVGA which was £250 but I got a 10% off voucher (now expired) and am selling the Borderlands 2 so all in all comes to about £200 which is much more reasonable for what the 660Ti is. Look around for deals, would be my advice. Scan's daily deals are quite good.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Rumours suggest incoming price cuts for the 660 Ti which would make the decision easier:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2269376
At the moment the 7950 and 660 Ti are very close, both have different strengths and weaknesses.
The 7950 does have better memory, but many current games simply don't need that amount of memory or bandwidth. It seems likely that games of the future will be able to take advantage of this, but other architectural features of the 7950 may not be so future proof. It's all very speculative at this point.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Yep the difference isn't day and night but it is enough to make the 7950 a better contender for now, and as games are always improving, for the future as well.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
For right now, for BF3, for the two MSI cards the 660 Ti will perform better, especially at factory clocks.
It will also do so using less power and with less noise.
That isn't to say you shouldn't consider the 7950 for it's better performance in other titles, but it's not a clear cut win.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
get dat sweet sweet 660ti, especially if you're going to be playing a lot of PhysX enabled games
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
OK, I take everything back I said, because this 7950 is better and cheaper than the MSI version mentioned above:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...odid=GX-304-SP
Only 6 left though!
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Haha glad we could come to an agreement ;)
Regarding that card there are only 5 left now! Seems the OP is nowhere to be seen though :p
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
I'll change my mind again in a couple of days :P
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Either the 660ti or the 7950 will do fine at ~£250 price point. I'll be selling my Borderlands 2 code from my 660ti so that should bring my expenditure down.
You really can't go wrong. Also, all those who keep harping on about the 192bit memory bandwidth please read this. It makes a difference but doesn't cripple the card.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Sorry guys i'm here...i've been really busy at work this week! I am overwhelmed with all the responses - thank you all very much.
Although the 7950 seems the better card than the 660Ti, I do like the NVidia features such as PhysX and atm stable drivers. Also I think i've been brand brain-washed and convinced that AMD cards are lesser in quality in some way...
OK, so next question would be do I go for a 660Ti or just the newly released GTX660 non ti version?
Also which branded GPU would you rank best between EVGA, MSI, ASUS etc?
I'm about to download the FIFA 13 PC Demo and play it using my integrated HD 4000 graphics!
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
dcwt2010
Either the 660ti or the 7950 will do fine at ~£250 price point. I'll be selling my Borderlands 2 code from my 660ti so that should bring my expenditure down.
You really can't go wrong. Also, all those who keep harping on about the 192bit memory bandwidth. It makes a difference but doesn't cripple the card.
How much you reckon you will get for the Borderlands 2 code?
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
flamstead
atm stable drivers. Also I think i've been brand brain-washed and convinced that AMD cards are lesser in quality in some way...
Stable drivers?? Considering the stuttering issues Nvidia has had this year,I think that is more an old wives tale!! ;)
Not sure what you mean quality,as I have had both AMD and Nvidia cards which have lasted years.
Also,the 192 bit memory controller and lower number of ROPS will be an issue over time with the GTX660TI against the GTX670. The HD7950 ATM does better when you start using intensive forms of AA or are interested in modding games like Skyrim.
I remember having similar conversations about the pre-overclocked 8800GT 256MB cards vs the 512MB version,the overclcoked GTX460 768MB cards vs the 1GB version and the massively factory overclocked GTX560TI cards vs the GTX570,with people recommending the first cards over the second ones.
The GTX660TI will show its age much quicker than a GTX670 or HD7950 IMHO.
Also,remember the games which the HD7950 comes with including Sleeping Dogs,which sells for as much as the BL2 online if you look at the price of Steam codes(around £15 to £20) .
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
I'm sure you are right about AMD drivers improving, but I'm not sure I follow your logic here!
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
CAT-THE-FIFTH
Stable drivers?? Considering the stuttering issues Nvidia has had this year,I think that is more an old wives tale!! ;)
Not sure what you mean quality,as I have had both AMD and Nvidia cards which have lasted years.
