384bit or 192bit?

[dienan47]

What's the better choice?

1. Asus Geforce GTX 660Ti 2GB DDR5 DirectCUII
2. Asus Radeon HD7950 3GB DDR5 DirectCUII

*I don't care about phsyx as it's used in a very small number of games.
*Both cards come with 3 years of warranty so I might OC it a bit without changing the voltage.
*I have a mid tower case but the airflow is good.
*I heard people saying that the 660ti is already chocking on its bandwidth problem. Anyway I don't think a big bandwidth like 384bit isn't going to be a huge advantage.
*660ti is a couple of bucks cheaper than the 7950.
*Assuming that I upgrade after AMD 8000 and Nvidia 700 series comes, I'd be waiting for AMD 9000 and Nvidia 800 series (skipping the next genaration) will one of these two hold the ground and allow me to play games at mid-high settings?
*I'm not going past 1920x1080 so have no hopes of going multi gpu setup later.

Right now I'm leaning towards HD 7950 because it looks a bit better than the 660ti. It's my personal favour but not going to buy the card for the outer look..

Thanks in advance..

 

[darkspartenwarrior]

If you're willing to overclock the 7950(moderately to high overclocks) beats the 660Ti by quite a bit(even if the 660ti is overclocked), and can reach and even surpass GTX670 level. However doing this voids the warranty on the 7950 and there's always the probability you'll end up with a gimped chip(low limits/voltages). At stock the 660Ti wins.

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2012/08/23/galaxy_gtx_660_ti_gc_oc_vs_670_hd_7950/

overclocking review comparing 660ti, 670, and 7950.

For 1920x1080 bandwidth will not be a problem, the only way that could be a limitation is if you like to crank up the AA/AF, 16xAF/8xAA will strain a 192-bit card, but not a 384-bit one.

 

[devilofdeaths]

the 7950 is better hands down.with overclocking the 7950 makes the 660Ti eat its dust and it starts catching up to the 670

 

[devilofdeaths]

If you're willing to overclock the 7950(moderately to high overclocks) beats the 660Ti by quite a bit(even if the 660ti is overclocked), and can reach and even surpass GTX670 level. However doing this voids the warranty on the 7950 and there's always the probability you'll end up with a gimped chip(low limits/voltages). At stock the 660Ti wins.

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2012/08/23/galaxy_gtx_660_ti_gc_oc_vs_670_hd_7950/

overclocking review comparing 660ti, 670, and 7950.

For 1920x1080 bandwidth will not be a problem, the only way that could be a limitation is if you like to crank up the AA/AF, 16xAF/8xAA will strain a 192-bit card, but not a 384-bit one.

the 7950's are an overclockers dream if you get one that doesn't go past 1050Mhz that you have to be extremely unlucky.also overclocking doesn't void the warranty only changing the voltage does and the OP said he won't change the voltage and the 7950 overclocks great even without a voltage change while the 660Ti can barely get past 1050Mhz while the 7950 is up around 1150Mhz

 

[dienan47]

The 7950 I listed comes 100mhz OCd so I'm hoping to add more 150mhz to the clock. OCing might affect the warranty but the place I'm getting the card told me to OC it and they would glady OC it to a stable clock for me. Even if the card fries (not happening on a 150mhz oc lol) the warranty and the reputation they have can be trusted.
I saw a post here that Farcry 3 can't be maxed out on the 7950 or 660ti. With vsync off and AF at 4x. If this is true what's the point of getting such an expensive card? However since I will be playing a lot of old games like Diablo 2 I won't notice much at that but I'm hoping that I'll be able to run Crysis 3 ultra without any lags..

 

[manofchalk]

Go for the 7950, while the effects of the smaller memory bus on the 660Ti aren't that big of an issue now at 1080p, who knows how things will develop in the future.
Plus its a stronger card and a much better overclocker.

I'm maxing out Far Cry 3 with an overclocked 7870, admittedly at 2x AA. Getting a fairly solid 45fps during fights and higher when nothing is happening.
Anti-Aliasing is always a performance killer on graphics cards, but there isn't much reason to go beyond 8x, the visual difference isn't noticeable but the performance hit is.

You will want to keep V-Sync on unless you want the GPU running at 100% all the time and for screen tearing to occur.

 

[dienan47]

Turning vsync on and getting constant 50-60 FPS is possible with 7950? I'm not even thinking of reducing settings except AA,AF and Vsync. If it's not possible to get a solid number I could also get a 7870 for $100 cheaper than the 7950 and oc it.. Not hoping 7950 it to do 7970 dual gpu card's work but you get the point.

 

[manofchalk]

Why would you go down a step if your looking for better performance?
A 7950 can overclock close to stock 7970 levels of performance just like a 7870 can overclock close to a stock 7950.
A lot of people forget when they make the overclocking argument that the card their clocking too also can overclock.

Also the 7970 isnt a dual GPU card, thats the 7990.

Just jumped into Far Cry 3 to look at the settings I'v been running at, havent actually been maxing out everything. Most of the settings are either on High or Very High, with Ambient Lighting on Medium. MSAA has been turned off. Gotta say, the game still looks good even if it isn't completely maxed out.

I think its just one of those games where you need multiple cards to max it out and get a nice FPS. Even the 7970, the strongest single GPU card, can only only achieve ~35FPS when the Ultra preset is used and 4x MSAA at 1080p.
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/far-cry-3-performance-benchmark,3379-6.html

 

[dienan47]

I was just saying about 7870 OCd to stock 7950 :]
If you coulp pm me a screenshot of your FC3 settings I could try to do the same settings and test after going everything max. Might test lowering GPU eating settings to get a solid 50fps.
Something I noticed when playing crysis 2 because it's a fast phased FPS unlike FC3, if the FPS is above 35 then the gameply is really smooth. It's really easy to pop headshots even with my cheap G300 mouse..

http://hothardware.com/m/News/Gods-of-War-Asus-Launches-DualGPU-7970-Gigahertz-Edition-On-One-PCB/default.aspx

 

[machv1]

I have a Sapphire 7950 Vapor X gpu, I mistakengly ordered the wrong one I think. My mobo is a asrock z77 extreme 4, with a i5 2500k cpu
My question is
Will GDDR 5 work or should it have been GDDR3
will 384 bit work or should have it been 192 bit

 

[manofchalk]

The graphics card memory specifications have no point of conflict with the rest of the system, it will work.

 

[nikoli707]

lol, wtf, gddr3 is that still available for purchase?

384bit is better than 192bit and gddr5 is better than gddr3

anyways, for 1080p gaming a 7870 is usually enough. for 1440p 7950 is usually enough.