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Generic Monk posted:Y'know, I was just about to post that selling off the 290X and getting a 980 or something would be more economical rather than trying to band aid the flaws endemic to the card. Plus I've always much preferred Nvidia's drivers and featureset compared to AMD's iffy implementations. If I was to do that I'm leaning toward the 980 as I have a 1440p monitor and SLI still hasn't swayed me as being worth the money. I'm always keen to point out the downside of SLI - driver issues, etc - but that area is far better than it once was, and if you do need more power than a single 970, a pair of them will give you vastly more Performance:Dollar than a 980 will. If you do put a pair of 970s in that case I'd be buying a good fan for the side panel, in addition to replacing the stock fans as I said before. The latter I'd do anyway.
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Dec 2, 2014 16:53
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1gnoirents posted:No, it's a smaller heatsink and different fans. MSI has had this line for at least the last two gens. If the difference is $10, I always recommend the "Gaming" bump if for nothing else but the fans. I really hate those fans however I haven't heard them on a 970. I notice there is also a golden edition now, with an all copper cooler.
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Dec 2, 2014 16:54
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The Lord Bude posted:I notice there is also a golden edition now, with an all copper cooler. I thought that thing was the same card with a gold cover but I'm glad to see there is a difference. I would be skeptical, to say the least, that the difference is worth $50 in any practical way other than being able to say "yeah its got a solid copper heatsink Limited Edition (tm)" but when they first had a little press release about it they didn't mention the copper at all.
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Dec 2, 2014 17:05
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I have to say that I am loving the hell out of the new DSR option in the Nvidia drivers. Long overdue for an incredibly simplistic and dummy-proof way of supersampling without having to fiddle with external software with varying levels of success. Been playing the second season of The Walking Dead on my television and it's like playing an animated series with not a single jagged edge to be seen.
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Dec 2, 2014 17:09
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So maybe it IS just the AMD drivers causing the Radeon to look fuzzier? My laptop is connected to HDMI 1 and displays a pretty sharp picture. I'd thought this was because HDMI 1 is typically the HDMI port that the TV would recognize as a PC signal by default, but now I'm thinking it's because the GPU in my laptop is an ancient GT555m with updated drivers. e: I do intend to buy a monitor, but unsure what to buy. Is there anything with better res than 1080p and not 4k and somewhat cost-effective? I've heard of people playing PC games at crazy resolutions that seem slightly better than 1080p, but perhaps that's my long-PC-gaming-deprived mind in wishful-thinking mode. Up to now I haven't been able to even run games from the past year and a half at an acceptable frame rate on any graphical setting, and now I'm drunk on GPU power running Bioshock Infinite at very high settings and getting 120fps. life is killing me fucked around with this message at 17:28 on Dec 2, 2014 |
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Dec 2, 2014 17:25
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Your budget is going to determine your options . Frankly it sounds like a solid 1080p would make you happy. The next step is 1440p which can vary wildly in price but is a much more pleasing 27" experience. 4k isn't worthwhile imo except for desktop applications unless you go all out on your gpu situation, which I'm guessing isn't your goal
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Dec 2, 2014 17:34
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life is killing me posted:e: I do intend to buy a monitor, but unsure what to buy. Is there anything with better res than 1080p and not 4k and somewhat cost-effective? You just missed Monoprice's 27" IPS 2560x1440 monitor for $299. You can find a large variety of Korean panels at that size, resolution, and price point if you watch. Most are pretty good.
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Dec 2, 2014 17:36
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1gnoirents posted:Your budget is going to determine your options . Frankly it sounds like a solid 1080p would make you happy. The next step is 1440p which can vary wildly in price but is a much more pleasing 27" experience. 4k isn't worthwhile imo except for desktop applications unless you go all out on your gpu situation, which I'm guessing isn't your goal I almost bought a 970 but the R9 290 being almost as good as a 970 and also on sale at Fry's meant I was going the AMD route. I'm good with 1080p but would like to see 1440p. I also feel that 4k isn't worthwhile. It could actually do wonders for my desktop computer, but I don't have the multitasking power in that processor to really be able to do enough work at once where I'd have to have 4 windows up. But I'm not willing to splurge on any graphics card that will drive 4k gaming at an acceptable quality and frame rate, if, in fact, one even exists just yet. I wouldn't mind going the 1440p route, as I feel like my R9 290 could handle that. I think. Twerk from Home posted:You just missed Monoprice's 27" IPS 2560x1440 monitor for $299. You can find a large variety of Korean panels at that size, resolution, and price point if you watch. Most are pretty good. Man, I shoulda bought a monitor at Fry's too. So many good sales there last weekend.
