Worth upgrading or wait

[Sonikku]

budget gamer here. made some upgrades to my machine for some of the more recent titles like witcher 3 and Inquisition. I game in 1080p.

My setup was

Windows 7
Asrock H77M socket 1155
Radeon 7770
Intel pentium g630 cpu
4gb ddr3 ram
Antenc 430 earthwatt PSU that came with my Antec Sonata 2 case

I upgraded the pentium g630 to an i5 2500 SR00T and doubled the ram to 8gb. I'm still using the radeon 7770 and am limited by the 430watt psu.

The question is, are there any viable upgrades in the $150 range that are worth it? Or might I better hold out one more year for the lower nm process?

 

[raghu78]

budget gamer here. made some upgrades to my machine for some of the more recent titles like witcher 3 and Inquisition. I game in 1080p.

My setup was

Windows 7
Asrock H77M socket 1155
Radeon 7770
Intel pentium g630 cpu
4gb ddr3 ram
Antenc 430 earthwatt PSU that came with my Antec Sonata 2 case

I upgraded the pentium g630 to an i5 2500 SR00T and doubled the ram to 8gb. I'm still using the radeon 7770 and am limited by the 430watt psu.

The question is, are there any viable upgrades in the $150 range that are worth it? Or might I better hold out one more year for the lower nm process?

wait for the GTX 950. based on the GM206 chip which powers GTX 960. might be a 896 cuda cores chip with the same 32 ROPs and 128 bit memory memory controller. GTX 950 should be faster than R9 370 which is basically a R7 265 / HD 7850 with higher memory clocks. GTX 950 should draw the same power as the HD 7770. GM206 is a very power efficient chip.

http://videocardz.com/57015/confirmed-nvidia-to-launch-geforce-gtx-950

 

[Ken g6]

Hm, good question. Your current GPU is basically an R7 250X. The best you could do new in your price range is either an R9 270 or a 270X with a molex-to-6pin connector. (They're both very similar to a 7870, just with different clock speeds.) Your PSU should be able to handle either. (Note: Stay away from the R7 370. It's like a 7790 or R9 265. No idea why they regressed there.)

Going to a 270x would be a big improvement. However, if I were you, I'd be looking around for sales on GTX 960s - new or used. They're even faster, and don't need that molex adapter.

 

[Blue_Max]

$150US is soooo close to a GTX 960 on sale. Scrape up some loose change until you get there. It'll run perfectly fine on your power supply, as it's a well-optimized card.

 

[Seba]

With your power supply, GTX 960 would be the best choice if you can buy one. The upgrade from HD 7770 would be significant (something like double performance/double fps with the same game settings). You can find short versions of GTX 960, that will fit in your case.

 

[frozentundra123456]

With that power supply, i agree, GTX 960 is the best choice.

Edit: Looking closer, seems like an R9 270 (non-X) requires only one six pin connector as well. AMD suggests a 500 watt power supply, but I think it should run on a quality 430 watt with no problem, especially if you dont overclock the cpu. Performance should be similar to the 960, it should be closer to your 150.00 price point. Not sure about fitting in your case though.

 

[skipsneeky2]

wait for the GTX 950. based on the GM206 chip which powers GTX 960. might be a 896 cuda cores chip with the same 32 ROPs and 128 bit memory memory controller. GTX 950 should be faster than R9 370 which is basically a R7 265 / HD 7850 with higher memory clocks. GTX 950 should draw the same power as the HD 7770. GM206 is a very power efficient chip.

http://videocardz.com/57015/confirmed-nvidia-to-launch-geforce-gtx-950

Hmm,very interesting if those are confirmed specs.Should certainly be faster than a 750 ti?I know the price and performance gaps between 750 ti and 960 are pretty staggering right now.

Got a buddy upgrading actually soon,this 950 could maybe be another choice to look into.

Thanks for posting that.

 

[shady28]

budget gamer here. made some upgrades to my machine for some of the more recent titles like witcher 3 and Inquisition. I game in 1080p.

My setup was

Windows 7
Asrock H77M socket 1155
Radeon 7770
Intel pentium g630 cpu
4gb ddr3 ram
Antenc 430 earthwatt PSU that came with my Antec Sonata 2 case

I upgraded the pentium g630 to an i5 2500 SR00T and doubled the ram to 8gb. I'm still using the radeon 7770 and am limited by the 430watt psu.

The question is, are there any viable upgrades in the $150 range that are worth it? Or might I better hold out one more year for the lower nm process?

You have 3 options in the current market without upgrading PSU - and I'm stretching a bit to $180 for the 960 (which is the best of the lot)

The cards are AMD Radeon R7 265, GTX 750 Ti, and GTX 960.

