Upgrading from GTX460 -- GTX 780 or single 670?

[Cera]

Obviously, the BEST choice seems to be the GTX780. It's newer, it has better stats overall, comparable to the Titan all that jazz. But I see a lot of people were waiting for this 700-series release just so they could nab the 670's at a lower price point and forego the 700-series altogether. I thought to do the same, but now I'm not so sure. I'm here asking you if you think I'm due for an upgrade, and what would YOU recommend? Or would you recommend the money be put in to a new motherboard/processor instead? -- and would there be extra costs associated to that?

I use multiple HD displays and one of them is a large pen/tablet screen. I use high resolutions. I've noticed some issues with my graphics card (slow/not enough memory) and this is why I've thought to upgrade. I'm a digital artist and work with LARGE files in Photoshop CS6 and Painter. I also use Flash. I am not a hardcore gamer but I do game (Skyrim, Borderlands 2, League of Legends, etc). I watch videos files while I work. My computer is fast and I'm happy with the speed. I think the times I come across the graphics card stumbling, it's more from using multiple monitors and having various graphic intensive games/programs running simultaneously. The BIG reason I noticed something is because my tablet screen, Photoshop and my Graphics Card and the Tablet driver have been having issues and shutting down that monitor AND Photoshop. I've tried fixing the drivers but am throwing my hands up now and saying: get a new card.

Also, I'd like to go max settings on games, again. Like I could a couple years ago... Haha.

My machine:
Windows 8 Pro 64bit
i7-950 @3.07gHz
ASUS P6X58D-E
24GB RAM
Geforce GTX 460 1GB
Cintiq 24HD
1 or 2 more 24" monitors
A bunch of HDDs. I run my programs and OS from a solid state drive, though.


So yes. The battle between the cards. What do you guys say? I don't think I want to upgrade my processor and MB till I see some true 8 core Intels popping up. And like I said, speed seems good. This is why in my very limited experience and knowledge of computers I thought -- graphics card upgrade?

Gimme your best shot! Tell me if you think the 780 is worth the buck. Or if you think a single 670 is good (two is too loud/hot for my taste, when you can just get the 780). Or if you have different ideas. I know both are better than what I have. I'm just thinking about which one will take me the furthest... or if they will take me exactly the same distance.

Thanks guys!

 

[sam_p_lay]

The GTX780 is an excellent card, but not excellent enough to justify that kind of price. This is an amazing deal and I'd highly recommend it:

http://www.novatech.co.uk/products/components/nvidiageforcegraphicscards/nvidiagtx670keplerseries/02g-p4-2678-kr.html

For the extra £280, a GTX780 will be around 25% faster than that card, or around 33% faster than a normal GTX670.

EDIT: I used the word 'excellent' far too much initially. OP, are you in America or Britain? Or even another country?

 

[Cera]

The GTX780 is an excellent card, but not excellent enough to justify that kind of price. This is an amazing deal and I'd highly recommend it:

http://www.novatech.co.uk/products/components/nvidiageforcegraphicscards/nvidiagtx670keplerseries/02g-p4-2678-kr.html

For the extra £280, a GTX780 will be around 25% faster than that card, or around 33% faster than a normal GTX670.

EDIT: I used the word 'excellent' far too much initially. OP, are you in America or Britain? Or even another country?

@sam_p_lay Canadiana-ville, so the prices are pretty on par with the American prices. I can get a 780 for about $660. Or I could get a 670FTW for $350 .. all with 5% tax, of course.

I mean, 770 is also a cheaper option, right? But I've only heard 'meh' about the 770. Thoughts, anyone?

I heard once that Photoshop didn't rely on the GPU, but it looks like CS6 does use it for certain things. And yes the 780 IS purdy pricey. My boyfriend got the 680 when it just came out for a price point a little less than that. He seems to be running everything OK, though I heard the 680 isn't as good as an OC 670. Regardless the 780 beats them both! But yeah. I don't like the idea of tossing money out if it's not necessary -- I just want what's best for the buck. And I don't know if the 780 would truly give me any noticeable difference for how I use my system. I can see it being more future-game proof than the 670, but that's all I can think of?

 

[sam_p_lay]

Ah 5% tax... not fair. In Britain it's 20%. I think you're exactly right about the GTX780 - it will give you a little more future-proofing, but it doesn't really justify its price. People can only consider it good value if they're considering value relative to the GTX Titan. By pricing their single-GPU flagship model at £800 instead of the usual £400 (or dollar equivalents), they've managed to make the £550 second best GPU somehow look like a bargain. GTX480 was a far bigger improvement over GTX280 than GTX780 is over GTX680, yet the GTX480 launched at £430. We have an expression here - "taking the piss". Hopefully AMD will start putting the pressure on again so nVidia behaves themselves.

Meantime, a GTX770 would be a good choice. It is indeed a bit of a letdown interms of how much improvement there is over GTX670, but it is faster (and faster than GTX680 also) and not excessively overpriced. On average it's only around 15% framerates behind the GTX780, which isn't gonna be hugely noticeable. And Photoshop will make use of the extra muscle by the way. Not sure about the details though - my Photoshop expertise is limited to the 'save for web' function.

 

[Cera]

Haha yes, my particular province is among one of the few in Canada that have the good tax rates! 20%? Crikey.

You might be right about the GTX770. It's not 'omgawd it's almost as good as the Titan!' like the GTX780 is, but for a fair price point it's probably the way to go. I read somewhere that you can modify a GTX680 to perform as a GTX770 does... but I'm not THAT adventurous, rofl.

Hopefully AMD will knock some sense in to Nvidia and they'll get some competitive pricing going on, I agree.

 

[sam_p_lay]

Haha yeah... they beat us too.

And modifying a GTX680 to be a GTX770 would really just involve a little overclocking of the GPU and some massive overclocking of the memory (don't know much about memory overclocking but you'd need to take it from 1500/6000MHz to 1750/7000MHz). That's probably near the limits of what the GTX680's memory can do (or beyond the limits - like I say I don't mess with this stuff personally) whereas the GTX770 memory can probably overclock a fair bit higher still. You'd only gain 5-10% performance over a stock GTX680 by doing so though.

 

[dbenet89]

I would always just go with a 780 if i can afford it, can always sli 2 780s if money allows and performance is needed instead of staying on last generation hardware, plus the 780 can easily overclock to titan speed or higher, same gpu.