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Dec 2, 2014 17:47
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life is killing me posted:I almost bought a 970 but the R9 290 being almost as good as a 970 and also on sale at Fry's meant I was going the AMD route. I'm good with 1080p but would like to see 1440p. A 290 is not almost as good as a 970. Taking overclocking into account a 970 should do about 40-50% better, at half the power use.
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Dec 2, 2014 17:52
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life is killing me posted:Man, I shoulda bought a monitor at Fry's too. So many good sales there last weekend. There's the worse Monoprice monitor for $280 right now.
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Dec 2, 2014 17:56
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The Lord Bude posted:A 290 is not almost as good as a 970. Taking overclocking into account a 970 should do about 40-50% better, at half the power use. If he snagged one of the $220-$240 deals it's probably a solid purchase, and there are a few benchmarks that put them within a few fps. Of course there are a few that get quite a bit wider, and once you factor OC like you said it gets wider. A 290 at $300+ is a no brainer not to buy but they made a pretty good case last week. I value the efficiency and drivers to the point where I still wouldn't get one but a 290 is still a 290 I guess. edit: to life is killing me, if you have the budget for a 1440p, say ~$350, and you don't mind a little return-fu, I'd recommend returning the 290, buying a 970 - selling the game code for ~$40, then get a $300 1440p monitor. On the other hand if you don't have that budget, a 290 will drive a 1080p monitor with ease 1gnoirents fucked around with this message at 18:23 on Dec 2, 2014 |
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Dec 2, 2014 18:19
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1gnoirents posted:edit: to life is killing me, if you have the budget for a 1440p, say ~$350, and you don't mind a little return-fu, I'd recommend returning the 290, buying a 970 - selling the game code for ~$40, then get a $300 1440p monitor. On the other hand if you don't have that budget, a 290 will drive a 1080p monitor with ease It all depends how cheap he got the 290. Several models of 290 dipped to $199 briefly, and pretty much all of them were around $220 at one point or another. I really do think they're worth buying that cheap.
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Dec 2, 2014 18:26
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Is there any way to get nVidia's Geforce experience to stop stealing focus? I like the idea of the software, but it's taking focus from the game I'm playing way too often.
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Dec 2, 2014 18:29
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Twerk from Home posted:It all depends how cheap he got the 290. Several models of 290 dipped to $199 briefly, and pretty much all of them were around $220 at one point or another. I really do think they're worth buying that cheap. Yes I agree. I didn't notice the $199 ones I just saw the 220-240 in passing, but that's a good price. Well, honestly its hilarious price for performance considering what things were like 2 months ago. But despite that, if I could still work out a 970 for +$50 or less id still go for it. It's just better.
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Dec 2, 2014 18:31
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1gnoirents posted:If he snagged one of the $220-$240 deals it's probably a solid purchase, and there are a few benchmarks that put them within a few fps. Of course there are a few that get quite a bit wider, and once you factor OC like you said it gets wider. Twerk from Home posted:It all depends how cheap he got the 290. Several models of 290 dipped to $199 briefly, and pretty much all of them were around $220 at one point or another. I really do think they're worth buying that cheap. 1gnoirents posted:Yes I agree. I didn't notice the $199 ones I just saw the 220-240 in passing, but that's a good price. Well, honestly its hilarious price for performance considering what things were like 2 months ago. I got it at Fry's for 240 after mail-in rebate. That said, I was dangerously close to buying a 970 anyway--but there were of course no sales for a 970. I have briefly considered doing a switcharoo like 1gnoirents suggested but I'm good with what I've got for now. Besides, I also snagged a 240gb PNY XLR8 SSD for $90 which, while not the lowest I saw, was still pretty drat good. The low price of the Radeon made the SSD purchase possible. The Lord Bude posted:A 290 is not almost as good as a 970. Taking overclocking into account a 970 should do about 40-50% better, at half the power use. You do bring up a good point about power usage. I had a 630w PSU, and neglected to buy a more powerful one at Fry's. The R9 says on the box that a 750w minimum is required, however I have few things in the PC that use up much power and so I'm doing okay so far on a 700w PSU. I honestly think I could have run everything on the 630w, but the +12v rail didn't supply enough amps. At some point, though, I'll either want to upgrade the PSU anyway just to be safe (scared to overclock the GPU at this stage) or just trade up to a 970 here soon. I have found I'm not keen on AMD's CCC and drivers, and I have experience with GeForce's drivers.
