Looking to upgrade Need advice!

Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
PC_FTW

PC_FTW

Honorable
Oct 19, 2012
45
0
10,530
My current build is:

MSI 970a-g46 Motherboard
AMD FX-6300
PNY 8GB RAM 1333 MHz
Thermaltake 500w PSU
MSI Radeon 7770 GHz Edition 1GB


I'm looking to upgrade my psu and graphic card when taxes come in. But at least under $300.
I currently know about the GTX 660 being priced around $189 on newegg and the 7870 around that too. But I'm having a hard time choosing which GPU to get. I game at 1080p. Games like Battlefield 3, Battlefield 4, Skyrim, and other fps games. The 7770 plays games good but I want something better.
 
Solution
apcs13


Ah, that's very strange. I saw one for $299 but checking again shows that it is out of stock. The 7950 is no where near worth $400, as the GTX 770 is less and greatly outperforms it! You're correct, and the Rx equivalent to that I think would be somewhere between the R9 270X and the R9 280X, and the 280X was $299 back in November, but is now unfortunately around $450. I guess that means the 7870 GHz is...
Sort by date Sort by votes
apcs13

apcs13

Honorable
Oct 2, 2013
960
0
11,360
If you're into Battlefield definitely get the 7870, not only is it faster than the 660 but with the new Mantle API you should get even more gains in the future.

TBH that power supply might still work for you with a 7870, my friend runs a similar rig as yours except with a 6350 (higher consumption), 1600 MHz RAM (again, slightly higher consumption), and a green HDD (lower consumption), off of a Corsair CX500 PSU, and it works completely fine.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
gamerboy214

gamerboy214

Honorable
Sep 26, 2013
49
0
10,540
Perhaps a Radeon 7870 would fit you more? It is a little bit better than the GTX 660, The GTX 660 has a TDP of 140 Watts and the Radeon 7870 Takes 175 Watts, My Suggestion for a PSU is a 600w, Cheers :D
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
ferwindjacks

ferwindjacks

Honorable
Jun 26, 2013
632
0
11,160
For 40-60 dollars more, go with a EVGA GTX 760 SC-you get ACX cooling, boosted performance, and cool EVGA software.
Your PSU would be fine with your build, but if you'd like an upgrade go with a 650w or 600w.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
PC_FTW

PC_FTW

Honorable
Oct 19, 2012
45
0
10,530
"OMG" so many choices lol. Well I would get a beefier psu but I get charged alot for taxes here in Tennessee. I'll see if I can get a 760 but if I get a 7870 which manufacturer should I get? I also want it to stay cool.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
apcs13

apcs13

Honorable
Oct 2, 2013
960
0
11,360


Dude, you're recommending the guy a 770, when his budget for a GPU and a PSU is $300, a 2GB GTX 770 is $380 and he would need a better PSU for that card, thats probably around $450, which (if you didn't know) is more than $300 by a fair bit.

The cheapest 760 is $250, and he would want a better PSU as well with that, which pushes the cost to probably at least $320-330, which would be worth it if he can afford it, but that's the thing with budgets, you're supposed to stick to them.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy (and own) Nvidia products, but to say you're not being biased is a little misleading right now. A lot more games are actually going to be optimized towards AMD in the future, mostly because of the Mantle API being pretty successful for early software, and that both "next-gen" consoles are running entirely off of AMD components and architecture. Also, a lot of games aren't really "optimized" towards Nvidia per-se (a few are), but what I think you mean is that they provide more features with Nvidia, such as PhysX, 3D, adaptive V-sync, and the GeForce experience, etc. However, AMD is much better when you are on a tight budget, and Mantle is pretty enticing.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Mousemonkey

Mousemonkey

Titan
Sep 3, 2006
59,466
17
92,965


That's not the impression I get when I see the posts and threads from people having problems stemming from something that was delayed and full of bugs.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
apcs13

apcs13

Honorable
Oct 2, 2013
960
0
11,360


A majority of people have had fair success with the API, and while a fair amount still have issues, it's still to be expected with new software on beta drivers. Besides, when it does work, it works fairly well, and that is what I was referencing.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Mousemonkey

Mousemonkey

Titan
Sep 3, 2006
59,466
17
92,965
Time will tell of course but I have doubts that it is the "next big thing" that you seem to be touting it as and there has been very little to suggest that consoles will have any bearing on how it turns out despite them having AMD kit inside as both MS and Sony use their own API's respectively.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
apcs13

apcs13

Honorable
Oct 2, 2013
960
0
11,360


I never touted it as the "next big thing", I don't think it's anywhere near the "next big thing", I just said it will boost performance and will make the AMD card a little faster in gaming scenarios with Mantle implementation. Both the Xbox One and PS4 implement DirectX in some ways, and PS4 also uses OpenCL, so its not like they have crazy foreign API's anyways. The fact that both use AMD architecture will most likely boost AMD in the future (educated hypothesis) because the new consoles are not nearly powerful enough to keep up with modern gaming, so there will have to be heavy optimization for the consoles and therefore heavy optimization for AMD hardware, causing better performance.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Mousemonkey

