7950 or 660ti?

[leeskiramm]

Hello everyone,

I'm planning on upgrading my GPU in the next month or so (whenever I get enough money), and I'm considering two cards at the moment:

- The Sapphire Vapor-X 7950 LINK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Sapphire-11196-09-40G-HD7950-Vapox-X-Graphics/dp/B0091MFBZC/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_S_nC?ie=UTF8&colid=3M9E7UJHZPZ8W&coliid=IDK3NSTEW7GCZ

- The Asus GTX 660ti LINK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Asus-GTX660-TI-DC2-2GD5-Graphics-PCI-Express/dp/B008X3CMSE/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pdT1_nS_nC?ie=UTF8&colid=3M9E7UJHZPZ8W&coliid=I1317K4TLU4YTC

The 7950 is £265, and the 660ti is £220. My main consideration is performance, but also will a Corsair CX600 PSU be enough to power either of these cards?

My system:

AMD FX8350 @stock
Asus M5A87
Asus HD6770
Corsair CX600
Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Rev.2
Samsung 830 256GB
Hitachi Deskstar 500GB

I'd really appreciate your opinions on which card is better for the price, and also if my PSU is good enough to run them!

 

[cc_moreau_cc]

In a case like this I would go for the 7950 since the 660ti has a 192-bit interface that limits it greatly and the 7950 has 3GB of memory. The Sapphire Vapor-X 7950 is a fantastic card. I have a friend who owns one and he says the cooling on the card is great. It also has great overclocking potential to put with that price. However, since you're willing to pay that for 7950, you could look for a 670 with similar pricing since the 670 gives about 10-15% more performance and also has great overclocking potential. But don't let me bog you down, the 7950 is an amazing card.

 

[hallowhero]

7950 All the way, there are literally over 10 different of these topics in the last month, and frankly the 7950 is recommended 4/5 times. I just got my 7950, I do not regret it at all. I went with the MSI twin however, but sapphire is a very good company as well. Enjoy!

 

[leeskiramm]

I just had a look at 670s, but they're all above £300, so unfortunately out of budget.

Will I be able to run the Vapor-X 7950 on my PSU?

 

[hallowhero]

Definitely, the 600 is enough for any of those cards.

 

[nikolarun]

you can get a 7950 in the UK for £220 maybe £200 on offer.

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3gb-xfx-radeon-hd-7950-double-d-5000mhz-gddr5-gpu-800mhz-dvi-dvi-hdmi-mdp

 

[leeskiramm]

you can get a 7950 in the UK for £220 maybe £200 on offer.

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3gb-xfx-radeon-hd-7950-double-d-5000mhz-gddr5-gpu-800mhz-dvi-dvi-hdmi-mdp

Thing with that one is that it has lower clocks, and I'm not particularly impressed by XFX if I'm brutally honest.

 

[3ogdy]

leeskiramm, if I were you I'd go with the HD7950.
If I was to compare the two cards:
The 600Ti has a memory bandwidth of around 144GB/s while the HD7950 is capable of outputting 240GB/s .
GFlOPS-wise, the difference is again favoring the AMD Radeon: 2459GFLOPS vs 2867GFLOPS(@stock frequencies)
Pixel Fill Rate is also higher on the Radeon (21960 MPixels/s vs 25600)
The Radeon needs some more power but it's more powerful, it's equipped with 3GB of VRAM and has a wider bus (384bit compared to nVidia's 192bit)
Even the Shader Processor number is higher on the Radeon(1792 vs 1344 on the GeForce)
There is no reason not to go with the AMD Radeon HD7950.
The official system requirements for the HD7950 state you'd need a 500W Power Supply Unit for a single HD7950 card and 750W PSU for a CrossfireX configuration.
I'd go with a Corsair PSU but, honestly, I've seen quite a few people ahving trouble with the CX series from Corsair, so I'd go with a different Corsair PSU or a different brand if the budget doesn't allow you to go with a better Corsair power supply unit.
I'd go with something like one of these:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-TX750V2-Enthusiast-Series-Bronze/dp/B004O0P9VC/ref=sr_1_2?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1358112677&sr=1-2

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-CMPSU-700GEU-CMPSU-700G-CMPSU-700GUK/dp/B004HGI90G/ref=sr_1_20?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1358112677&sr=1-20

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Cooler-Master-GX-Lite-Power-Supply/dp/B0078OFNNA/ref=sr_1_1?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1358112855&sr=1-1

DEFINITELY WORTH BUYING:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Thermaltake-Smart-Series-80plus-Supply/dp/B0079RFCPA/ref=sr_1_2?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1358112932&sr=1-2

 

[leeskiramm]

leeskiramm, if I were you I'd go with the HD7950.
If I was to compare the two cards:
The 600Ti has a memory bandwidth of around 144GB/s while the HD7950 is capable of outputting 240GB/s .
GFlOPS-wise, the difference is again favoring the AMD Radeon: 2459GFLOPS vs 2867GFLOPS(@stock frequencies)
Pixel Fill Rate is also higher on the Radeon (21960 MPixels/s vs 25600)
The Radeon needs some more power but it's more powerful, it's equipped with 3GB of VRAM and has a wider bus (384bit compared to nVidia's 192bit)
Even the Shader Processor number is higher on the Radeon(1792 vs 1344 on the GeForce)
There is no reason not to go with the AMD Radeon HD7950.
The official system requirements for the HD7950 state you'd need a 500W Power Supply Unit for a single HD7950 card and 750W PSU for a CrossfireX configuration.
I'd go with a Corsair PSU but, honestly, I've seen quite a few people ahving trouble with the CX series from Corsair, so I'd go with a different Corsair PSU or a different brand if the budget doesn't allow you to go with a better Corsair power supply unit.
I'd go with something like one of these:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-TX750V2-Enthusiast-Series-Bronze/dp/B004O0P9VC/ref=sr_1_2?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1358112677&sr=1-2

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-CMPSU-700GEU-CMPSU-700G-CMPSU-700GUK/dp/B004HGI90G/ref=sr_1_20?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1358112677&sr=1-20

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Cooler-Master-GX-Lite-Power-Supply/dp/B0078OFNNA/ref=sr_1_1?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1358112855&sr=1-1

DEFINITELY WORTH BUYING:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Thermaltake-Smart-Series-80plus-Supply/dp/B0079RFCPA/ref=sr_1_2?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1358112932&sr=1-2

Thanks for your very comprehensive reply! This and the other feedback has made up my mind for me - I'll definitely be going with the 7950! Thank you also for your help with PSUs, but it's a little academic as I only bought this PSU recently together with a CPU and SSD upgrade so I won't be upgrading it for a while, seeing as it seems to be adequate for my needs.

 

[sam_p_lay]

Sub-£300 GTX670s here:

http://www.scan.co.uk/shop/computer-hardware/all/gpu-nvidia/geforce-gtx-670-pci-e

Without a doubt your best option by miles.