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Dec 2, 2014 18:47
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life is killing me posted:You do bring up a good point about power usage. I had a 630w PSU, and neglected to buy a more powerful one at Fry's. The R9 says on the box that a 750w minimum is required, however I have few things in the PC that use up much power and so I'm doing okay so far on a 700w PSU. I honestly think I could have run everything on the 630w, but the +12v rail didn't supply enough amps. I ran an overclocked 290, i5-2500K with a significant overclock (4.6GHz, +.01V), a bunch of hard drives and fans on a 6 year old out of warranty 520W PSU. You were probably fine on the 630. I upgraded to that 750W Rosewill Capstone because it was $25 after rebate and a friend of mine could use the 520W in a budget build.
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Dec 2, 2014 18:52
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Twerk from Home posted:I ran an overclocked 290, i5-2500K with a significant overclock (4.6GHz, +.01V), a bunch of hard drives and fans on a 6 year old out of warranty 520W PSU. You were probably fine on the 630. I upgraded to that 750W Rosewill Capstone because it was $25 after rebate and a friend of mine could use the 520W in a budget build. You gave your buddy a 6 year old PSU? Do you secretly hate him or something? 
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Dec 2, 2014 18:56
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Twerk from Home posted:I ran an overclocked 290, i5-2500K with a significant overclock (4.6GHz, +.01V), a bunch of hard drives and fans on a 6 year old out of warranty 520W PSU. You were probably fine on the 630. I upgraded to that 750W Rosewill Capstone because it was $25 after rebate and a friend of mine could use the 520W in a budget build. I've never even had a card before now that was easily overclocked via the GPU's control panel, so I'm still a little wary of overclocking it knowing it'd be so easy to overdo it. It's plenty powerful at this point for the games I want to play. Being able to play B:I at 120fps on very high settings is like a dream come true for me.
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Dec 2, 2014 18:57
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life is killing me posted:You do bring up a good point about power usage. I had a 630w PSU, and neglected to buy a more powerful one at Fry's. The R9 says on the box that a 750w minimum is required, however I have few things in the PC that use up much power and so I'm doing okay so far on a 700w PSU. I honestly think I could have run everything on the 630w, but the +12v rail didn't supply enough amps. The overclocked 290 I bought for *$180* ran more than comfortably along with a bunch of harddrives and a heavily-overclocked 2600K on an old 750TX (since replaced by a Seasonic Gold model so I could save another 40-50W and run it fanless). The 290 will use more power than a 970 for sure, but it's not to the insane level the 'recommended' PSU suggests. Not sure I'd have gone with a 290 for $240 though if there was only a ~$60 difference to the 970.
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Dec 2, 2014 18:59
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isndl posted:You gave your buddy a 6 year old PSU? Do you secretly hate him or something? Yeah, people act like they're time bombs but reputable Seasonic 80+ PSUs are realistically good a couple years past warranty.
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Dec 2, 2014 19:02
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The Lord Bude posted:A 290 is not almost as good as a 970. Taking overclocking into account a 970 should do about 40-50% better, at half the power use. The 970 is great and all, but you're overstating things to a kind of ridiculous degree dude.
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Dec 2, 2014 19:06
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A 290x is probably closer to a 970 than a vanilla 290 is. If the 290 was not on sale I would have bought the 970 because the price points are otherwise so close to each other it would have made more sense to spend the extra $20-$30 on the 970. e: and yeah, the 970 is being hailed as the greatest thing to happen to GPUs since the Titan. I understand. I'm not a die-hard fanboy of either AMD or Nvidia, I just got what seemed the most powerful and cost-effective for the power at the time. That ended up being the 290 because it was on sale for a good $110 cheaper than the least-expensive 970 I could find in stock anywhere, and also let me spend a few extra bucks on a bigger SSD than the one which I was previously going to buy. life is killing me fucked around with this message at 19:28 on Dec 2, 2014 |
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Dec 2, 2014 19:25
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life is killing me posted:I got it at Fry's for 240 after mail-in rebate. That said, I was dangerously close to buying a 970 anyway--but there were of course no sales for a 970. I have briefly considered doing a switcharoo like 1gnoirents suggested but I'm good with what I've got for now. Besides, I also snagged a 240gb PNY XLR8 SSD for $90 which, while not the lowest I saw, was still pretty drat good. The low price of the Radeon made the SSD purchase possible. The power recommendations on AMD/Nvidia's website are always grossly inflated because they can't assume you have a good quality PSU that can handle its rated wattage - assuming you have a good psu (what is it? how old?) 630w should be more than enough. A gtx 970 is comfortable on 450w.
