GTX 680 VS XFX Radeon HD 7970 Balck Edition

[jerodpaul]

Ok, So I'm wondering why the GTX 680 is the best no question, because Maximum PC Magazine boasts the XFX Radeon HD 7970 Black edition as the best. So what's the best and why?

 

[ilysaml]

Generally the GTX 680 is a bit faster than HD 7970, when you OC the HD 7970 you get comparable results.

Right now most of the HD 7970s are sold with a factory OCing of 1 GHz which minimizes the gap in performance compared to GTX 680.

So whatever you pick, will get you satisfied just choose the right card with the right cooler.

 

[17seconds]

The GTX 680 will generally perform better in some of the more popular games out right now, like Battlefield 3 and Skyrim. The 7970 has some games where it holds the advantage, but those are generally less popular titles.

With the GTX 680 you also get extras that the 7970 can't match, like PhysX, Adaptive Vsync, Geforce Experience, Ambient Occlusion, Turbo Boost, FXAA, TXAA. Just looking at the relative performance doesn't give a full picture.

 

[maxh22]

Yes I agree but get the 670 its almost as good as a 7970 and $100 less!

 

[jerodpaul]

Best answer selected by JerodPaul.

 

[blazorthon]

Actually, AMD has ambient Occlusion (although they don't advertise it like Nvidia did), PhysX is hardly used in any games at all, Adaptive V-Sync doesn't work for many people with the GTX 600 cards, Turbo Boost isn't a feature as much as it is a performance optimization that doesn't make a big difference, FXAA isn't an advantage at all, TXAA isn't operable in many games (perhaps most), the GTX 600 cards give many people severe stuttering problems not present in similarly performing Radeon systems,and the 7970 wins in more games than you give it credit for (although overall, the 680 is a few percent better if you total results from many games). The 7970 is better compared to the GTX 670 than the GTX 680 and even then, OC versus OC, the 7970 wins against the GTX 680 and at resolutions higher than 2560x1600, the 7970(s) win against the GTX 680 overall, although the 7970 does use a little more power (don't compare TDPs, Nvidia gets closer to their TDP than AMD does and the 680 actually doesn't use much less power than the 7970 at load and the 7970 wins at idle) tan the 680.

If you want to care about Nvidia's feature advantage, make sure that you're playing games that actually use them (such as Batman: Arkam City). Regardless, if you guys want to suggest video cards, could you people at least be unbiased about it? Of the top cards such as this, I'd recommend a factory overclocked GTX 670 4GB (about the same price as the GTX 680, sometimes cheaper, but just as fast and without a VRAM capacity bottle-neck in very intensive games at high resolutions such as 5760x1080 and 5760x1200 and up today. Future games will kill 2GB at even 2560x1600 and then the 2GB models of the GTX 600 cards will be screwed).

The GTX 670 is a slightly more power efficient card than the 680 and with 4GB of VRAM and a slight factory overclock, it meets or beats the reference GTX 680 of the same or a slightly greater price and can handle much greater amounts of VRAM capacity usage. If that wasn't an option, then a Radeon 7970 would be my recommendation strictly because it does not have memory bottle-necks and if you pump up the settings in many games where the 680 at first beats the 7970, the 7970 pulls ahead of the GTX 680. This is because as the load increases, the efficiency of resource usage on the 7970 increases, whereas the 680 does not have this advantage. This is why the Radeon 7970 in CFX can beat the GTX 680 very badly when you increase resolutions and settings to the maximum settings that will still allow great performance. Even though the 7970 is a few percent behind the 680 most of the time (it is usually not distinguishably behind except at very low resolutions for its performance), it will get better and better as load increases and has no memory bottle-necks, so it is by far the more future proofed option compared to the GTX 680. The GTX 670 4GB only gets a recommendation above the 7970 because it keeps up well enough and saves you money on power usage while also not having a memory capacity bottle-neck.