Also,the 192 bit memory controller and lower number of ROPS will be an issue over time with the GTX660TI against the GTX670.
I remember having similar conversations about the 8800GT 256MB vs the 512MB version,the GTX460 768MB vs the 1GB version and the massively factory overclocked GTX560TI cards vs the GTX570,with people recommending the first cards over the second ones.
The GTX660TI will show its age much quicker than a GTX670 or HD7950 IMHO.
Marketing and pricing strategies. I know I should be solely focusing on performance at the end of the day.
I have read a lot of your previous posts in other threads and respect many of them so let me ask you this. In your honest opinion for the games that I'm looking to play on my PC should I get a 7950 or 660 Ti?
Whats a reasonable frame rate to play most PC games at without stutter or is that dependent on the game?
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
flamstead
Marketing and pricing strategies. I know I should be solely focusing on performance at the end of the day.
I have read a lot of your previous posts in other threads and respect many of them so let me ask you this. In your honest opinion for the games that I'm looking to play on my PC should I get a 7950 or 660 Ti?
Whats a reasonable frame rate to play most PC games at without stutter or is that dependent on the game?
These are my views:
1.)For pure overall performance I would get an HD7950.It suffers much less with intensive forms of AA and even with mods too. The GTX660TI has a reduced number of ROPs and less memory bandwidth than a GTX670 despite using the same number of shaders and the same clockspeeds. The cards I mentioned before had enough RAM and ROPs at the time they were released,but these became the main limitations as time progressed. A lot of people will try to only look at the short term and not the long term with these cards. If you are spending well over £200,do not get something which will hit limitations sooner rather than later.
2.)If you overclock,as long as you get a better HD7950,you can 30% to 45% additional overclocks on average(however XFX and Sapphire models are voltage locked but you can still hit 1GHZ on stock voltage!). Hence for overclocking on average I would get an HD7950.
3.)If you need a shorter PCB,are cooling limited or have a more marginal PSU the GTX660TI makes more sense.
4.)If you really need PhysX(sadly it is more about gimping games first it seems),then get a GTX660TI.
Now,if the GTX660TI was around £200 up front I might recommend it more often,but it isn't and I just think the HD7950 has more legs.
Also,it appears the GTX660TI is not selling that well:
http://www.kitguru.net/components/gr...very-sluggish/
Even the purchasing manager over on OcUK,mentioned that the HD7950 and HD7870 had much higher sales:
http://forums.hexus.net/hexus-news/2...ml#post2591269
There seems to be some noise,that there will be a price cut on the GTX660TI as a result in the next few weeks. It might be worth waiting as you might be able to get a £200 GTX660TI.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
The 660 Ti and 7950 are pretty close, it depends upon the games you play now and the games you anticipate playing in the future.
But most of all it depends upon the price.
I mean when you can pick up a quality 7950 for £240 that is hard to argue with, but then again Nvidia are preparing to announce price cuts for the 660 Ti.
The key thing is usually the minimum frame rate, you never want this to drop below 30fps. For most games having an average of 50-60 fps should give you confidence that the minimum will not drop below 30fps. This should be achievable on almost any graphics card, the issue is how high you can push the resolution and effects while doing so.
Having excess memory capacity is great, but AMD cards will usually hit another bottleneck before their memory advantage is fully used. But hey, at least it's there :)
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Features such as physx will be useless if you plan to play fifa 13 :p
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
The 7950 for £240-£270 is the choice. I agree entirely with Cat's thoughts on the matter.
Though if you've got the funds, a 670 can be had for £290 and i'd make the jump. For a new build that you'd like to last, get the best you can - it's that simple. A 670 will keep you going for a good while and that's before any overclocking. The 660Ti i wouldn't bother with unless you really can't spend more than £220, and only if you're willing to wait and see / have faith that rumoured cuts will come good.
If OP's happy to spend ~£300, a 670. May be more than you need right now but that's no bad thing.
If OP wants to spare some funds, a 7950 with a decent cooler. You won't regret it and no game right now strains it too hard at High/Ultra settings.
