BACKGROUND: I'm changing out my entire system for an upgrade to DDR3 from DDR2, and I always had trouble with my graphics card (EVGA GTX 285 -- it should be noted that several people had heating issues with this card, so it may have been a design problem) concerning the running temperatures with max fan speed on a full tower Lian Li PC-P80 (ref: ran L4D2 around 87-90c and crashed constantly on League of Legends [kernel crash on W7 prof], though DotA 2 is no problem -- is this stemming from a driver or programming complication?). I avoided going to water cooling because frankly, I think I'd do more harm than good while trying to install it solo.
WORRY: I don't want to cook my setup that is w/o a heavy-duty cooling system.
QUESTION: For newer cards that come overclocked in the box, which cards would work well in a full tower with ample air flow for cooling? The only reason why I was looking at
EVGA 03G-P4-2667-KR GeForce GTX 660 FTW Signature 2 3GB 192-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card
was due to the lower chances of overheating since it is -not- overclocked.
SUMMARY INFO
Budget for GPU: ~200-500 USD.
Mem Pref: > or = 3GB
HDCP: I don't see why I'd need it.
SLI: No intention to do so but am willing if necessary in 2 years. I intended to SLI the GTX285 but never really felt the need to before it went off main market.
Investment time: I'd like to not upgrade this for at least 4 years.
Proposed MB: GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-UD3H LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX
Proposed CPU: Intel Core i7-3770 Ivy Bridge 3.4GHz (3.9GHz Turbo)
Proposed RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 32GB (4 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
Proposed OS: Win7 Professional or Win8
Proposed Usage for GPU: Able to keep up with the newer Frostbite Engines for the next few years.
Current PSU: 600-800W
All suggestions and advice are welcome. Thanks in advance.
WORRY: I don't want to cook my setup that is w/o a heavy-duty cooling system.
QUESTION: For newer cards that come overclocked in the box, which cards would work well in a full tower with ample air flow for cooling? The only reason why I was looking at
EVGA 03G-P4-2667-KR GeForce GTX 660 FTW Signature 2 3GB 192-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Support Video Card
was due to the lower chances of overheating since it is -not- overclocked.
SUMMARY INFO
Budget for GPU: ~200-500 USD.
Mem Pref: > or = 3GB
HDCP: I don't see why I'd need it.
SLI: No intention to do so but am willing if necessary in 2 years. I intended to SLI the GTX285 but never really felt the need to before it went off main market.
Investment time: I'd like to not upgrade this for at least 4 years.
Proposed MB: GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-UD3H LGA 1155 Intel Z77 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX
Proposed CPU: Intel Core i7-3770 Ivy Bridge 3.4GHz (3.9GHz Turbo)
Proposed RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 32GB (4 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
Proposed OS: Win7 Professional or Win8
Proposed Usage for GPU: Able to keep up with the newer Frostbite Engines for the next few years.
Current PSU: 600-800W
All suggestions and advice are welcome. Thanks in advance.