 

[zakattak80]

Actually, AMD has ambient Occlusion (although they don't advertise it like Nvidia did), PhysX is hardly used in any games at all, Adaptive V-Sync doesn't work for many people with the GTX 600 cards, Turbo Boost isn't a feature as much as it is a performance optimization that doesn't make a big difference, FXAA isn't an advantage at all, TXAA isn't operable in many games (perhaps most), and the 7970 wins in more games than you give it credit for (although overall, the 680 is a few percent better if you total results from many games). The 7970 is better compared to the GTX 670 than the GTX 680 and even then, OC versus OC, the 7970 wins against the GTX 680 and at resolutions higher than 2560x1600, the 7970(s) win against the GTX 680 overall, although the 7970 does use a little more power (don't compare TDPs, Nvidia gets closer to their TDP than AMD does and the 680 actually doesn't use much less power than the 7970 at load and the 7970 wins at idle) tan the 680.

If you want to care about Nvidia's feature advantage, make sure that you're playing games that actually use them (such as Batman: Arkam City). Regardless, if you guys want to suggest video cards, could you people at least be unbiased about it? Of the top cards such as this, I'd recommend a factory overclocked GTX 670 4GB (about the same price as the GTX 680, sometimes cheaper, but just as fast and without a VRAM capacity bottle-neck in very intensive games at high resolutions such as 5760x1080 and 5760x1200 and up today. Future games will kill 2GB at even 2560x1600 and then the 2GB models of the GTX 600 cards will be screwed). The GTX 670 is a slightly more power efficient card than the 680 and with 4GB of VRAM and a slight factory overclock, it meets or beats the reference GTX 680 of the same or a slightly greater price and can handle much greater amounts of VRAM capacity usage.

+1, it's starting to get painfull seeing people suggest even the 670 is faster then the 7970. then, they show a chart showing BF3, skyrim, and dues ex as if there universally being played by all pc gamers. i have not tried bF3 since the beta(had a 5770 then), never touch skyrim, and shooter RGP's just arn't my thing

 

[ilysaml]

Matto17secs is a big nVidia fan, I didn't want to get in a long argument with him in order not to ruin the main thread.

He was comparing technologies vs technologies which is mainly wrong, also all what he stated has nothing to do with real world performance and barely noticeable.

 

[17seconds]

+1, it's starting to get painfull seeing people suggest even the 670 is faster then the 7970. then, they show a chart showing BF3, skyrim, and dues ex as if there universally being played by all pc gamers. i have not tried bF3 since the beta(had a 5770 then), never touch skyrim, and shooter RGP's just arn't my thing

The choice was between a 680 and a 7970 on a single card. That's a smack down, unless you really are into playing Metro 2033 or Total War: Shogun.

Merely stating that features and advantages are useless, which is subjective and clearly something an AMD user would not have experience with, does not help prove any point other than your own personal bias. Perhaps we could hear about some of the driver features and technologies that AMD cards offer which Nvidia cards don't offer. How about Graphics Core Neutral? See it's about offering something new to the conversation, rather than just being contrary, there's a big difference.

Here's a review of Adaptive VSync:
http://hardocp.com/article/2012/04/16/nvidia_adaptive_vsync_technology_review

 

[jerodpaul]

Ok thanks all updating the question a little, what are the major differences between the cards, what advantages do they have over eachother, and features the other does not, i want you to use your bias and argue one side over the other, but still pose an argument that states what the other card has that the one you're arguing for does not.
Thanks
PS This is obviously not solved lol

 

[jerodpaul]

Actually I am going to restart this thread under same name virtually, please comment on it.

 

[17seconds]

Please do yourself a favor and look at some reviews, learn about the technology, and don't just take the advice of random people on a public forum thread.

I still stand pat with my first answer, which was an honest answer. With performance so close between the cards, you need to find something else to separate them. I still feel that the extras offered by Nvidia have no comparable match on the AMD side.

Here is more info about the new exclusive features on the GTX 680:
http://techreport.com/articles.x/22735

Here is a look at the PhysX effects in Batman: Arkham City:
http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/articles/exclusive-physx-in-batman-arkham-city-a-first-look/


Even if one wants to deny that additional graphics settings, physics effects, and additional technologies that make for a smoother gaming experience are worthless, and even if you just want to focus on pure performance, then the GTX 680 is still the way to go.