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Dec 3, 2014 03:31
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Hace posted:The 970 is great and all, but you're overstating things to a kind of ridiculous degree dude. I've seen people post benchmarks of their overclock in this very thread... I'm guesstimating a bit, because I can't be arsed going back and digging it up, but I don't think it's that ridiculous. Edit: I've been reading back over the thread around the time of the 970 launch - A 970 can overclock to at least hit reference 980 performance levels. A reference 980 is a good 10% faster than a 780ti. A 290 sits somewhere between a 770 and a 780. The Lord Bude fucked around with this message at 03:48 on Dec 3, 2014 |
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Dec 3, 2014 03:32
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Even without an overclock, I'd take a 970 over my R9 290 without a second thought. It's a good, fast card, but there are some games where it drops the ball hard. Nvidia's aggressive courting of developers for exclusive effects and the CUDA stuff on top of their (generally) better optimisation and efficiency make going for an AMD card difficult to recommend. For what I paid for it, and the results I get, I genuinely bummed I didn't wait a couples months to get a 970.
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Dec 3, 2014 06:17
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cat doter posted:Even without an overclock, I'd take a 970 over my R9 290 without a second thought. It's a good, fast card, but there are some games where it drops the ball hard. Nvidia's aggressive courting of developers for exclusive effects and the CUDA stuff on top of their (generally) better optimisation and efficiency make going for an AMD card difficult to recommend. For what I paid for it, and the results I get, I genuinely bummed I didn't wait a couples months to get a 970. Meh, there's always something new on the horizon right? It is a sweet card though ^^
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Dec 3, 2014 07:30
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cat doter posted:Even without an overclock, I'd take a 970 over my R9 290 without a second thought. It's a good, fast card, but there are some games where it drops the ball hard. Nvidia's aggressive courting of developers for exclusive effects and the CUDA stuff on top of their (generally) better optimisation and efficiency make going for an AMD card difficult to recommend. For what I paid for it, and the results I get, I genuinely bummed I didn't wait a couples months to get a 970. Actually nvidia's optimization hasn't been so hot lately, some recent benchmarks of Far Cry 4 and Dragon Age: Inquisition actually favor AMD quite a bit.
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Dec 3, 2014 07:40
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Far Cry 4 for example is nvidia branded, so presumably they got their optimizations in before the game's release, no? AMD does theirs after the fact. If true, it shows how key that process is.
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Dec 3, 2014 08:27
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Hace posted:Actually nvidia's optimization hasn't been so hot lately, some recent benchmarks of Far Cry 4 and Dragon Age: Inquisition actually favor AMD quite a bit. That's always the story though, their architectures are different enough that each game benefits the cards differently. With nvidia they seem to be going after developers hard, and I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing, it gives nvidia a better value proposition, but it can make you feel like you're losing out if you're on AMD. When those particular games have exclusive CUDA effects AND they run worse on AMD it can feel like rubbing salt in the wound.
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Dec 3, 2014 08:33
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Jago posted:Far Cry 4 for example is nvidia branded, so presumably they got their optimizations in before the game's release, no? AMD does theirs after the fact. If true, it shows how key that process is.
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Dec 3, 2014 15:38
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This is such a horrible uneducation post, so I apologize for that. I read through the OP and skimmed the thread, as well as some googling prior to finding this thread, and I'm trying to figure out exactly how good/crap my GPU is. I'm on a late 2012 27" iMac with a Nvidia 675mx 1gb. I still don't even know what this means but more recently I've been getting into CG programs and hearing about GPU rendering and I'm trying to figure out if I should be in the market for a new machine in the next couple years, or what my GPU is even capable of. I have such a poor working knowledge of the subject, sorry if this is incoherent!
