GTX 960 officially launched - In stock at variety of retailers.

http://maxwell.nvidia.com/gtx-960/

Quote:

---

Experience next-generation gaming with GeForce® GTX™ 960—the perfect upgrade to the advanced performance, power efficiency, and realistic gameplay only NVIDIA Maxwell™ technology can offer.

---

If - like me - you have been more than a little tempted by NVIDIA's GTX 970 video card, but can't justify the £250+ price tag, then the company's latest entry might just be the upgrade you're after. Nvidia is rounding out its Maxwell family of video cards with the GTX 960, which it describes as hitting the "sweet spot" when it comes to price and performance. It's far more powerful than entry-level cards such as the GTX 750 announced about a year ago, but it seems to be coming in a reasonable amount cheaper than its bigger brothers - currently priced anywhere from £160 upwards.

There's already stock at OcUK (if you can bring yourself to buy from them):
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/produc...Asc&subid=2379

And even high-street gadget cave Maplin has gotten their stock of the Asus STRIX model in early:
http://www.maplin.co.uk/p/ASUS-Nvidi...ics-Card-a44tc

After some good advice from some of you earlier in the month, I'm considering buying either the EVGA or MSI model which both seem to strike a good balance of performance and features at around £175.

Are you upgrading to one, or would you rather spend the extra ££ on a GTX 970?

Ben

Based upon the specs revealed I dont think I'll be getting a 960. I only just built with a 760 anyway so my opinion may be a little different because of that. As it stands though it doesnt seem like it would be much better at all for me, if i upgrade to this series at all it will end up being the 970.

Perhaps benchmarks will prove otherwise when they start cropping up but on paper the 960 looks quite disappointing.

Scan have them starting at £160: http://www.scan.co.uk/shop/computer-...0-(1024-cores)

I think I will wait.

So after weeks of chat and speculation. You might as well buy something else.

It might be an interesting next month or two with AMD no doubt slashing Radeon prices at some point to counter the 960 coming to market.

I have an original 7870. Would this be a good upgrade at £160 or I've seen a R9 285 for £145 or even a R9 280 at £140. Or is it even worth it? I'm only gaming at 1080p and £150 is about my limit.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by evolva13

I have an original 7870. Would this be a good upgrade at £160 or I've seen a R9 285 for £145 or even a R9 280 at £140. Or is it even worth it? I'm only gaming at 1080p and £150 is about my limit.

---

For budgets like that AMD wins pretty easily currently. There doesnt seem to be any real disadvantage to taking the 285 over the 280 over than slightly higher price but you'll have to ask someone with more experience with AMD about that.

As long as you dont use any games that you particularly like having Nvidia features on such as PhysX AMD are the better choice in your case, as long as you also have a sufficient PSU since they tend to be hungrier. The AMDs also come with 3GB VRAM which should be useful, I wouldnt expect to see too much difference between the 760 and 960 benchmark wise. If youre particularly curious then wait a day or two, benchmarks of the 960 should show up soon.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jag272

For budgets like that AMD wins pretty easily currently. There doesnt seem to be any real disadvantage to taking the 285 over the 280 over than slightly higher price but you'll have to ask someone with more experience with AMD about that.

As long as you dont use any games that you particularly like having Nvidia features on such as PhysX AMD are the better choice in your case, as long as you also have a sufficient PSU since they tend to be hungrier. The AMDs also come with 3GB VRAM which should be useful, I wouldnt expect to see too much difference between the 760 and 960 benchmark wise. If youre particularly curious then wait a day or two, benchmarks of the 960 should show up soon.

---

I've looked at the benchmarks pretty similar to the 285. Its a toss up between energy efficiency and physx vs Mantle. Is it a big enough upgrade from a 7870? Just to smooth things out a little bit or do a save a bit longer and go for a 4GB r9 290 (I can't quite stretch to a 970) but would it be overkill for 1080p or due to the new consoles will the new minimum be 4GB? Sorry for all the questions its partly thinking out loud and partly got myself in a muddle about it. I don't think I'm quite CPU limited yet I'm rocking a 2500K on a Z68 ROG Maximus.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by evolva13

I've looked at the benchmarks pretty similar to the 285. Its a toss up between energy efficiency and physx vs Mantle. Is it a big enough upgrade from a 7870? Just to smooth things out a little bit or do a save a bit longer and go for a 4GB r9 290 (I can't quite stretch to a 970) but would it be overkill for 1080p or due to the new consoles will the new minimum be 4GB? Sorry for all the questions its partly thinking out loud and partly got myself in a muddle about it. I don't think I'm quite CPU limited yet I'm rocking a 2500K on a Z68 ROG Maximus.

---

I dont particularly know much about AMD. Judging by PassMark and a few benchmarks the 7870 sits around GTX 660 territory which is the target audience for the 960 really. Upgrading to the 960 or AMD equivalent from there should be noticable but personally I would hold off and get a 290, depends how much bang you expect for your buck.

Looking at a few benchmarks the 760 appears to be just short of 20% stronger than the 7870. 960 will ofcourse be stronger more so, maybe up to the 30/40% range. That's fine for some people, not so much for others, up to you to decide if its worth your money at that point. As I said I would personally hold off and get one of the higher end cards if youre 7870 is doing well for you currently.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by evolva13

I've looked at the benchmarks pretty similar to the 285. Its a toss up between energy efficiency and physx vs Mantle. Is it a big enough upgrade from a 7870?

---

I'm on a 7870 and a 960 is nothing like enough of an upgrade. The 7870 is already pretty efficient at stock, or can be OC'd very well if you need to run a demanding game at high res. Mantle may help the 7870 punch harder as well, though they need to get VRAM usage under control.

I have a GTX660 and the GTX960 and 2600XT are the new 8600GT and 2600XT.

I was keeping an eye out for these, as I wanted to run them in SLi - but the performance just isn't there.
As others are saying i'm expecting a Ti variant of the card.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by jag272

I dont particularly know much about AMD. Judging by PassMark and a few benchmarks the 7870 sits around GTX 660 territory which is the target audience for the 960 really. Upgrading to the 960 or AMD equivalent from there should be noticable but personally I would hold off and get a 290, depends how much bang you expect for your buck.

Looking at a few benchmarks the 760 appears to be just short of 20% stronger than the 7870. 960 will ofcourse be stronger more so, maybe up to the 30/40% range. That's fine for some people, not so much for others, up to you to decide if its worth your money at that point. As I said I would personally hold off and get one of the higher end cards if youre 7870 is doing well for you currently.

---

Thanks for the advice. I had another think about it and came to the same conclusion really. I think if I wait a bit longer I may do the whole system when Skylake comes out later in the year.

960 is kinda weak not really a next gen upgrade :(