Best way to spend 400$ on (a) graphics card(s)

[mjmjpfaff]

what the thread says. i am building a gaming computer for my friend and he has 400$ out of 1500$ to spend on graphics cards, ha has a trio sli capable motherboark and an i5 2500k if you are wondering. I resently found a gtx 560 ti with rebate 199 but that deal has expired. and what r your thoughts on tri sli'ing 55o ti's?

 

[mjmjpfaff]

what the thread says, what is the best graphics card(s) for under 400$. i am building a gaming computer for my friend and he has 400$ out of 1500$ to spend on graphics cards, ha has a tri sli capable motherboard and an i5 2500k if you are wondering. I resently found a gtx 560 ti with rebate 199 but that deal has expired. and what r your thoughts on tri sli'ing 550 ti's?

refined my last post.

 

[Mousemonkey]

GTX550's and GTX560's cannot be Tri-SLi'd.

 

[shrkbay]

imo best for ~400$ is a single GTX 570

 

[mjmjpfaff]

what about sli'ing and crossfiring 2 cards
thanx for info about 550 ti

 

[Mousemonkey]

Both the 550 and 560 can be run in dual SLi but I would only bother with the 560's myself.

 

[majin ssj eric]

Two 560's in SLI would be the best value-per-performance but you'll be hard-pressed to find two for $400. A single 6970 or GTX 570 would be very fast but not as fast as SLI 560's....

 

[mdd1963]

550s are massively overpriced, but, IMO, so are 560s....; for $500, one is very close to funding a pair of 6950s.....

 

[Mousemonkey]

550s are massively overpriced, but, IMO, so are 560s....; for $500, one is very close to funding a pair of 6950s.....

So at $400 the OP is nowhere near.

 

[jjb8675309]

go for a single gtx 570, then sli a second down the road, they scale better than 580s and are darn close in sli performance, plus from my experiences crossfire drivers are crap...I got mine (pny tx 570) for 304 AR you could save some money and if your friend is playing at 1080p then the 570 will be more than enough for right now, imo (when oc'ed mine is practically a gtx 580) prior to this I had crossfire 6870s and hated them

 

[mjmjpfaff]

so a single 570 will be good enough now and great later since he will be sli'ing?

 

[shrkbay]

^Yes, or he probably can also go for CF *SLI is more expensive and gives less performance* or a single AMD card, but for ~400$ budget i highly recommend GTX 570, it'll give enough *and even more* performance on 1080p.

 

[jjb8675309]

yes a gtx 570 which will be more than fine for now than a second down the road if the OP wants

 

[mjmjpfaff]

what would be the equivalent to a gtx 570 amd wise because he will be playing only waar games like crysis call of duty and battlefield and is that card better for those games?

 

[mjmjpfaff]

i think i will get him a 6950 2gb unlock it to a 6970 and oc it. since it only has a +/- 5 fps difference on any game, a low price, and crossfires better than 570's sli.

 

[jjb8675309]

yeah but crossfire drivers are *** and with gtx 570s in sli, the difference in scaling is actually very small the 570s.. but in the end I think a single 6950 unlocked to a 6970 is a good choice

 

[mjmjpfaff]

ive read the 6*** series drivers have fixed the 5*** series problems and are running well.

 

[jjb8675309]

well im speaking from personal expirience and after being fed up and selling the pair I am much happier with a single card, just saying if your minimum fps is crap and you are expirienceing microstutter consistently across several games and drivers have spent a lot of money on gpus then it is not worth it, just saying, toms does not paint the whole picture trust me...

 

[Tamz_msc]

I read somewhere on these forums that the newer batches of 6950s can't be unlocked.
Single GTX 570 at present seems to be the best option.

 

[phenom90]

since you have 400 to spend you 'll likely ended up deciding between gtx 570 and hd 6970... even though i would like to recommend gtx 580(it's a 500 dollars card) so it exceed your budget.... i'll take on gtx 570 since i'm playing with this card now.. and everything is great... and below is what i recommend... since it is built with custom pcb... it should handle voltage tweaking better than reference model... and not to mention it doing so at lower operating temperatures compared to reference card...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127582

 

[shrkbay]

OP: I heard there have been improvements with 6900 series over 6800 and earlier released series and also there aren't many people complaining about 6900s

 

[jjb8675309]

since you have 400 to spend you 'll likely ended up deciding between gtx 570 and hd 6970... even though i would like to recommend gtx 580(it's a 500 dollars card) so it exceed your budget.... i'll take on gtx 570 since i'm playing with this card now.. and everything is great... and below is what i recommend... since it is built with custom pcb... it should handle voltage tweaking better than reference model... and not to mention it doing so at lower operating temperatures compared to reference card...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127582

agreed

 

[jednx01]

For that price range, I would go with sli 560s... I think you'll be pretty happy with that choice...

 

[mjmjpfaff]

stricty 400$. please find each card for 200$ then.

 

[Mousemonkey]

well im speaking from personal expirience and after being fed up and selling the pair I am much happier with a single card, just saying if your minimum fps is crap and you are expirienceing microstutter consistently across several games and drivers have spent a lot of money on gpus then it is not worth it, just saying, toms does not paint the whole picture trust me...

Whenever I've ever said anything about ATi drivers being poopy a flamefest normally ensues so I've left that subject alone for a while and it is amusing seeing the ATi problem posts turning up left right and center.