For 1080 , which is more future proof r9 390 or 970

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John4777

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Sep 9, 2015
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I am planning to buy a new graphic card. I have selected two graphic cards and can't decide which one to buy - R9 390 or 970. My rig:
specs-
Asus m5a97 r2.0
And fx 8320 @4ghz
Corsair vengeance 8gb ram
Corsair vs550 psu
Current graphic card - r9 270x 2gb.
So at 1920x1080 , which graphic card should I prefer to buy? I am thinking of a long term use , like 5 years or bit more. R9 specs are quite impressive but they say it's good when you have higher resolution. On the other hand , 3.5 gb issue on 970 worries me as it won't be enough in the future.
 
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R9 390 is faster than 970 in both 1080p and 1440p. So from the start, that is the better card. As for future proofing, if last-gen was anything to by, future gaming will start requiring more and more VRAM. They'll use it for better textures and storing more game assets and cache in the memory. So in the long term the 970 may start to require lowering visuals to preserve performance while the 390 will have no such problems.

As for current examples, I guess only Shadow of Mordor, Grand Theft Auto V, Far Cry 4 and Assassin's Creed Unity at max setting at 1440p-4K go over the 4 GB threshold so the difference in performance will be more pronounced there.

There really isn't any good reason for anyone to buy a 960, 970 or 980s today.
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Silverbear

Silverbear

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Feb 24, 2015
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An r9 390 will edge out the 970 in most games:

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Powercolor/R9_390_PCS_Plus/22.html

The only problem being, you would need to upgrade to a higher wattage PSU, around 650 Watts:

http://www.realhardtechx.com/index_archivos/Page362.htm

A 970 is a great 1080p card and will max out most games at that resolution right now and in the immediate future, but in 5 years it will be a different story.

Also, no need to worry about the whole 3.5 GB issue, that was blown way out of proportion.
 
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turbopixel

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May 18, 2015
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We can't see the future. In future cards with HBM, they seem to have very high vram. Even with two GTX 970 rendering fast with high boost clocks, the 4gb (or so called 3.5+0.5) would be the bottlenecking part. I wanted buy next year a second GTX 970, but after thinking about this, I come up to the conclusion its better to buy a card with high vram (2-3 years later). So, the current GTX 970 is not future proof (no card will be).
 
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iam2thecrowe

iam2thecrowe

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Jul 4, 2010
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preliminary tests are showing dx12 has significant performance gains for AMD's architecture, and yeah the 8gb vram is a bonus for if/when games come with larger textures and draw distances. The issue i see at the moment is your VS550 psu, an oc'd 8350 and r9 390 will put too much load on that psu.
 
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George Phillips

George Phillips

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R9 390 would also run a lot faster in future DX 12 supported games. Early benchmarks show that AMD cards properly implement DX12 features in hardware and could run Nvidia card one class above the same price point. The only concern is indeed the PSU. 550W should be enough but a 650W and above PSU would run better in the long run.
 
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Cryio

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Oct 6, 2010
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R9 390 is faster than 970 in both 1080p and 1440p. So from the start, that is the better card. As for future proofing, if last-gen was anything to by, future gaming will start requiring more and more VRAM. They'll use it for better textures and storing more game assets and cache in the memory. So in the long term the 970 may start to require lowering visuals to preserve performance while the 390 will have no such problems.

As for current examples, I guess only Shadow of Mordor, Grand Theft Auto V, Far Cry 4 and Assassin's Creed Unity at max setting at 1440p-4K go over the 4 GB threshold so the difference in performance will be more pronounced there.

There really isn't any good reason for anyone to buy a 960, 970 or 980s today.
 
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John4777

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Sep 9, 2015
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By considering all your suggestion , it is wise to buy r9 390 which what I will do and also to upgrade my psu to 650 or more. Thanks for helping me out , really appreciate it!
 
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iam2thecrowe

iam2thecrowe

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Jul 4, 2010
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I would beg to differ, at 1080p all the reviews i have read suggest a gtx970 is faster overall, and you wouldnt have to upgrade psu. It can also be overclocked by a higher percentage, the 390 has little room for overclocking. 4gb is plenty for some time to come at 1080p too.
perfrel_1920.gif
 
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