GPU Comparisson, Need help

skugz · May 14, 2013

I'm new at this so something doesn't make sense to me.

Why is this( http://www.computeruniverse.net/en/products/90492018/evga-geforce-gtx660-3gb-ddr5-ftw-edition.asp ) GPU cheaper than this ( http://www.computeruniverse.net/en/products/90486393/gigabyte-geforce-gtx680-2gb-ddr5.asp ) GPU, when I can see that the first has 3.0 GB and the second one has 2.0 GB?
Also what does the name "Gigabyte" , or "EVGA" have to do with GPUs? I though NVIDIA makes them.

And lastly, a friend of mine told me that any GPU can go on any motherboard, is this true?

carowden · May 14, 2013

the 3.0 gb is cheaper because the gpu is a less powerful one, it just happens to have more memory. it is a 660, where as the other is a 680. they start at 610 and go through 690, each one a step above the one before it (670 is better than 660, 680 is better than 670, etc)

and nvidia does manufacture the actual gpu, but EVGA and Gigabyte put that gpu on their board with their branded cooler (sometimes their boards and coolers are a remake of the reference card's, sometimes they are a custom design unique to their cards)

babernet_1 · May 14, 2013

You have much to learn. Please spend a week or two learning before you get around to purchasing a graphics board.

The first board has a much lower performance Graphics Processor Unit (GPU) than the second one. Normally, 2GB is all you need for a common 1920X1080 display.

There are basically two GPU manufacturers, AMD (Radeon) and Nvidia (Geforce). However, other companies take their GPU's and put them on electronics boards and add the supporting components and coolers. These are companies such as Gigabyte and EVGA.

Yes, any GPU can go on any motherboard, but you cannot always put multiple GPU's on a given motherboard. This is called SLI (Scalable Link Interface) for Nvidia and CF (Cross Fire) for AMD. Motherboards need special chips to do this you you need to make sure they support SLI and/or CF.

skugz · May 14, 2013

babernet_1 :

Thanks for the reply and don't worry I won't buy anything until I'm very aware of what I'm buying. You mentioned that the first has a less powerfull GPU. How is this measured? Is it by the 660, 670,... numbers and if so what do these numbers mean?

Paul Raver · May 14, 2013

NVidia makes the cards, other company are allowed to make/tweak there own model based.
For instance i got a ASUS GTX 660 DCII OC, a Nvidia GTX 660 with a ASUS spin to it

What card you buy is up to your budget, but look at the performance.
Just adding RAM is not going to make a huge difference.
Always look at CUDA cores, GPU Processor clock speed(MHz) and then the amount of RAM.
In this case both editions are GTX 660(not Ti) the same amount of CUDA cores.
Only there clock speed(Mhz), Memory interface (bit) and RAM(GB) amount is different, what should translate is to slight performance boost.
But if it is worth the money is up to you.

Consider buying something you could later turn into a SLI setup.
Prices will drop and then you can add a second card IF your motherboard supports it.

EVGA GeForce GTX660 3GB DDR5 FTW-Edition
Graphics Engine NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660
Memory Interface 192-bit
Core Clock 1046 MHz
Effective Memory Clock 6.008 GHz
CUDA Cores 960
Boost Clock 1111 MHz
Gigabyte GeForce GTX680 2GB DDR5 SOC-Edition
Graphics Engine NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680
Memory Interface 256-bit
Core Clock 1137 MHz
Effective Memory Clock 6.2 GHz
Boost Clock 1202 MHz

babernet_1 · May 14, 2013

The truth is, the more questions you have that we answer, the more questions that will result. Here are a few links for you to study:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-graphics-card-review,3107.html

Especially note page seven where it shows the various GPU's verses their performance level.

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/GeForce_GTX_680_SLI/1.html

This shows you various games at various display resolutions and different GPU's

remy721 · May 14, 2013

Thanks for the reply and don't worry I won't buy anything until I'm very aware of what I'm buying. You mentioned that the first has a less powerfull GPU. How is this measured? Is it by the 660, 670,... numbers and if so what do these numbers mean?

