Video Card Upgrade?

[goobernoodles]

I'm feeling the itch to upgrade my GTX480 in preparation for BF4. I don't really have a budget set but I'm open to anything in the $2-400 price range. I'm currently at 1920x1200. I'm also running a 2500K and 8gb of ram. Doubt it's worth upgrading either of those at this point.

GTX 760? 770? What do you guys think? Let's see some opinions.

 

[lehtv]

Why do people upgrade in preparation for a game? You won't see how your current card would perform until you see some benchmarks. By that time, if you preordered the game, you'll probably already have it and you can see for yourself if you need an upgrade or not. At least that's my philosophy... once I find a game that doesn't run well enough in my own experience, I upgrade.

On the other hand, the fact is that GTX 480 is getting a bit old, and it's a noisy power hog.

FWIW: GTX 760 is about 20-30% faster than GTX 480. (It's roughly the same as comparing GTX 660 Ti to GTX 570.) I think that's not a large enough improvement... I would probably get a 7970 instead, costs $100 less than a GTX 770 for the same performance with a bit of stock voltage OC'ing. Sapphire 7970 $290 AR (compare to GTX 570 ~ 480)

 

[goobernoodles]

If there's a reason to wait other than "wait and see what will run the game well" I'll wait. If nothing is going to come out that is going to change the landscape, I don't really see the point in waiting. I got an unexpected extra $300 the other day, so I feel like splurging.

There isn't a new line of cards coming out until late this year, correct? 20-30% improvement does seem kind of lame for that kind of cash.

 

[raghu78]

OP wait for Hawaii GPU press reveal event tomorrow. the retail launch should be in early - mid Oct. Hawaii Pro aka R9-290 should come in at USD 400 - 450. BF4 is expected to be bundled with these GPUs.

live webcast on sep 25th at 3 pm EDT.

http://ir.amd.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=74093&p=irol-eventDetails&EventId=5024687

so be patient. even if you prefer a Nvidia card wait as there could be price changes on nvidia GPUs.

 

[toyota]

a 760 is not much of an upgrade over a gtx480 especially considering that card is 3.5 years old.

so yeah just wait and see what happens so maybe you end up with a real upgrade for a better price than what we have now.

 

[Jacky60]

I'm feeling the itch to upgrade my GTX480 in preparation for BF4. I don't really have a budget set but I'm open to anything in the $2-400 price range. I'm currently at 1920x1200. I'm also running a 2500K and 8gb of ram. Doubt it's worth upgrading either of those at this point.

GTX 760? 770? What do you guys think? Let's see some opinions.

I'd say 2x7950 or 1x290x

 

[seitur]

There isn't a new line of cards coming out until late this year, correct?

New line of GPUs from AMD is revealed tommorow.

For new line of Nvidia cards you'll have to wait for another half a year more or less.

 

[goobernoodles]

Ah okay. Any idea when they're expected to actually go on sale?

 

[hackerballs]

Can I have the old 480 when you throw it out? lol

with a bandwidth of 177 GB/s, the GTX480 is still a very powerful card. It will play the new BF4 on Ultra. Specs are going to be close to the specs of BF3.

why not another 480? It would rock!! and save you money also

 

[parvadomus]

Can I have the old 480 when you throw it out? lol

with a bandwidth of 177 GB/s, the GTX480 is still a very powerful card. It will play the new BF4 on Ultra. Specs are going to be close to the specs of BF3.

why not another 480? It would rock!! and save you money also

That would be a big waste of money. GTX480's efficiency is very very bad, even more in SLI. It has only 1.5Gb VRAM too, thats low for today games and probably BF4.
Best bang for buck would be a 7970 (when OCed can offer twice as much performance than GTX480), and sell that GTX480 ASAP.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

BF4 is supposed to have system requirements and demands similar to BF3. (Just an updated engine.)

The VRAM might - might - be tight, but we don't know that yet. It also depends on whether you're an eyecandy++ type of person who demands maximum settings, or a more casual gamer who sets everything to "medium" and has a blast w/o worrying about it.

So... I'd sit tight with the 480 until the game is out. Or at least a demo. *shrug*

a 760 is not much of an upgrade over a gtx480 especially considering that card is 3.5 years old.

The 480 launch price was $500. $500 today will get you a GTX770, which, depending on the benchmark, looks to be about 2x as fast as the 480.

Fair comparisons include price point. If you move downmarket, you do so at your peril.

That said, if the OP only has $300, then a 760 will be a nice upgrade. Uses less power, has more VRAM, and crunches more maths to boot.

 

[goobernoodles]

I'm flexible on how much I can spend. I usually spend in the 2-300 dollar range on video cards, however I got a screaming deal on the 480 for $200 if I recall correctly. I could spend 4-500ish if there was a compelling case to do so - I just got an extra $300 helping a friend's boss move and figured I'd throw it at a video card since BF4 is coming out.

It's been a while since I've upgraded much of anything on this computer. That said, it seems like the improvement of video cards has slowed a bit compared to what it used to be. I'll probably just wait until the Beta is released to get a better idea of how different cards perform. These new AMD cards look intriguing though.

 

[toyota]

BF4 is supposed to have system requirements and demands similar to BF3. (Just an updated engine.)

The VRAM might - might - be tight, but we don't know that yet. It also depends on whether you're an eyecandy++ type of person who demands maximum settings, or a more casual gamer who sets everything to "medium" and has a blast w/o worrying about it.

So... I'd sit tight with the 480 until the game is out. Or at least a demo. *shrug*



The 480 launch price was $500. $500 today will get you a GTX770, which, depending on the benchmark, looks to be about 2x as fast as the 480.

