Hi guys,
I've been spending a huge amount of time lately compiling a spreadsheet containing information on graphics cards that I'm considering for my first PC build. Up until recently it only contained Nvidia products, as I was a little scared by reports of AMD drivers spoiling the performance as well as the fact Crossfire was vastly inferior to SLI. Seemed like the on-paper figures didn't represent the in-game experience at times.
However, it seems with the release of the frame pacing update and the new R9 series of cards I'd be doing myself a disservice if I didn't at least consider AMD products. On paper, they look very strong, especially from a price/performance perspective. But I don't really understand them all that well, so was wondering if you guys could help me out.
It seems both companies utilise technologies that are exclusive to them. For example, Nvidia use PhysX, whereas AMD do not. Could anyone point me in the direction of a comparison between each company's exclusive technologies? I am specifically interested in anything that will make a significant difference to the look of a game, for example someone told me AMD cannot use Ambient Occlusion, which if true is quite a difference.
In case it helps, I am considering either a single, high-end GPU now (GTX 780) with plans to SLI/XF it 6 months or so down the line, or perhaps a pair of mid-range GPUs (760s) from the start. I'll almost certainly be playing on 1080p and nothing more, BUT would want to be able to play anything at a decent framerate and with settings as close to maximised as possible. I'd like to keep the budget for the card/s under £600.
Finally, the games I'll most likely be playing will be things like Crysis 3 and Battlefield 4, Batman and Final Fantasy XIV:ARR in case that makes a difference...
Thanks for any help!
I've been spending a huge amount of time lately compiling a spreadsheet containing information on graphics cards that I'm considering for my first PC build. Up until recently it only contained Nvidia products, as I was a little scared by reports of AMD drivers spoiling the performance as well as the fact Crossfire was vastly inferior to SLI. Seemed like the on-paper figures didn't represent the in-game experience at times.
However, it seems with the release of the frame pacing update and the new R9 series of cards I'd be doing myself a disservice if I didn't at least consider AMD products. On paper, they look very strong, especially from a price/performance perspective. But I don't really understand them all that well, so was wondering if you guys could help me out.
It seems both companies utilise technologies that are exclusive to them. For example, Nvidia use PhysX, whereas AMD do not. Could anyone point me in the direction of a comparison between each company's exclusive technologies? I am specifically interested in anything that will make a significant difference to the look of a game, for example someone told me AMD cannot use Ambient Occlusion, which if true is quite a difference.
In case it helps, I am considering either a single, high-end GPU now (GTX 780) with plans to SLI/XF it 6 months or so down the line, or perhaps a pair of mid-range GPUs (760s) from the start. I'll almost certainly be playing on 1080p and nothing more, BUT would want to be able to play anything at a decent framerate and with settings as close to maximised as possible. I'd like to keep the budget for the card/s under £600.
Finally, the games I'll most likely be playing will be things like Crysis 3 and Battlefield 4, Batman and Final Fantasy XIV:ARR in case that makes a difference...
Thanks for any help!
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