This link below is a comparison between those 3 and the 7770. I tried to pick cards that were in the middle of the AIB 'pack' for each, though in the R7 265's case there was only the ref card :

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/...=on&prod[7206]=on&prod[7335]=on&prod[7222]=on

At 1080p, the index (average FPS) :

960 : 75.9

R7 265 : 51.35

750 Ti : 46.75

7770 : 38.3


There is also the newer R7 370 which is the same as the R7 265, but with a 7-8% higher clock (should scale pretty well).

I've been seeing the 960 going for $179 +S/H and tax. There are at least 2 960s at newegg for that price right now.

The 750 Ti 2GB have been selling for as low as $110, but currently are $125 at Newegg.

The 265 is also $125 but requires a Mail in rebate ($145 without).

The 370 is $150.

The 960 is by far the best choice. For about 15% more cash you get 50-60% more performance.

Edit: Since you already have an AMD card, I would not rec a 750 Ti. You may have driver problems. If you can't stretch to $180 for the 960, the AMD R7 370 or 265 would be my rec.

 

[chucky2]

If you keep your hardware for a while, might want to wait for something with HEVC/H.265 full decode and something that has HDMI 2.0/2.0a support.

 

[frozentundra123456]

This seems to be the best deal: R9 270

1280 shaders (twice your 7770) and requires only one six pin connector. It should run on a quality 430 watt PSU. Less than 150.00 after rebate.

I was looking at the R7 370, but that is only 1024 shaders. AMD's rebranding and nomenclature is getting ridiculous. Still would be a significant upgrade though.

 

[Seba]

With that power supply, i agree, GTX 960 is the best choice.

Edit: Looking closer, seems like an R9 270 (non-X) requires only one six pin connector as well.

Yes, both require only one 6 pin power connector, but GTX 960 is significantly faster than R9 270 and not much more expensive (something like $40 more).

 

[NTMBK]

Wait for 14nm next year. You lasted this long on a 28nm GPU, just hang in there a while longer. Perf/W will go up significantly, meaning the 430W PSU is less of a problem, and you can save up for a while longer.

 

[Seba]

I think that he would have to wait longer than a year in his price range. He can double the performance now for a reasonable amount (~$200) so why wait?

 

[Mondozei]

Nvidia will release a 950 Ti or something similar so my advice is to wait for a moment.

Otherwise, a used (Sapphire Tri-X) R9-290 on ebay/craigslist is really unbeatable in price/performance. You can find some at 160 dollars or so at Ebay/Craigslist, which is really, really good. AMD's driver support for Hawaii has been better than Nvidia's support for Kepler. And that won't change very soon in large part because the 300-series is so similar to the 200-series, and it is on the same GCN arch as well. The only question mark would be the PSU. You'd probably need to upgrade that one anyway. Get one of EVGA's Supernova PSUs, one of the cheaper models at 600 watt or so. They have a 10(!) year warranty so it will be worth it over the long haul.

 

[Seba]

GTX 960 is Maxwell, not Kepler. Nobody recommender a Kepler card in this thread.

R9 290 is to much for his power supply. And a R9 290 card + a good and powerfull power supply is way out of his budget.

 

[Sonikku]

The 960 is looking like the best option, if not hold out for the newer process next year.

 

[Lalilulelo]

The 960 is looking like the best option, if not hold out for the newer process next year.

Since you're limited to the 460w . I would saved up for a better PSU 860w and 290 for $200~ since HD 7770 is decent enough. I recently purchased the Nitro 390 and plan on selling it if the node shink next year if its decent , 50%+ performance increase w/ decent pricing :$

 

[TemjinGold]

Why would OP need 860w for 1 card? Also, unless buying used, 290 is NOT ~$200.

 

[tential]

Why would OP need 860w for 1 card? Also, unless buying used, 290 is NOT ~$200.

The issue here is knowing how much the OP is wiling to spend on graphics cards.
Some are recommending a "cheap" upgrade now and then wait next year. Others are recommending to hold out til next year then get a super low end card.

Doesn't seem like anyone really knows the OP's financial situation but the OP and so recommending a plan doesn't really help when we're all flying int he dark as to what OP's goal is, budget per year, etc. because if OP is keeping this card for a long time then I say wait, but if they're willing to get rid of it within like 2 years, or if they like to buy/sell used, then I'd say pick up a used card cheap and then sell it when you want mor eperformance blah blah blah.

Really, we just don't know what the OP is up to!

 

[shady28]

The issue here is knowing how much the OP is wiling to spend on graphics cards.

If we take the OP at their word, the budget is $150.

At that price and with that PSU, the best you can do is an R9 270 2GB ($149 at newegg).

Most suggestions were to push it to $180 and get a GTX 960, which will perform about 30% better than R9 270 for about 20% more $$.

How we got from $150 budget to $240 R9 290 + $50 for a new PSU? Probably someone failed to read the OP's post.