The XFX Black is clocked at 1000 mhz, while the 7970 card in this review is clocked at 1050 mhz. The GTX 680 is at stock settings:

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/VTX3D/Radeon_HD_7970_X-Edition/28.html

Here are the games from that review that favor the overclocked 7970:
- Alan Wake
- Aliens vs. Predator
- Battleforge
- Crysis
- Crysis 2
- Metro 2033
- STALKER
- Starcraft 2

Here are the games that favor the stock GTX 680:
- Batman: Arkham City
- Battlefield 3
- Call of Duty 4
- Civilization V
- Dirt 3
- Dragon Age 2
- Hard Reset
- Total War: Shogun
- Skyrim
- World of Warcraft


What about overclocked results? Here's what HardOCP has to say in their head to head overclocking review:
"The Bottom Line
NVIDIA has been able to manhandle AMD with each launch this generation. AMD started off strong this year with no competition in sight. NVIDIA was late to the fight, but it did not show up unarmed when it did finally show. AMD has historically held the crown for most power efficient, fast, and affordable GPUs. However, the tides have shifted with NVIDIA's "Kepler" family of GPUs. With the launch of the GeForce GTX 680 and GeForce GTX 670 we have seen NVIDIA trump AMD’s GPU efficiency, performance, and value. NVIDIA even beat AMD to the punch this time with a dual-GPU solution much in part because of the Kepler’s tremendous efficiencies.

It is also worth again noting that AMD has been having trouble this generation keeping up with driver issues and CrossFireX support. For the first four months of the Radeon HD 7970 there wasn't even an "official" driver. NVIDIA on the other hand has been quick to support new hardware with unified drivers at launch of GTX 680. Even with the launch of GTX 690 that driver already supported its next release the GTX 670 so we were able to use publically available drivers from NVIDIA's website for the GTX 670. We've also seen [here] [here] [here] how NVIDIA's SLI is smoother than AMD's CrossFireX, and in every case we've tested so far this generation we prefer SLI over CFX for the best experience. And if you have not been exposed to NVIDIA’s Adaptive VSync Technology, you should give this feature a few moments of your time.

The GeForce GTX 680 represents a tremendous piece of technology that any gamer should love to have in his rig. The GeForce GTX 670 represents what is easily the best value in enthusiast PC gaming GPUs. Pick your poison.

Kyle and I have both been running Radeon HD 7970 configurations in our primary gaming machines for months now and been happy with these solutions. Both of us are now going Green once again."
http://www.hardocp.com/article/2012/05/14/geforce_680_670_vs_radeon_7970_7950_gaming_perf/4

 

[mouse24]

Here is what I would do, and yes I am effectively ignoring the majority of those hugely long posts.

For 100 bucks less and 7% less performance, I'd grab a 670 and just OC it

670 vs 7970... meh I still probably wouldn't pay the extra 50 bucks for such a small performance gain.

You are getting 93% of the performance of a 680 at 3/4ths the cost.

And you get all the nifty little doodads that no one would notice without being told, like physx. (/sips tea and watches fanboys rage) Which is a performance hit anywho.


My analogy to this would be its like paying 1 dollar for a 2 liter of soda or paying $1.75 for a 3 liter. When at the end of the day all you want is a few glass fulls.

Edit: hell just grab 2 used 480s and shove them in SLI.

 

[zakattak80]

The choice was between a 680 and a 7970 on a single card. That's a smack down, unless you really are into playing Metro 2033 or Total War: Shogun.

Merely stating that features and advantages are useless, which is subjective and clearly something an AMD user would not have experience with, does not help prove any point other than your own personal bias. Perhaps we could hear about some of the driver features and technologies that AMD cards offer which Nvidia cards don't offer. How about Graphics Core Neutral? See it's about offering something new to the conversation, rather than just being contrary, there's a big difference.

Here's a review of Adaptive VSync:
http://hardocp.com/article/2012/04/16/nvidia_adaptive_vsync_technology_review

i never said feature are useless, i just said the 670 is equel to 7970 and that 5 percent less then the 680. the 7970 clocked to 1000mhz is equel to the 680. secondly, i bought a 560 ti at best buy to play with it and test phsx for a week and concluded that it was a great feature and all, but at the same time it's not a feature that devolopers use unless nvidia pushes them to. i sent it back for a full refund as well.

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/NVIDIA/GeForce_GTX_670/28.html

 

[Mousemonkey]

This topic has been closed by Mousemonkey