Those numbers are just model numbers created by Nvidia - of themselves, they mean nothing (in other words, a GTX 660 doesn't do something 660 times better, or perform 660 million operations a second, or something - it's just a model number).
In general, the higher the number, the better the GPU is; so a 680 is faster than a 660. The way it's usually broken down is the first number (a "6" in this case) is in reference to a series, so they may be referred to as the GTX 6XX series or GTX 6 series or whatever. The second number is the model indicator of that series. The third number is always a 0, as far as I can remember, so, yeah, whatever.
You'll learn that is always isn't that simple, though. There's also suffixes to deal with, such as "TI" and "Boost", though those usually put that GPU between it's model and the model above it. So, a GTX660TI is faster than a GTX660 but slower than a GTX670.

Sometimes series matters, but often not by much. Even though a GTX580, for example, is an older series, it's still really fast (being of the "80" model type) and still beats, say, a GTX670. The series themselves sort of follow chip evolution (they change series with new architecture) but there's not always the case.

And this is just Nvidia's stuff. AMD's part numbers get really crazy...

skugz · May 14, 2013

babernet_1 :

Thanks, I'll check it out.

skugz · May 14, 2013

remy721 :

Thanks for the reply and don't worry I won't buy anything until I'm very aware of what I'm buying. You mentioned that the first has a less powerfull GPU. How is this measured? Is it by the 660, 670,... numbers and if so what do these numbers mean?

Those numbers are just model numbers created by Nvidia - of themselves, they mean nothing (in other words, a GTX 660 doesn't do something 660 times better, or perform 660 million operations a second, or something - it's just a model number).
In general, the higher the number, the better the GPU is; so a 680 is faster than a 660. The way it's usually broken down is the first number (a "6" in this case) is in reference to a series, so they may be referred to as the GTX 6XX series or GTX 6 series or whatever. The second number is the model indicator of that series. The third number is always a 0, as far as I can remember, so, yeah, whatever.
You'll learn that is always isn't that simple, though. There's also suffixes to deal with, such as "TI" and "Boost", though those usually put that GPU between it's model and the model above it. So, a GTX660TI is faster than a GTX660 but slower than a GTX670.

Sometimes series matters, but often not by much. Even though a GTX580, for example, is an older series, it's still really fast (being of the "80" model type) and still beats, say, a GTX670. The series themselves sort of follow chip evolution (they change series with new architecture) but there's not always the case.

And this is just Nvidia's stuff. AMD's part numbers get really crazy...

Yeah, a lot of stuff to learn. Thanks for the help I'll get into it more now.

Mousemonkey · May 14, 2013

remy721 :

Thanks for the reply and don't worry I won't buy anything until I'm very aware of what I'm buying. You mentioned that the first has a less powerfull GPU. How is this measured? Is it by the 660, 670,... numbers and if so what do these numbers mean?

Those numbers are just model numbers created by Nvidia - of themselves, they mean nothing (in other words, a GTX 660 doesn't do something 660 times better, or perform 660 million operations a second, or something - it's just a model number).
In general, the higher the number, the better the GPU is; so a 680 is faster than a 660. The way it's usually broken down is the first number (a "6" in this case) is in reference to a series, so they may be referred to as the GTX 6XX series or GTX 6 series or whatever. The second number is the model indicator of that series. The third number is always a 0, as far as I can remember, so, yeah, whatever.
You'll learn that is always isn't that simple, though. There's also suffixes to deal with, such as "TI" and "Boost", though those usually put that GPU between it's model and the model above it. So, a GTX660TI is faster than a GTX660 but slower than a GTX670.

Sometimes series matters, but often not by much. Even though a GTX580, for example, is an older series, it's still really fast (being of the "80" model type) and still beats, say, a GTX670. The series themselves sort of follow chip evolution (they change series with new architecture) but there's not always the case.

And this is just Nvidia's stuff. AMD's part numbers get really crazy...

There are a couple that end in "5", the GTX275, GTX285, GTX295 and GTX465 spring to mind.

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GPU Comparisson, Need help

skugz

Honorable

carowden

Honorable

babernet_1

Honorable

skugz

Honorable

Paul Raver

Honorable

babernet_1

Honorable

remy721

Distinguished

skugz

Honorable

skugz

Honorable

Mousemonkey

Titan

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