If you're angling at a 7950, try and get one on sale and before the model you want is replaced with boost bios stock. I was going to get the MSI Twin-Frozr 3, but it's end of line at Scan and the new bios version is £300. I personally decided to switch up to a 670 for my new 3XS build because i could.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Thanks Cat, I think I'm gonna holdout for a bit maybe til November as ill be heavily playing Fifa 13 on the Xbox come end of the month...hopefully within that time the price of a non reference 670 drops sub £290 or the GTX 660 Ti drops to around the £210-£200 mark but honestly i cant see it dropping especially if Nvidia are releasing the non ti version and also the GTX650.
Wish I had snapped up the EVGA GTX 670 from PC World when they had a 10% code going!
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
flamstead
Thanks Cat, I think I'm gonna holdout for a bit maybe til November as ill be heavily playing Fifa 13 on the Xbox come end of the month...hopefully within that time the price of a non reference 670 drops sub £290 or the GTX 660 Ti drops to around the £210-£200 mark but honestly i cant see it dropping especially if Nvidia are releasing the non ti version and also the GTX650.
Wish I had snapped up the EVGA GTX 670 from PC World when they had a 10% code going!
Here is an article which looks at the memory bandwidth limitations of the GTX660TI with a bandwidth heavy game:
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/geforc...-32522-10.html
This is why at around £200 it would be better value. However,it also seems AMD is dropping prices too:
http://www.techpowerup.com/172097/AM...rice-Cuts.html
That means an HD7870 will be well under £200 hopefully and the HD7950 3GB will start at around £220 to £230.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Wow, more price cuts, awesome :)
Have to say though that article in Toms is just pointless, just telling us stuff we already knew.
"We really can’t recommend Nvidia's GeForce GTX 660 Ti if you plan to use 4x or 8x MSAA;"
Yeah the 660 Ti only gets 93fps (53fps min) that's just unplayable.
Turning off all the other effects that the card handles well is pointless, it's just not realistic. I mean who in their right mind would turn on 8x MSAA but turn off tesselation, HBAO and MVSS?
How many people can even tell the difference between 4x MSAA and 8x MSAA anyway?
Maybe they should run another article on AMD cards called "testing for shader/tessellation limitations". That would be equally pointless, people get the information they need from actual game tests, all this fake theoretical stuff is rubbish. I much prefer the way HardOCP tests cards by showing what features/resolutions can be enabled while performing to a level that is playable:
http://www.hardocp.com/article/2012/...o_card_review/
It's far more interesting to know that a card will let you play with say 4x MSAA rather than that card gives you 70fps instead of 60fps.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Willzzz
Wow, more price cuts, awesome :)
Have to say though that article in Toms is just pointless, just telling us stuff we already knew.
"We really can’t recommend Nvidia's GeForce GTX 660 Ti if you plan to use 4x or 8x MSAA;"
Yeah the 660 Ti only gets 93fps (53fps min) that's just unplayable.
Turning off all the other effects that the card handles well is pointless, it's just not realistic. I mean who in their right mind would turn on 8x MSAA but turn off tesselation, HBAO and MVSS?
How many people can even tell the difference between 4x MSAA and 8x MSAA anyway?
No,because it highlights what most of us have been saying and you forget the game tested is a Nvidia sponsered title. The GTX660 is bandwidth and ROP limited and is a poor choice at its current price. In fact for a long time the game ran poorly on AMD cards.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Willzzz
Maybe they should run another article on AMD cards called "testing for shader/tessellation limitations". That would be equally pointless, people get the information they need from actual game tests, all this fake theoretical stuff is rubbish. I much prefer the way HardOCP tests cards by showing what features/resolutions can be enabled while performing to a level that is playable:
http://www.hardocp.com/article/2012/...o_card_review/
It's far more interesting to know that a card will let you play with say 4x MSAA rather than that card gives you 70fps instead of 60fps.
You mean the same website which only recommends Galaxy cards after being sponsored by them?? You do realise even people on other forums who own Nvidia cards find HardOCP a joke. Even when people question some of their own findings they end up being banned from their forums and the editors are morons too.
