Nice Sapphire 7950 for $270. Give me a reason I shouldn't buy it.

skept1k · Jul 20, 2013

As the title says, this card is only $270 and beats out the 760 gtx in all the benchmarks I've reviewed. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202026

Give me a reason why I shouldn't buy it for this price.

refillable · Jul 20, 2013

Beats 760? As far as I know a 7950 will trade blows with 760.

Reason why not to buy it? Well... You can wait half a year till AMD release their next Gen GPUs changing all card's prices.

skept1k · Jul 20, 2013

refillable :

Yeah, that's the only thing i can think of to not buy it. I'm no AMD fanboy but the 760 is a great option too, but the 7950 shows more stock horsepower from what I can see. Is Sapphire any good? I'm used to XFX, ASUS, and EVGA.

NoOneLt · Jul 20, 2013

Well, if You have enough horsepower now for current gen games don't waste money on current gen card, if AMD will release something interesting prices will definitely go down a bit and You will have what to choose from.

skept1k · Jul 20, 2013

NoOneLt :

I definitely have enough horsepower, 2 OC'ed 460 GTX's 768mb in SLi but the VRAM seriously limits me at points.

NoOneLt · Jul 20, 2013

What resolutions You are going to play on?

Anyway, why not to buy if the question is to buy or not today:
1. if we look here 660Ti beats 7950, 3GB VRAM seems to have no help, maybe GPU just bottle necking here.. Found similar reviews, maybe on higher res 7950 beats GTX660ti. But 760 just a bit faster, also have 4GB version, but i don't believe it make sense for this GPU and todays, and maybe even tommorows games.
2. 760 is more energy efficient, cooler, and SLI has less problems than Cross-fire
3. 760 is cheaper.

skept1k · Jul 20, 2013

NoOneLt :

I'm going to be playing on Eyefinity/4091x900 resolution. 7950 has a 384-bit bus vs 760/660 256-bit bus, but both overclock like mad beasts. 7950 with unlocked voltage boasts up to 1200mhz core for some people. that's a lot of horsepower, and combined with crossfire it would be insane. Hopefully AMD will get their drivers together with the next update.

bretmh · Jul 20, 2013

They're equally good, I would go with nVidia though. They have been doing a good job on drivers.

skept1k · Jul 20, 2013

bretmh :

I would like to disagree, I've had awful driver issues with all of the 3xx series.

refillable · Jul 20, 2013

skept1k :

Oops... I have to disagree with you

.

1. The tested performance on TPU is older, and doesn't use updated drivers. As a 7850 user myself, The difference from 12.6 to 13.1 is not logical. I think TPU did that also. 3GB will definetely help for higher resolution, especially eyefinity. You can look at this. 4GB 760 is ~$290 btw.
2. 760 is not more energy efficient. I am always tricked by this logic. I am used to know that the 680 beat the 7970 GHz in terms of power consumption but I am really surprised that it is different on cheaper cards. If you don't believe me, take a look at this.
'Quiet' depends on the cooler, not the card/Chipset. I'm sure the TS will not look at reference design but look onto dual fan coolers such as the Vapor-X for AMD cards and MSI TF for nVidia cards. They are both nice coolers and should be on par in terms of quietness.
SLI is a breeze to install compared to CF. So TS can take this as a plus factor for nVidia cards. Unless AMD fixes their driver! I am waiting for this since a long time!
3. Yes that's correct!

For the TS:
You're playing 4320x900 right? There is no such thing as a 4091x900 as far as I know. I think you used 3 1440x900 monitors.

My options are:

1. Wait for the AMD next-gen cards, and then buy them if it's going to be nice (It should be nice anyway).
2. IF you can't wait, get the 7950 right now!

BTW I have issues with my 3xx nvidia laptop drivers... You have the same fate as I do :lol:!

17seconds · Jul 20, 2013

You can't play PhysX games on it.

skept1k · Jul 21, 2013

17seconds :

Actually you CAN play PhysX games on AMD cards. You just don't get the full effects of PhysX, but it can still be turned on. Besides, PhysX has never been and most likely never will be a reason to buy a video card. It's not utilized by enough games and it can be very demanding.

skept1k · Jul 21, 2013

refillable :

skept1k :

Oops... I have to disagree with you

.

