7970 Crossfire or 780 GTX for 30 inch display

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superrambo

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Jun 2, 2010
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Hello all, I currently have a Gigabyte 7970 OC 3gb at stock clocks I am wondering if I should upgrade to the new GTX 780 or instead go Crossfire 7970's and OC them to the maxcores? I am gaming on a Dell U3011 30 inch monitor and want to play most of the recent games on 2560x1600 resolution with max settings (high AA if possible). Is microstuttering that bad with crossfire that I should just go single GPU? I am really liking the performance of the 7970. I returned a GTX 680 2gb I was using and bought this instead, and I couldn't be happier. I can play all games currently like Witcher 2 and Metro at max resolution with max settings but really want to push the games to their potential with AA etc. which I don't use.

Here's my current specs:

AS Rock ATX Motherboard Z77 EXTREME4
Intel Core i5-3570K (OC'd to 4.1 GHz)
Gigabyte Radeon HD 7970 OC 3GB (Stock clocks)
Corsair Vengeance 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 1600 MHz (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory
Samsung Electronics 840 Pro Series 2.5-Inch 256 GB
Western Digital Caviar Black 1 TB Internal Desktop Hard Drive x2
Noctua NH-D14 CPU Cooler
Corsair Professional Series AX 850 Watt ATX/EPS Modular 80 PLUS Gold

Corsair Obsidian 800D Full Tower Case.

The case isn't the best for dual GPU but I currently have a good air cooling configuration in the case with a few aftermarket fans and a BEASTLY (but loud) Silverstone 140mm x 38mm fan.

CPU Idle: 30C average across cores
GPU Idle: 32C

I tried pushing my 7970 to the max GPU clock and memory clock settings in Catalyst (1200 GPU clock and 1650 Memory clock) and my computer crashed while gaming a couple times.... Not because of temperature. So I decided to just leave it at stock.

Thanks all
 
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fudoka711

fudoka711

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Well, 2 7970's in cf will definitely beat out a gtx 780. Plus, there's no vram advantage for going for the 780.

If you can live with the sound, heat, and extra power - they definitely go for the extra 7970.

The only other option I can think of is to sell your current 7970 and go for a titan (not the 690 since it won't have enough vram). It's way overpriced, but it'll definitely have enough vram.

Also, just out of curiosity - is there a reason you stopped your cpu overclock at 4.1ghz? I feel like you could safely get a few more hunded mhz out of it while still being well within safe parameters.
 
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manofchalk

manofchalk

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May 11, 2012
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Your rig is set for dual cards, might as well go for it. Its a cheaper value alternative than buying a 780 considering you already have a 7970.

However you may want to look up Frame Rating, which is a relatively new aspect of performance that Crossfire setups are hit quite badly by.

Also about your desire for higher Anti-Aliasing. A higher resolution actually reduces the need for the higher levels of AA. Anti-Aliasing is a technology designed to compensate for low resolution displays, the higher res the screen the less of an impact it has. At 1600p I wouldn't see any reason to go above 2x.
 
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superrambo

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Is there any benefit to ever purchase a 690 since a Titan is the same price? I am trying to overclock my current 7970 and started getting artifacts at 1150/1600 speeds during games like Witcher 2 and Crysis 3. Maybe because I was too impatient and went for a high overclock without small increments. I'll try again going up 20-30 each time and do a stress test each time

I can't get my CPU overclock past 4.4 because my temps get too high in my case at 90C load and my computer shuts down. I am trying to mod the case for better airflow because I want to stay with air cooling for now. I might tweak the voltage down and try it again.

 
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manofchalk

manofchalk

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May 11, 2012
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Yea, around that point is when you have to start applying voltage to keep the 7970 stable.

90°C on that CPU, with a Noctua NH-D14 in an 800D?
You sure there's thermal paste under that cooler? :lol:
Something must be wrong for you to be getting those temperatures.
 
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