That Galaxy card is also a pre-overclocked card with 3GB memory which means it costs more than most 2GB cards,and is also compared to stock GTX670 and HD7950 cards.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Yeah and the galaxy card is worse, so let's not even discuss it :)
I said I liked the way they test, not the website or the way it's run.
The fact that they test by features rather than just frames per second. FPS is actually quite a meaningless stat in many ways, especially when you are comparing figures like 132fps vs 123 fps and then concluding that 123fps @ 4xMSAA means that the card is rubbish.
Having a better graphics card is only worthwhile if it means you can enable higher resolutions or more features. Slight fps differences are imperceptible and not the basis for a comprehensive review.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
CAT-THE-FIFTH
No,because it highlights what most of us have been saying and you forget the game tested is a Nvidia sponsered title. The GTX660 is bandwidth and ROP limited and is a poor choice at its current price. In fact for a long time the game ran poorly on AMD cards.
Yes it highlights what everyone already knew, that is why it is pointless. We all know the memory is the weak point on the 660 Ti, we also know how it performs in actual games rather than what is essentially a theoretical test that Toms have done (even if they used a real game as tool for constructing the test).
And yes I agree that for general purpose gaming the 7950 is currently preferable to the 660 Ti.
Also I didn't link to the Galaxy review, in fact I only linked to a 660 Ti review by chance because it was at the top. I could have linked to a 7970 review, the only purpose of the link was to show the FORMAT they used, not any of the results.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
The point of Cat's link was to provide a specific example in review that shows quite nicely where the 660 Ti's problems are.
I get what you're saying, Willzzz, about a more realistic test but that wasn't the point of the example.
In real life, the 660 Ti does other GPU intensive operations well, but what about when you have those features enabled, and then you put on MSAA? Regardless of comparison against AMD's cards with the same settings, as soon as MSAA is enabled the 660 Ti dives, and in real life that'll be alongside any performance hits incurred by higher settings elsewhere. I'd expect a card i've paid more than £230 on to handle some reasonable MSAA, regardless of what my other gameplay settings are. That's the point here - it's not terrible, and FXAA helps a lot...but it's still a bit naff for over £200.
And it's also interesting to see the 3GB struggling so much, when many wondered if it might be a bit better. It just reinforces the bandwidth issue, even if we did know about it beforehand. I particularly agree with a point touched upon in that review too: that a 1.5GB 660 Ti at £200 would make far more sense.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Fjo
and in real life that'll be alongside any performance hits incurred by higher settings elsewhere.
Actually I don't think that is true at all, when we are talking about a bottleneck (such as memory) it's called that because it doesn't let the other components work to their fullest.
Adding extra features such as tessellation is going to stress a totally different part of the GPU so it shouldn't impact performance significantly.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Fjo
The point of Cat's link was to provide a specific example in review that shows quite nicely where the 660 Ti's problems are.
I get what you're saying, Willzzz, about a more realistic test but that wasn't the point of the example.
In real life, the 660 Ti does other GPU intensive operations well, but what about when you have those features enabled, and then you put on MSAA? Regardless of comparison against AMD's cards with the same settings, as soon as MSAA is enabled the 660 Ti dives, and in real life that'll be alongside any performance hits incurred by higher settings elsewhere. I'd expect a card i've paid more than £230 on to handle some reasonable MSAA, regardless of what my other gameplay settings are. That's the point here - it's not terrible, and FXAA helps a lot...but it's still a bit naff for over £200.
And it's also interesting to see the 3GB struggling so much, when many wondered if it might be a bit better. It just reinforces the bandwidth issue, even if we did know about it beforehand. I particularly agree with a point touched upon in that review too: that a 1.5GB 660 Ti at £200 would make far more sense.
Again, this http://www.hardocp.com/article/2012/...ettings_review article compares a 2GB 660ti to a 2GB 670ti and then a 3GB 660ti to a 7950. They overclocked the 660ti to match clocks with the 670ti and it shows clearly that the smaller bandwidth bus isn't as bad as how others have reported. Unlike Tomshardware they tested it over 4 games.