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Dec 3, 2014 18:42
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redcheval posted:This is such a horrible uneducation post, so I apologize for that. I read through the OP and skimmed the thread, as well as some googling prior to finding this thread, and I'm trying to figure out exactly how good/crap my GPU is. I'm on a late 2012 27" iMac with a Nvidia 675mx 1gb. I still don't even know what this means but more recently I've been getting into CG programs and hearing about GPU rendering and I'm trying to figure out if I should be in the market for a new machine in the next couple years, or what my GPU is even capable of. I have such a poor working knowledge of the subject, sorry if this is incoherent! Well its not good, but its going to depend what exactly you're doing. Does CG mean computer graphics? If so what programs. Being as it is an imac you're pretty SOL for upgrades besides buying another $2000 imac for $185 in gpu performance, because Apple. But if you need/want Apple for the work you're doing you have very few options other than that. If you don't need OSX though I pretty much recommend buying a separate PC for this edit: I just specced out a 27" (1440) iMac for giggles with CG or rendering in mind and came out to $2750. That includes +$200 for 8 gb additional ram, +$200 for an i7 over an i5, a +$150 1tb "fusion" drive since you cant just have an SSD without sacrificing huge storage, and a 780m gpu (for a mere +$150, the first reasonable upgrade price!). Since mobile gpus are the only option thats wholly depressing performance for $2750 imo 1gnoirents fucked around with this message at 19:00 on Dec 3, 2014 |
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Dec 3, 2014 18:48
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1gnoirents posted:Well its not good, but its going to depend what exactly you're doing. Does CG mean computer graphics? If so what programs. Hackintosh.
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Dec 3, 2014 18:54
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Animal posted:Hackintosh. Yeah or that. I have basically zero knowledge about it except that it can be janky.
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Dec 3, 2014 19:02
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redcheval posted:This is such a horrible uneducation post, so I apologize for that. I read through the OP and skimmed the thread, as well as some googling prior to finding this thread, and I'm trying to figure out exactly how good/crap my GPU is. I'm on a late 2012 27" iMac with a Nvidia 675mx 1gb. I still don't even know what this means but more recently I've been getting into CG programs and hearing about GPU rendering and I'm trying to figure out if I should be in the market for a new machine in the next couple years, or what my GPU is even capable of. I have such a poor working knowledge of the subject, sorry if this is incoherent! The correct answer is to build a PC for 1/3 the price of an iMac and have the ability to upgrade it later 
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Dec 3, 2014 19:33
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That's what I thought, and fortunately I didn't get the iMac for CG work (Cinema 4D for the curious!). Thinking ahead to my next machine, though, since I am probably going to be doing a lot more of that in the future.
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Dec 3, 2014 20:02
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At this point is there any reason for someone to buy a Mac instead of a Windows pc other than being an Apple fanboy? I understand in the old days there were reasons, but now, a Mac is just a PC with OSX and a giant markup on parts.
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Dec 3, 2014 21:05
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veedubfreak posted:At this point is there any reason for someone to buy a Mac instead of a Windows pc other than being an Apple fanboy? I understand in the old days there were reasons, but now, a Mac is just a PC with OSX and a giant markup on parts. FWIW I have a friend who historically was a huge Apple fanboy and has recently shifted away to Windows/Linux for the very reasons you've stated. I know he's particularly frustrated with Apple riding on their reputation rather than providing an innovative product.
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Dec 3, 2014 21:13
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veedubfreak posted:At this point is there any reason for someone to buy a Mac instead of a Windows pc other than being an Apple fanboy? I understand in the old days there were reasons, but now, a Mac is just a PC with OSX and a giant markup on parts. Actually, what I've seen is that the move to commodity hardware has brought down Mac prices significantly. OSX is nice, the battery life is great, and the lower-spec Airs are cheaper than Windows-based competitors. I snagged a 13" 2014 Macbook Air for $750 at Best Buy a couple months ago, and I couldn't find a comparable Windows ultraportable under $900 at that time. The rMBPs also compete in the premium laptop space, and you won't find a Windows laptop with an SSD and screen of that resolution until you get close in price. The non-retina Macbook Pro is a huge idiot trap though, and hasn't been updated since 2012. Apple also doesn't give a flying gently caress about the non-laptop space and the Mac Mini refresh was a step backwards.
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Dec 3, 2014 21:14
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veedubfreak posted:At this point is there any reason for someone to buy a Mac instead of a Windows pc other than being an Apple fanboy? I understand in the old days there were reasons, but now, a Mac is just a PC with OSX and a giant markup on parts. People buy macs because they want OSX. do you mean Vs an hackintosh? Macs generally arn't overpriced except for product lines that dont get updated for a long time like the mac mini and mac pro did. Not saying they arn't expensive, but you generally get good displays, the best build quality, etc..
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