Upgrading from 8800gts, need help on deciding card (more info inside)

[thinkmad]

APPROXIMATE PURCHASE DATE: Either this week or next week.
BUDGET RANGE: Cheaper the better. Honestly I want the best bang for my buck.

USAGE FROM MOST TO LEAST IMPORTANT: What I will be using this for is gaming. I usually play league of legends, and my card currently is good enough for it, but Im looking to play other games that I purchased during the steam summer sale. Metro2033, deus ex, the witcher 2 to name a few. A game I would like to play in the future would be bioshock infinity and eventually I would like to play borderlands 2 at some point.

CURRENT GPU AND POWER SUPPLY: 8800 gts alpha dog edition 512 mb (yes it's old from 2008) and my powersupply I believe is 650 watts. I dont remember the exact brand. Could have been 750 watts too but lets just say 650w.

OTHER RELEVANT SYSTEM SPECS: i7-2600k, asrock z77 extreme 4, gskill 16 gb ram.

PREFERRED WEBSITE(S) FOR PARTS: newegg.com
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: USA

PARTS PREFERENCES: No preference. Just not overly noisy.

OVERCLOCKING: Unlikely as I am unsure of how to overclock but always a possibility/Maybe
SLI OR CROSSFIRE: Definitely not, just want 1 card.

MONITOR RESOLUTION: 1080

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: I want a card that will last a long time that I can kind of skimp by in the future. I don't like to upgrade often, before I purchased my i7 I was running amd x2 3600.

Things I've been looking at so far were the: Radeon 7870 and the 7950. I also was considering an nvidia card but I've done a lot of reading stating that the radeon cards can give me better bang for my buck. I looked at the best card of the month and the 7870 was recommended, but I like that the 7950 on newegg has 3 free games that come with it. Something I have been considering.

What can you all suggest me? I am heading off to work so I will not be able to check in until later.

 

[Dnx]

Hi, heres a list of the best you can get:
1.- hd 7970
2.- geforce gtx 670
3.- hd 7950
4.- hd 7870
in that order, any of those specially the top 3 would give you over 2 years of nice performance. Hope this helps .

 

[Onus]

Assuming your PSU is a quality model (i.e. one capable of producing what's on it's label, cleanly), you'd be able to run any single card on a 650W PSU.
Depending on the games you play and the settings you want, choose from the list dnx put up. I have a HD7870; since my gaming habits don't change much (I play as many older games as new ones), I hope it lasts a lot longer than just two years.

 

[ProSnipor]

Okay actually the 7950 beats out a stock 670 with a little overclocking, that and amd's new drivers for the card are just flat out epic. I would totally grab that if your psu is a name brand one, being the 7950 requires 2 6 pin power connectors from your psu, along with a minimum psu of 500 watts. The 7950 can max bf3 just fine at 1080p, it can handle borderlands 2 no problem, it will run great in the witcher 2 (no uber sampling though, no one card can really handle that well yet ) along with being able to play metro 2033 maxed at 1080p with decent fps. To make a long story short, i would pick up a 7950. Here's one of my favorite 7950 models (lifetime warranty if you register at on the companies website)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150588

 

[djangoringo]

~215$ : 660 GTX : http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127702

~280$ : http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127697

 

[Dnx]

Okay actually the 7950 beats out a stock 670 with a little overclocking, that and amd's new drivers for the card are just flat out epic. I would totally grab that if your psu is a name brand one, being the 7950 requires 2 6 pin power connectors from your psu, along with a minimum psu of 500 watts. The 7950 can max bf3 just fine at 1080p, it can handle borderlands 2 no problem, it will run great in the witcher 2 (no uber sampling though, no one card can really handle that well yet ) along with being able to play metro 2033 maxed at 1080p with decent fps. To make a long story short, i would pick up a 7950. Here's one of my favorite 7950 models (lifetime warranty if you register at on the companies website)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150588

I wouldnt put the 7950 over the 670, since the 670 its also oc friendly. But anyway both cards are great. And 7950 its cheaper.

 

[djangoringo]

Actually the 660 ti is better/faster than the 7950 and it's cheaper :

http://techreport.com/discussion/23981/radeon-hd-7950-vs-geforce-gtx-660-ti-revisited#metal


670 competes with 7970(not the ghz)

 

[thinkmad]

My power supply is a cooler master 650w. It's been running for a long time, since I got my last graphics card actually.

I'm currently leaning towards the 670. Thanks for all your help. I'm not an overclocker at all, I probably should have said that. Any further opinions/input?

 

[thinkmad]

So I have been looking at the cards again and I wanted to see if there is a significant difference between these two cards. I've also decided if I do go with the 670 I will likely go with evga.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130787
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130782

The slightly more expensive card has a few more features when I compare them. My question is, is the difference worth it?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Productcompare.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100006519%2050001402%2040000048%20600315498%20600311820&IsNodeId=1&bop=And&CompareItemList=-1|14-130-787^icn_ironegg_overlay_125x94%23%2C14-130-782^icn_ironegg_overlay_125x94%23

Edit: I do not do 3d gaming. Just single monitor gaming and I am not an overclocker.

 

[djangoringo]

The evga 670 ftw has the 680 gtx pcb, which means it can overclock better(also has already a factory oc better than the other one) than the normal evga one and get better performance.
I'd go with the 670 gtx ftw.