Now I entirely agree that overall a 7950 is better value but having had two gens of 5850 I wanted to go Nvidia again for their superior control panel. AMD are catching up but it's taken them years...
Oh, I sold my Borderlands 2 code for 20 quid so my 660ti only cost me £220 (it was the Palit Jetstream version).
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
But you can sell the 3 game bundle that comes with the 7800 series for around £30 too.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Didn't say you couldn't, I was merely mentioning what I did. I'll stress again, the 7950 is a very good deal right now but the 660ti isn't a complete turd. It is about 10 to 15% overpriced and I certainly wouldn't have paid more than £220 (I knew I could sell the Borderlands 2 code as I had steam friends who were interested) for it but it is still a very capable card.
It does exactly what I want, play Battlefield 3 on ultra settings at 1080. As I don't plan to buy a new monitor for another two years it'll do just fine (in two year's time I'll probably want to upgrade the graphics card too).
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Oh absolutely I agree.
Some people make up ridiculous stories about the 192bit bus and how it can't handle MSAA and future games. It's mostly rubbish.
When you turn up the settings the 660 cards actually do a fine job with 4xMSAA in most games. Sometimes it is the AMD cards that can't handle it, turn on 4xMSAA in Shogun 2 and the 7870 plummets from a healthy 40fps minimum to a pathetic 22fps, while the 660 manages a playable 30fps minimum.
http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum...review-16.html
We see the 660 series happily handling 4xMSAA in other games as well, and even placing above (technically) the 7950 in Batman with 8xMSAA.
Ah but then they say the 660 will suck at future releases due to the memory issues, but will it? It actually does very well on Unigine, a future 3D engine and will be able to take advantage of TXAA in future titles.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Willzzz
Oh absolutely I agree.
Some people make up ridiculous stories about the 192bit bus and how it can't handle MSAA and future games. It's mostly rubbish.
Not really as it more like you are the one making up stories. All you do is cherry pick examples to suit your short term advice and anyway the HD7950 is still faster overall in your example. Funny how you seem to ignore all other articles which show performance dropping much higher on the GTX660TI with AA and mods! ;)
This is why GTX670 and GTX680 owners on OcUK who are recommending HD7950 cards over GTX660TI cards. I wonder why?? They seem to be quite objective or maybe they are talking rubbish. Perhaps I should ask them?
This is why GTX660TI sales have been poor:
http://www.kitguru.net/components/gr...very-sluggish/
The same arguments were made about the GTX460 768MB and 8800GT 256MB too by people. Good short term cards since especially pre-overclocked but started losing their way after a while.
This is why the GTX670 is a better buy than a GTX660TI. At well over £200 you can go on how great it is,but with the GTX660 cards under £200 now,it is just a white elephant.
If Nvidia had launched a £200 GTX660TI in a world of £250 HD7950 cards it would be different,but alas this is not the case.
Cards like the GTX460 1GB and 8800GT 512MB lasted much longer,but where are they proponents now of the other cards now?? Nowhere - just poor short term advice to win the argument for the day,and not a peep when these cards started hitting issues. The same goes with all the proponents of the £200+ 1GHZ GTX560TI against the cheaper GTX570 cards and so on.
I have been here six years and seen all the arguments TBH with various cards,but we will have to agree to disagree on this one!
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Yeah I cherry picked to make a point, but I didn't pretend that was typical. The Toms article cherry picked and then tried to make a general point out of it.
Let's have a look at the conclusion:
http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum...review-24.html
At 1920 4xAA the 660 Ti is faster than the 7950 across an average of all benchmarks. It is only at 2560 or 'extreme' settings that the 7950 is better.
Yeah some cards didn't work long term because of a lack of total RAM, the 660 series has 2gb which is going to be perfectly fine for a long long time.
Anyone don't think I am some Nvidia fan boy, I have a completely open mind about the next card I am going to buy.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
As I said, the 7950 is the better card judged on just performance but the 660ti is no slouch. As I said, the Hardocp article specifically looks at what happens when you turn on high FSAA in several games (unlike Tomshardware which based it on one) and even if you don't like what they write you can see the full data in the form of graphs. This is far more helpful than just a table with averages (if a card framerate dips below 30fps frequently then an average of 60fps doesn't mean jack etc) and you can make up your own mind.
