- May 29, 2013
- 4
- 0
- 10,510
I have been coming here for information for quite some time now and figured I may as well get into the action. I do gaming when I have the time outside of class (college student/TA) with games like Borderlands 2, Skyrim, Metro2033, Alan Wake, Darksiders, Don't Starve, Reus, Black and White 2, Red Faction, Warcraft 3, Battlefield 2, Delta Force: Black Hawk down, and Joint Operations. There are more, but I figured I would provide a good test group.
Now the thing is I need a new GPU, I have been running HD 4850s in xfire for years now, they play every one of these games, but not on very good settings and I had to do some tweaking to get some of them to run at all. The cards have held up for about 5 years so it is time to lay them to rest, or actually turn one of them into a bitcoin miner while I game.
I need recommendations on cards that run no higher than $220. Right now the HD 7870 is at a good price of about $220, the sapphire edition is $225 with rebate. I compared it with a slightly cheaper GeForce GTX 660, but from what I can tell the 7870 destroys the 660, and in some cases the 660ti.
Knowing what I do I am leaning towards the 7870GHz sapphire card here:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202025
and it comes with 4 free games, which I can use or trade on steam forums.
I know it s close with the 660ti, sometimes better, sometimes worse all depending on the optimization of the game, but the ti is much more expensive at the moment.
I want to know if this is the best for my price range or if I am missing something, or if I am missing a much better sale. I did see the articles on the card in these forums but it is almost always this vs that. I would simply like an updated 5/29/2013 which is best performance for price/longevity (another 5 years) card. Everything I find seems to be back when the 7870 and 660ti were close to same price, mostly what caused the fan wars.
To be very clear:
-I know the physx engine aspect of nvida cards, and I love it, but I can run cpu physx, not as good, but still gives the desired effect.
-I know my rig is not the best, but I have gotten all of this on sale for totaling at $315, not including the GPU.
-and no trashing brands, both are amazing, each has the market top in alternating runs, I have noticed on here that this becomes an issue some times, keep it to the cards themselves, cold hard facts on the hardware and performance, though I trust most posters won't be inconsiderate like this.
Thank you for any help.
MOBO: ASUS M5A97 AM3+ 970
CPU: AMD PhenomII x4 965 BE @3.8GHz+ Xigmatek Gaia SD1283120mm CPU cooler
GPU: Sapphire Radeon HD 4850 xfire
RAM: G.Skill Ripjaws X 8GDDR3 2133
HDD: OCZ Vertex 4 SSD 128Gb + 2Tb Samsung M3
7 case fans to help with cooling (the 4850s idle at almost 80c with 50/14 fan speeds even after maintenance, still playing with temp fixes)
Now the thing is I need a new GPU, I have been running HD 4850s in xfire for years now, they play every one of these games, but not on very good settings and I had to do some tweaking to get some of them to run at all. The cards have held up for about 5 years so it is time to lay them to rest, or actually turn one of them into a bitcoin miner while I game.
I need recommendations on cards that run no higher than $220. Right now the HD 7870 is at a good price of about $220, the sapphire edition is $225 with rebate. I compared it with a slightly cheaper GeForce GTX 660, but from what I can tell the 7870 destroys the 660, and in some cases the 660ti.
Knowing what I do I am leaning towards the 7870GHz sapphire card here:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202025
and it comes with 4 free games, which I can use or trade on steam forums.
I know it s close with the 660ti, sometimes better, sometimes worse all depending on the optimization of the game, but the ti is much more expensive at the moment.
I want to know if this is the best for my price range or if I am missing something, or if I am missing a much better sale. I did see the articles on the card in these forums but it is almost always this vs that. I would simply like an updated 5/29/2013 which is best performance for price/longevity (another 5 years) card. Everything I find seems to be back when the 7870 and 660ti were close to same price, mostly what caused the fan wars.
To be very clear:
-I know the physx engine aspect of nvida cards, and I love it, but I can run cpu physx, not as good, but still gives the desired effect.
-I know my rig is not the best, but I have gotten all of this on sale for totaling at $315, not including the GPU.
-and no trashing brands, both are amazing, each has the market top in alternating runs, I have noticed on here that this becomes an issue some times, keep it to the cards themselves, cold hard facts on the hardware and performance, though I trust most posters won't be inconsiderate like this.
Thank you for any help.
MOBO: ASUS M5A97 AM3+ 970
CPU: AMD PhenomII x4 965 BE @3.8GHz+ Xigmatek Gaia SD1283120mm CPU cooler
GPU: Sapphire Radeon HD 4850 xfire
RAM: G.Skill Ripjaws X 8GDDR3 2133
HDD: OCZ Vertex 4 SSD 128Gb + 2Tb Samsung M3
7 case fans to help with cooling (the 4850s idle at almost 80c with 50/14 fan speeds even after maintenance, still playing with temp fixes)
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