Mousemonkey

Titan
Sep 3, 2006
59,466
17
92,965


As questions have been raised about AMD's lack of multi threaded support at the driver level and if that is their reason for pushing Mantle I wouldn't be so quick with the "educated hypothesis" that every game dev will be jumping on the Mantle bandwagon, chances are they will only jump if paid and AMD's pockets are not the deepest ones out there, as far as PC's are concerned MS rules the roost and that means DX.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
apcs13

apcs13

Honorable
Oct 2, 2013
960
0
11,360


I wasn't even really touching on Mantle in that last paragraph, neither console supports Mantle and probably won't ever, or at least for a long while. I was talking about better game optimization for AMD specific hardware, not Mantle.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Mousemonkey

Mousemonkey

Titan
Sep 3, 2006
59,466
17
92,965




Oh please, in your earlier post you quite clearly mention it :-
A lot more games are actually going to be optimized towards AMD in the future, mostly because of the Mantle API being pretty successful for early software, and that both "next-gen" consoles are running entirely off of AMD components and architecture.
Click to expand...
and that is what further posts then stem from so don't try and wriggle out of it because it's there for all to see.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
apcs13

apcs13

Honorable
Oct 2, 2013
960
0
11,360


Dude, calm down please, I did clearly mention it in an earlier post, but I never said that it was the "next big thing", nor that it was used in consoles. You were referring to my previous post, not my first, in your last comment, which is when I only talked about game optimization, not mentioning a single thing about Mantle. I'm not trying to "wriggle out" of anything, all I'm saying is that due to multiple factors an AMD GPU might work out pretty well for the OP to get. I think you need to take a breather, my friend.

Plus, on another note, your comment about AMD being bad with multiple threads on a driver level makes absolutely no sense. Why would AMD, who specialize in making cheap multi-core CPU and sell them as their main processor line, make bad multi-core drivers? That's entirely wrong sir, and I'm not trying to start an argument here, I just don't want anyone to be talked out of buying a great product because they got misinformed.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
apcs13

apcs13

Honorable
Oct 2, 2013
960
0
11,360


Thanks for insulting my intelligence, that makes you seem like a great guy with a legitimate argument! It's pretty much the same thing, so I saved a little time and neglected to re-read the entirety of all your inaccurate rants to copy exactly what you said, my dearest apologies. I'm going to stop replying to you now if you don't mind, you are clogging up this thread and not helping the OP in any way, so I think it is a waste of all of our lives. Good day, sir.

OP, sorry about all of that. If $300 is the roof of your budget, either the 7870 GHz, 7950, or GTX 760 seems like a good deal at the moment
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Mousemonkey

Mousemonkey

Titan
Sep 3, 2006
59,466
17
92,965


Thank you for confirming that you didn't bother to read and as for any inaccuracies, time will tell.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
S

smeezekitty

Distinguished
Sep 11, 2012
6,960
0
18,460
Just get the 7870 if (or 270x) if it appeals to you. It will run great on your PSU and is in budget.

We could argue AMD vs NVidia until we are blue in the face but the truth is they both make good cards.
They both have problems sometimes but that is just how hardware can be sometimes.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
PC_FTW

PC_FTW

Honorable
Oct 19, 2012
45
0
10,530
OP, sorry about all of that. If $300 is the roof of your budget, either the 7870 GHz, 7950, or GTX 760 seems like a good deal at the moment
Click to expand...

Thanks ill look into those but last I checked the 7950 was going for 419 on newegg. Maybe cause of the new r-series. But I'm not sure. But I will definitely check out the 760 and 7870.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
apcs13

apcs13

Honorable
Oct 2, 2013
960
0
11,360


Ah, that's very strange. I saw one for $299 but checking again shows that it is out of stock. The 7950 is no where near worth $400, as the GTX 770 is less and greatly outperforms it! You're correct, and the Rx equivalent to that I think would be somewhere between the R9 270X and the R9 280X, and the 280X was $299 back in November, but is now unfortunately around $450. I guess that means the 7870 GHz is your best bet, because while you could get a GTX 760 for around $250-270, you would want to upgrade your PSU, which would put you over-budget.
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Solution
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Latest posts

Moderators online

Share this page

COMPANY
RESOURCES
FOLLOW
Top Bottom