A piece of hardware is only as good as software that goes with it so as long as Nvidia keeps paying developers to optimise their games I don't think I have anything to worry about.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
I would go for an AMD card if they are still running their 3 for Free program.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Willzzz
Some people make up ridiculous stories about the 192bit bus and how it can't handle MSAA and future games. It's mostly rubbish.
Rubbish? You need to go back and look at reviews and draw your own conclusions.
You can see that depending on what you are throwing at it, the difference between a 580 and 680 can be anywhere from 5% to 50%......funnily enough you only get a 5-10% performance benefit over the previous generation when you are maximising the available bandwidth of a 580.....you get 50% (and in some cases more) when bandwidth is kept to a considerably lower level.
I've said it a number of times, and I will say it again....the nVidia 600 series cards are all being marketed 2 notches up in the range over where they should be.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
The GTX 660 cards are right where they need to be in price terms, slightly below the 7870 and provides equal performance on average.
You just have to look at the games you play and make your choice based on that.
The GTX 660 series can happily handle 1080p 4xMSAA in the majority of games, and while some games are AMD favoured, there are others where AMD chokes.
The reduced memory bandwidth is a factor, but it's not a design flaw.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
On average the 7870 is faster than the gtx 660 :)
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/647?vs=550
The 7950 (no boost) is better at everything other than Dirt 3, Shogun, Battlefield 3 and Portal with MSAA.
Three of those games are known to be particularly Nvidia favoured, and on Portal both cards well exceed 60fps.
For ~£240 the 7950's better. Without MSAA and now and then at 1680x1050, the 660Ti does a bit better.
They're not worth more than ~£200 with stock specs and cooling.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Actually no, the 660 Ti wins in Skyrim @ 1080p 4xAA which is surely the most popular setting.
It also wins at Civ 5 under the same settings, but hey lets call those two a draw, because the difference is so slight.
Metro is basically a draw (47.5 vs 51).
Batman is a draw (79 vs 82)
Starcraft 2 is also a win/draw (http://www.anandtech.com/show/6276/n...pler-family/11)
The only game where the 7950 pulls out a convincing win is Crysis.
"due to the constant flip-flopping of the GTX 660 Ti and 7950 on our benchmarks there is no sure-fire recommendation to hand down there"
If you play Crysis, get a 7950, if you play BF3 get a 660 Ti, everyone else buy the cheapest of the two you can find.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Just to point out that based on current games this debate is near-pointless. Anything north of 30FPS is nearly un-noticable (remember that movies run as 24FPS).
I can understand getting a card that will give you some future-proofing. But then the decision cant really be based on specific games and/or technologies, as there is little or no way to know what games you will be playing in a year or 2's time. Any 'future-proofing' decision (IMO) should be based on general, overall, Indexed figures (i.e. tests that average the results from a large selection of games).
Such as: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/charts...reme,2977.html
Then take into account cost, and workout a 'points-per-pound' evaluation of each card.
If you take it that the HD 7950 and GTX 660 TI are roughly the same price, the benchmarks run by tomshardware would suggest that the 7950 is better VFM (by about 5%).
The only exception to the above would be if you play a specific nVidia sponsored title at extremely high resolution (i.e. across 3 screens).
Also, just to point out that my HD 6950 runs BF3 on max settings flawlessly... It cost my £120... why spend more?
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Produ...94.400.457.460
Most people at this price range will be playing at 1080p or similar. If we look at the MSAA game comparisons they're all very close - so we'll call those draws.
The only ones with significant gaps are:
Crysis - 7950.
Battlefield - 660 Ti.
That's as you said, and temps/power usage average out roughly the same depending on test.
Computation and synthetics don't necessarily matter to everyone, but the former's AMD's, and so is the latter (but by a smaller margin).
