Worth upgrading my video card?

Upgrade or no?

  • Yes GTX 770

    Votes: 4 80.0%
  • Yes HD 7970

    Votes: 1 20.0%
  • No not good enough for the cost

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Total voters
    5

Leozeo

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Aug 3, 2013
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I came into a GTX 660 a few months on the cheap ($70) and have been happy with its performance over my HD 7770. I will be coming into some extra cash thanks to my birthday in a few weeks and was thinking of upgrading again for future games (TitanFall looking so good :)

Would it be worth going to a GTX 770 or HD 7970 both costing around $400 or would the upgrade be too minor for the cost?

Also if I do upgrade the 660 would go into my Lil brothers rig and would be an upgrade from his HD 6800.
 

In3rt1a

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Jun 9, 2013
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A 7970 or gtx 770 will be a monumental performance increase. My sapphire radeon 7970 is tearing through everything at maxed out settings on 1080p. Highly recommend it. You can get powercolor's for $320 at newegg right now. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131468&nm_mc=KNC-GoogleAdwords&cm_mmc=KNC-GoogleAdwords-_-pla-_-Desktop+Graphics+Cards-_-N82E16814131468&gclid=CMXAqLTw4LgCFU5xQgoduFEA0A
Edit: Powercolor's card has gotten some bad reviews... The next cheapest is the card I have right now, the sapphire radeon 7970 w/ boost: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202008&nm_mc=KNC-GoogleAdwords&cm_mmc=KNC-GoogleAdwords-_-pla-_-Desktop+Graphics+Cards-_-N82E16814202008&gclid=CMWZotTx4LgCFQnhQgodzRoA6g
$370 after mir.
 

fnatic

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Jun 25, 2013
366
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10,860
EVGA GTX 770 SC would be the card to get. 409 price point I believe. It beats out the 7970Ghz edition as well. But if you want to save some cash and go with the 7970 I'd go with a ASUS or Gigabyte with ASUS first. At that point though the prices are similar and again 770 is more worth it, in my opinion.
 

fnatic

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Jun 25, 2013
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583


Depending on what game you play they are close but the 770 edges it out 90% of the time.
 
Aug 2, 2013
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10,630


what's your other config and native resolution?

 

In3rt1a

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Jun 9, 2013
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One of the reasons the 7970 runs better in 3d mark is because 3d mark utilizes loads of memory and a large bit interface. The 7970 is more futureproof, due to the fact that it has larger bit interfaces and memory at similar prices compared to the nvidia cards. In summary, for raw power/futureproof, go radeon. Nvidia does have better customer support and drivers though. And if you really like physx and use cuda acceleration, then nvidia cards are better for you.
 

In3rt1a

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Jun 9, 2013
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3d mark is not hypothetical, it is a simulation of a game, designed to be even more demanding then most games. +some websites support the 7970 over the 770, and vice versa. Just depends on where you look. 3d mark is unbiased.
 

fnatic

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Jun 25, 2013
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No matter I still trust the actual gaming experience VS 3d mark. Especially for he games that Him, you or I play. Wouldn't you? As for future proof no games in the even distant future will eat up his memory unless crysis keeps up the trend and rapes every card that isn't tri-sli or in that range.
 

MagR

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Aug 31, 2009
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Hi

I've got a reference EVGA GTX770 and am quite impressed. I went from twin GTX570's in Sli and this single card is much better. The 770 and 7970 seem pretty similar in performance if you look at all the benchmarks - some games favour the GTX, some the Radeon. I'm assuming you are gaming at 1920x1200 or 1920 x1080. The larger VRAM of the 7970 (3GB to 2GB) probably does not make a difference at this resolution.

If you look at the differences between a 660 and a 770 the 770 has an extra 40% transistors over the 660 and has a slightly higher clockspeed. This makes it faster as the architectures are essentially the same (it is difficult to compare with the 7970 as the architectue is a very different. The biggest difference to me is the VRAM. Both have 2GB but the 770 has a 256 bit bus compared to the 192 bit bus of the 660. This gives the 660 a memory bandwidth (which is a better measure of memory speed than just Ghz) of 144GB/sec (192/8*6) compared to the 770's 224GB/sec (256/8*7). My VRAM is overclocked to 8Ghz so I get 256GB/sec bandwidth (256/8*8). The 7970 has an even higher bandwidth of 288GB/sec as it uses a 384bit bus (384/8*6).

High bandwidth with a decent amount of memory means you get less stuttering as the memory swaps textures and a much smoother gaming experience. With hindsight my 570's in sli were memory limited as sli does not double the memory capacity or speed. For example they couldn't handle the high res texture packs in Skyrim whereas I use both the official and 2K texture pack together with the 770. Framerates become irrelevant if your memory is causing unpleasant stutters.

I notice the new GTX760 has a substantially cut down gpu compared to the 770/680/670 but uses the 256bit bus of those more expensive cards and is getting very good reviews.

The GTX 770 is also pretty quiet. I use watercooling so my card now has a block on it but I tested it in an air cooled rig to make sure it worked before voiding my warranty and removing the cooler. Mine is a stock model with a blower and when it hit 80 degrees it throttles the speed slightly leaving the card more or less inaudible. Custom coolers will be even quieter and won't have to throttle as often. Asus and Gigabyte usually produce decent aftermarket cards with improved coolers.

Overall I would expect a 770 to give you an increase in the minimum framerate in games (more relevant than average in my opinion) of at least 50% based on logic and the benchmarks I've seen with a smoother less stuttery delivery.

Hope this helps

Mag