Extreme Buyers remorse

amdfan22

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Dec 17, 2009
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I recently purchased a msi 270x .

I need a graphics card to play some games on my 3 week vacation and i had sold my hd 5850 so i needed a GPU.

Following the amount of positive reviews i saw online i purchased it for 187 euros.

Fast foward two months and I saw a saphire 280 for only 17 more euros and a VTX 3D 280x for 35 euros more.

And now i regret my purchase a bit, i mean MSI makes great cards and iterms of build quality , cooling system , overclock im totally satisfied but it totally kills me that if i had a little bit more of patience i could have gotten a much better card.

The 270x is more than enough for my 1440x900 resolution but im seeing myself purchasing another one to crossfire in two years time or a brand new mid end gpu and if i had waited a bit it could have a much future proof GPU.
 
Solution
If you wait for the next best thing, or a better price, you will wait forever.
So long as a purchase does the job you bought ok.
In this case, the R9-280 and 280X are only a couple of tiers apart in performance on tom's hierarchy chart.
Not enough difference to incent you to make a change.
Such performance differences are mostly detectable only by a synthetic benchmark.

There is no such thing as "future proof"
You buy what you need today... today. Or at most looking forward for 6 months.

FWIW:
Here is my canned rant on planning for dual cards:
-----------------------------Start of rant----------------------------------------------------
Dual graphics cards vs. a good single card.

a) How good do you really need to be?
A single...

spat55

Distinguished


When Nvidia/AMD come up with 20nm/16nm then everything will be thrashed! R9 290 will be good enough for 2 years for me hopefully.
 
If you wait for the next best thing, or a better price, you will wait forever.
So long as a purchase does the job you bought ok.
In this case, the R9-280 and 280X are only a couple of tiers apart in performance on tom's hierarchy chart.
Not enough difference to incent you to make a change.
Such performance differences are mostly detectable only by a synthetic benchmark.

There is no such thing as "future proof"
You buy what you need today... today. Or at most looking forward for 6 months.

FWIW:
Here is my canned rant on planning for dual cards:
-----------------------------Start of rant----------------------------------------------------
Dual graphics cards vs. a good single card.

a) How good do you really need to be?
A single GTX650/ti or 7770 can give you good performance at 1920 x 1200 in most games.

A single GTX660 or 7850 will give you excellent performance at 1920 x 1200 in most games.
Even 2560 x 1600 will be good with lowered detail.
A single gtx690,7990, GTX780ti or R9-290X is about as good as it gets for a single card.

Only if you are looking at triple monitor gaming, or a 4k monitor, might sli/cf will be needed.
Even that is now changing with triple monitor support on top end cards and stronger single card solutions.

b) The costs for a single card are lower.
You require a less expensive motherboard; no need for sli/cf or multiple pci-e slots.
Even a ITX motherboard will do.

Your psu costs are less.
A GTX660 needs a 430w psu, even a GTX780 only needs a 575w psu.
When you add another card to the mix, plan on adding 200w to your psu requirements.

Even the most power hungry GTX690 only needs 620w, or a 7990 needs 700w.

Case cooling becomes more of an issue with dual cards.
That means a more expensive case with more and stronger fans.
You will also look at more noise.

c) Dual gpu's do not always render their half of the display in sync, causing microstuttering. It is an annoying effect.
The benefit of higher benchmark fps can be offset, particularly with lower tier cards.
Read this: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-geforce-stutter-crossfire,2995.html

d) dual gpu support is dependent on the driver. Not all games can benefit from dual cards.

e) dual cards up front reduces your option to get another card for an upgrade. Not that I suggest you plan for that.
It will often be the case that replacing your current card with a newer gen card will offer a better upgrade path.
The high end Maxwell and amd 8000 or 9000 series are due the end of the year or next year.
-------------------------------End of rant-----------------------------------------------------------
 
Solution

amdfan22

Distinguished
Dec 17, 2009
26
0
18,530
"If you wait for the next best thing, or a better price, you will wait forever.
So long as a purchase does the job you bought ok."

Thats very true , i went with the 270x because i needed a cheap card for my vacations.

At my resolution of 1440x900 its pretty fast , i wouldn't get it if i had a 1080p monitor since i like to get a higher tier card .

If i had a 1080p monitor i would get a card that could do 1440p decently so it would last me longer.

My last card was a HD 5850 which was overkill at the time for my low res but it lasted me 4 years so that has been my strategy.

Cards have been becoming cheaper , a 1440p or 1080p card is much cheaper now than it was 4 years ago.

Im probably gonna get a new mid/high end card in 3 years , my strategy 4 years ago was to buy a second hd 5850 sometime, but the mid end cards of 2014 could do 2 times the frame rate of my 5850.

Technology evolves so rapidly its scary.