1. The tested performance on TPU is older, and doesn't use updated drivers. As a 7850 user myself, The difference from 12.6 to 13.1 is not logical. I think TPU did that also. 3GB will definetely help for higher resolution, especially eyefinity. You can look at this. 4GB 760 is ~$290 btw.
2. 760 is not more energy efficient. I am always tricked by this logic. I am used to know that the 680 beat the 7970 GHz in terms of power consumption but I am really surprised that it is different on cheaper cards. If you don't believe me, take a look at this.
'Quiet' depends on the cooler, not the card/Chipset. I'm sure the TS will not look at reference design but look onto dual fan coolers such as the Vapor-X for AMD cards and MSI TF for nVidia cards. They are both nice coolers and should be on par in terms of quietness.
SLI is a breeze to install compared to CF. So TS can take this as a plus factor for nVidia cards. Unless AMD fixes their driver! I am waiting for this since a long time!
3. Yes that's correct!

For the TS:
You're playing 4320x900 right? There is no such thing as a 4091x900 as far as I know. I think you used 3 1440x900 monitors.

My options are:

1. Wait for the AMD next-gen cards, and then buy them if it's going to be nice (It should be nice anyway).
2. IF you can't wait, get the 7950 right now!

BTW I have issues with my 3xx nvidia laptop drivers... You have the same fate as I do :lol:!

I made a typo on the res haha :lol: It's spanning across 3 1440x900 indeed, the full res is actually 4601x900.

I want to wait for the new AMD 8xxx/9xxx series but when are they coming out? If it's a month away I can totally wait, but anything over two months I'm not keen on as these cards are aggravating me.

And yeah man, those 3xx drivers are driving me mad! :fou:

17seconds · Jul 21, 2013

skept1k :

Well you asked for a reason, and that's certainly one. You only need to play one of those games to make you feel like you're missing out on something. PhysX on the CPU is simply lame. It's certainly not something you plan on doing at the start when better options are available. Borderlands 2 is literally the only PhysX game that is coded well enough to use the CPU, and then only on Medium settings. So the smart buyer decides at the start: do I want to play PhysX games, or not?

skept1k · Jul 22, 2013

17seconds :

PhysX worked fine for me on my 4.2 ghz i5-3470k when I played Hawken on Ultra settings. I wasn't very impressed with PhysX effects to be honest, the textures for the effects it created looked really ugly and actually kinda broke the immersion for me. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's nice and all, but it's definitely not a deal breaker for me. Thanks for the reply though man

refillable · Jul 22, 2013

two months are not likely.. at least to me they'll come October.

coozie7 · Jul 22, 2013

For your monitor config the 3Gb of memory is going to come in more than handy, you'll have to get a 4Gb GTX760 to run those 3 displays if it's not going to run into VRAM issues, if not now, then later on, and it's going to be doubly important if you plan on SLI at some point in the future.
That card has good feedback.
PhysX is a dead gimmick.
AFAIK BF3 prefers NVIDIA hardware, besides it's the only test where the 660Ti bests the HD7950.
AMD already has the 8xxx cards out, but they're OEM only, not available through retail and the rumours suggest the 9xxx will turn up sometime in October (as Refillable says), but we're all aware how release dates can slip...
All in all I can't see a single reason NOT to 'add to cart'.

skept1k · Jul 22, 2013

coozie7 :

So far the best response I've gotten

Now, I do have a question though, I DO run all three monitors while playing games sometimes but the video driver usually resets or crashes even though it can run for 30 minutes and be fine, so I just run it on my single. Is it doing that because of the 768mb limit?

Also, how would a 760 gtx SLI setup compare to a 7950 Xfire setup? I know the 7950 is more powerful by default but I can't find benchmarks anywhere comparing them.

coozie7 · Jul 23, 2013

There is a huge list of possible reasons for the SLI problem ranging from temperature (either CPU or GPU) to memory or even the power supply starting to show its age, it may even be software related, which drivers are you using? We're getting quite a few posts here relating to the later 300 series drivers causing problems.
As things stand SLI is the best multi_GPU option for two reasons:
Cooling, the dual slot AMD coolers are less than good, the Nvidia ones are better, and exhaust all their heat out of the case and you're already aware of the placing problems that some motherboards cause, choking the upper card of cool air, something the AMD coolers have a real job dealing with.
Performance, right now SLI is the better software option, usually more stable and it provides a smoother experience-Google ' Crossfire microstuttering' if you have not already done so.
Downsides of SLI-for your setup:
You'll have to use the more expensive 4Gb GTX760 cards, I've already seen Max Payne 3 use slightly more than 2Gb and do not expect future games to become less demanding.

Nice Sapphire 7950 for $270. Give me a reason I shouldn't buy it.

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