Fair comparisons include price point. If you move downmarket, you do so at your peril.

That said, if the OP only has $300, then a 760 will be a nice upgrade. Uses less power, has more VRAM, and crunches more maths to boot.

lol, what? a 770 is about 50% faster than a 480 so not sure where you got the 100% increase from. again he needs a faster card than the 760 for real substantial upgrade over the 480 after all this time.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

lol, what? a 770 is about 50% faster than a 480 so not sure where you got the 100% increase from. again he needs a faster card than the 760 for real substantial upgrade over the 480 after all this time.

The anand bench results, comparing the 770 to the 580. It's anywhere from 50% higher score to double, depending on the benchmark.

The 580 was like 10-20% faster than the 480, according to other reviews.

It would have been more accurate to say "up to twice as fast," I suppose.

 

[hackerballs]

Don't want to spoil your spending, but why would you think 1.5 VRam is not enough for BF4? IS there any game out there that will overload 1.5 Vram. I'm not talking about future shock here, the op can save money for a new GPU when he really needs it. Don't see any point of spending on a 7970 when new cards are due out.

Here, check this out http://www.overclock.net/t/780310/how-much-vram-do-you-need-for-todays-games#post_10057086

A higher Resolution Monitor will benefit from more Vram . Also the higher the resolution, the more you take the AA off while still maintaining a Ultra setting. Because you use a 1200p like I do, this will enable you to take the AA off and still have a great looking pic and letting you increase your FPS in games.

and read this review before you sound off about it being very, very bad in SLI http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/geforce-gtx-480,2585-14.html

Was trying to save you some money goobernoddles and still get you rocking with GPU power.

Seems to be too many cooks spoiling the soup here before they do any Research. Don't put your heart and soul into just one "off" review and call it a day.
2 x gtx480 = GTX590

But try to wait for the game to be out first and then you can decide, but your 480 by itself will still play on Ultra on BF4

 

[toyota]

The anand bench results, comparing the 770 to the 580. It's anywhere from 50% higher score to double, depending on the benchmark.

The 580 was like 10-20% faster than the 480, according to other reviews.

It would have been more accurate to say "up to twice as fast," I suppose.

almost exactly 50% faster than the 570 at 1920. and of course the 570 is dead even with the 480 overall. http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/NVIDIA/GeForce_GTX_770/27.html

 

[VI3L]

Just buy 2 titans bro

But seriously, dont go sli 480s! I had these back in the day and they were by far the loudest/hottest setup I have had.

If you really wanted to buy RIGHT NOW, a gtx 770 would be able to handle bf4 pretty well IMO. The noise and heat reduction would be nice too. Try to sell your 480 on Craigslist or something.

I had two of the 4gb cards b4 my 780s and they are good cards. I would recommend the EVGA 770 with ACX cooling, super quiet and chilly.

 

[Insomniator]

This thread makes me curious... the 7950 looks twice as my 560ti 448 according to Anand benches. Is 2x not that good of an increase?

I don't HAVE to upgrade my card, just kind of want to for Crysis 3.

 

[hackerballs]

don't think you need an upgrade for Crysis 3. My son uses his GTX460 on High/1080p with some Ultra settings. Yours should be no problem with the extra bandwidth you have.

But the 7950 is a great "bang for the buck" and does put your card to shame

 

[toyota]

don't think you need an upgrade for Crysis 3. My son uses his GTX460 on High/1080p with some Ultra settings. Yours should be no problem with the extra bandwidth you have.

But the 7950 is a great "bang for the buck" and does put your card to shame

no he doesnt unless he considers 20 fps acceptable. and btw there is no ultra setting in Crysis 3 so you must mean very high.

 

[hackerballs]

Yes, that is what I meant and even my OLD, old Q6600/8gRam/GTX275 can play it on high so his 560Ti 448 can do very high. almost up to a 570 there with that card

 

[toyota]

Yes, that is what I meant and even my OLD, old Q6600/8gRam/GTX275 can play it on high so his 560Ti 448 can do very high. almost up to a 570 there with that card

sorry but a gtx460 can not play Crysis 3 smoothly on mix of high and very high settings at 1080. my oced gtx660 ti, which is over twice as fast as 460 can barely stay at 60 fps on just high settings with shadows on medium. so again he must think 20 fps is playable because that is what he would be getting. and you must enjoy super low framerates yourself claiming now that a gtx560 ti can run very high settings.

and this backs me up as cards even faster are not doing what you claim. http://www.techspot.com/review/642-crysis-3-performance/page5.html

 

[Buddyd]

Yes, that is what I meant and even my OLD, old Q6600/8gRam/GTX275 can play it on high so his 560Ti 448 can do very high. almost up to a 570 there with that card

Hackerballs you may be talking about Crysis or Crysis 2, Crysis 3 won't run on a GTX 275 because it doesn't support Direct X 11. I run a GTX 275 and found that out the hard way.

 

[pcslookout]

Crysis 3 is such a true test of graphic cards! About to try my GTX 770 4 GB with all very high ! Not sure about AA or AF yet.

I just want 30 fps is all for my minimum.


When will be able to play Crysis 3 on triple monitors at 60 fps ?

 

[toyota]

Crysis 3 is such a true test of graphic cards! About to try my GTX 770 4 GB with all very high ! Not sure about AA or AF yet.

I just want 30 fps is all for my minimum.


When will be able to play Crysis 3 on triple monitors at 60 fps ?

if your 770 is oced you will be able to average almost 60 fps on very high with shadows on medium and using SMAA 1 or 2 at 1080. any decent card can run 16x AF will basically no performance it for years now.