What GPU to chose

[Skynet928]

I have always had the luxury of having a really good deal come my way when it comes to GPU's and when I first got into gaming, it was because of a 400 dollar GPU that was literally just given to me since the guy won a contest and didn't need it since he had a better one anyways.

I had to since then replace the GPU since it got old the thing would get too hot despite my best efforts to cool it off, water cooling, fans, dusting, etc.... the works. It was time for an upgrade regardless.

The moment I got my Radeon 6870, I was happy since I got it on a super crazy discount but I know that one day I will have to swap it out since as always, things will get old and you will need to update to the newer ports, slots, etc....

My question is, what do you all look for in a graphics card when you want to game that doesn't break the bank? I want a card that is not only good for gaming but doesn't break the bank at the same time no matter what time I plan to upgrade since I am not sure if I am going to do it anytime soon or not. I don't want a card that is going to be cheap and a waste of money but at the same time, I don't want to get a card that is overly expensive in terms of too much price, not enough performance, or good performance but requires you own your own personal power plant to power the thing. I was looking at some Radeon R9 cards and those things are power hungry!

 

[Aziebol]

One card that has incredible performance is the Gigabyte R9 270 which you can get for 170$ on amazon right now. Also I know the Msi r9 280 gaming edition is a very good card for 270$ So depending on how much you wanna spend those are some great options.

 

[Skynet928]

The problem that I see with an R9 is that there is too much power draw and I don't want that. I don't have any PSU's that can handle that. I would need at least a 1000w for that card and I don't want to spend money on that

 

[Aziebol]

The problem that I see with an R9 is that there is too much power draw and I don't want that. I don't have any PSU's that can handle that. I would need at least a 1000w for that card and I don't want to spend money on that

Well if your looking more towards like the R9 270 the msi version which also performs very well I believe only uses I 6 pin power connector so it is not as much of a power sucker as most R9 cards.

 

[smeezekitty]

R9 is just the new naming scheme and doesn't automatically make it power hungry.
Only the R9-290 and R9-290X are really power hungry.

 

[Skynet928]

Thing is, that didn't really answer my question. I wanted to know what you look for in a graphics card when you decide to go on the market for one. I am not sure if I am going to upgrade mine in a year, two years, or maybe next week, but regardless, I suppose what I was asking was how do I know when one is good and when one is not that great for my needs since they are always changing. I may or may not decide to go gaming and if that is the case, I need to know how to look for these cards

 

[smeezekitty]

The biggest things to look at are just benchmarks and price

 

[Aziebol]

Thing is, that didn't really answer my question. I wanted to know what you look for in a graphics card when you decide to go on the market for one. I am not sure if I am going to upgrade mine in a year, two years, or maybe next week, but regardless, I suppose what I was asking was how do I know when one is good and when one is not that great for my needs since they are always changing. I may or may not decide to go gaming and if that is the case, I need to know how to look for these cards

That's the thing if your needs are always changing it hard for me to suggest what to look for because something that is good now may not be in the near future. When you do decide to upgrade you want to think about what you are going to be using it for and you always want to look at multiple sites for different customer reviews as well as look up performance reviews on the product as well as comparing it to other cards

 

[CGurrell]

When a new GPU comes out, look at some benchmarks to see which category it fits in, with performance rising between each class in most cases. The categories usually are:

entry level, mid-range, high-end and Enthusiast (Normally the naming scheme and/or pricing will tell you this anyway, but it's nice to check).

Compile a list of 2 or 3 cards which have the performance you need, lets say for example a GTX 770, an r9 280x, and an r9 290x, and list them in order of performance in the games you play most, at the resolution you will be playing in. So for example, if you wanted to play Battlefield 4 at 1920x1080 using the Ultra preset, you would look at graphs like this (Note that multiple tests should be sought out as some can be anomolous):

Here we can see that the r9 290x (the retail one) is ahead of the r9 280x, which is ahead of the GTX 770, so you would list these in terms of performance as:

r9 290x, r9 280x, GTX 770

Then, after you have made a few lists, one for each game you would like to play, make one final graph showing the cost of each card with the cheapest at the TOP of the list (Note that when originally looking at GPUs, you should have chosen cards within your budget). For this particular example at this point in time, the list would be:

r9 280x ($239.99), GTX 770 ($309.99), r9 290x ($499.99).

I would, at this point, probably choose the r9 280x as it has great performance for the money, however your choice may differ. The next choice you have to make is which brand and cooling system you would like. For this, read some reviews or watch some YouTube videos. Linus, for NCIX Tech Tips, did a showcase of most of the non-reference r9 280x cards (see here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAx73othZFw) where he listed all of the prices (out of date at this point, but some quick research on pcpp will yield the currrent pricing) and specs of each card.

At the end of the day though, the decision is going to be largely made on personal preference, for example a lot of people would agree that nvidia cards use less power than AMD cards, making nvidia cards the ones for them, whilst others may prefer AMD cards due to better performance when virtual currency mining.

 

[Skynet928]

When a new GPU comes out, look at some benchmarks to see which category it fits in, with performance rising between each class in most cases. The categories usually are:

entry level, mid-range, high-end and Enthusiast (Normally the naming scheme and/or pricing will tell you this anyway, but it's nice to check).

Thank you, that is what I was looking for. I never thought of doing that and had always wondered if I was getting the best bang for my buck since I do have gaming needs but sometimes I wonder if I really still want to do that. So this way i can at least have a better idea of what I could get so that way, I don't overspend yet still have a good card that can at least play some games decently.