Finally, we come to the fact that these benches are at stock specs. Both cards come in a range of factory overclocks but the 7950 overclocks way further, it's a fact, and pulls the benchmarks even more in its favour. This is true whether you're talking about a standard or boost bios.
The 7950 also has greater potential for future use because its 384bit bus and 3GB of memory is not going to impede anything any time soon - the 660 Ti's 192bit, 2GB setup does seem to in certain applications now (i'll admit not in every case nor as badly as many insist, still), and that's likely to continue as games push on.
At Scan, the cheapest of either card is ~£230. You get Borderland 2 with Nvidia and Sleeping Dogs with AMD.
Right now it's down to preference, but i'm not the only one who can see the 660 Ti struggling to keep up with the 7950 not long from now, rather than the other way round.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Samwood
The only exception to the above would be if you play a specific nVidia sponsored title at extremely high resolution (i.e. across 3 screens).
Most reviews i've seen don't recommend a 660 Ti for multi-screen. It's one of the applications where its bus and memory really are an issue.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
While AMD generally has an edge at multi-screen resolutions it's not usually that big of an edge to reverse a game that favours Nvidia hardware.
You increase the resolution and you are increasing demands on all aspects of the hardware, not just the memory, sometimes it's the shaders that give in first and that means that AMD can't leverage their memory advantage.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Still haven't purchased one yet but I have just seen this . Should I grab one?
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
For £20 more you can get the Black edition with Sleeping Dogs. Between the two i'd pay the little extra for the nice factory OC. Be wary of XFX's customer services and warranty though.
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3gb-x...i-hdmi-mini-dp
http://forums.hexus.net/graphics-car...ally-look.html
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Also as I mentioned in your other thread beware of the horrendous noise.
The 7950 starts out as a noisy card, and while most manufacturers manage to slash that noise down to reasonable levels XFX have somehow managed to increase it.
There is a reason XFX cards are cheap and always in stock.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Thanks Wilzzz, never thought buying a graphics card would cause so much headache. So must avoid XFX cards. The search continues...just dont want to buy one at said price and then a week later reduced by £20...silly i know
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
In actual fact it seems that AMD cards have risen slightly in price. There were a number of bargains that sadly seem to have expired.
Here are a few options:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...56&subcat=1673
Good value decent brand 7950 £240
http://www.dabs.com/products/gigabyt...?q=7950&src=16
Good value decent brand 660Ti £230
http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum...xy-msi-10.html
The 660Ti is great at BF3 and Civ5 but not quite as good as the 7950 in many other games.
Or of course you could go for a 7870 / 660 which are both perfectly capable of running BF3 etc, especially with a mild overclock.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Oh and both sites do deals with quidco:
Overclockers do free shipping (expires 1st oct)
Dabs do 2% cashback (almost £4) shipping is free anyway
This is probably the cheapest card that will still give you good BF3 performance at top settings:
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-m...098mhz-cores-9
There used to be some good options for 7870s at that price range too, but sadly all seem to have disappeared or be out of stock.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
This is a pretty decent 7870 deal http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B...=hotukdeals-21
Couldn't say whether it'd be better for the OP than a 660 though I suppose
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Yeah that's not bad, no bundled games, but neither does the 660.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
holy god of nil
There is also this new MSI HD7870 which has appeared on the Scan website recently:
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-m...hdmi-2x-mini-d
Its about £10 cheaper than the Twin Frozr version on Ebuyer which has sold out.
Edit!!
Aria has it too,although you do have to pay for postage:
http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Compo...roductId=51966
This bumps the price up to around £187 delivered although it does have a game. OTH,the Twin Frozr might be better although both coolers look very similar. Both use heatpipes although the newer design appears to use wider diameter fans.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Aria having it in stock and with a free game is a win as far as I am concerned.
The cooler is almost certainly worse than the Twin Frozr version, this is clearly a budget edition, although coming from MSI I bet it still beats the pants off XFX.
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Re: New i5 ivy bridge build...What Graphics Card Should I get?
Just to let everyone know, I have gone with THIS card (MSI PE GTX 660 TI). Thanks for all the help and suggestions in this thread. If i could send thanks I would but I cant for some reason?!?.