GPU: GTW 670 vs 7970?

[redmosez]

Hey Guys


So I'm upgrading my GPU and I'm wondering what would be my best bet


My systems is


OS: Windows 7 (64)
CPU: i7 930 2.8 GHZ
Memory: 16GB
OS Drive: 120 GB SSD
Storage: 2 TB HDD


I'm in Australia and planning to buy from http://www.msy.com.au/default.jsp?category=18


Tossing up between these two cards:


Asus GTX670


Asus 7970


Also kinda considering the Asus 7950 as it's a ~$120 cheaper


No experience with overclocking so also wondering how hard that is




Also I have no experience overclocking and wondering if it's difficult to pick up?

[crowdx]

I have the 7970, meh, it runs a bit hot for my liking. Otherwise it is pretty fast but I think the GTX is faster.

[Ualaa]

I like my card: eVGA GTX670, 4GB Superclocked.
Haven't had an ATI in a long time, so cannot really compare it to a 7970.

[heyaz]

I thought 680 was the card the cool kids were using?

[Ualaa]

A 680 is better than a 670.
But a 670 is a very good card, and for the money a much better deal.

[moosejaw]

I switched from the 6970 to a 670 ftw 4gb (like many on here have) and I prefer the Nvidia now due to driver maturity. Nvidia seems to be much more responsive to bugs and it seems you actually get the "bang for your buck" out of the hardware. I had been buying Ati cards since the 8800gt was current tech. I don't regret my purchase at all.

BTW the evga 670 FTW is built on the full length 680 pcb with an updated reference 680 cooler, so 680 cooling solutions will work with the card. It does have a stacked power socket that must be taken into account for aftermarket coolers.

[Grondir]

But how do you get around using only 2 monitors with nVidia cards? Use a second GPU?

[MiRai]

But how do you get around using only 2 monitors with nVidia cards? Use a second GPU?
What do you mean 'get around'? As opposed to AMD's use of DisplayPort? If I'm not mistaken, all GTX 6xx cards can power 3 monitors.

[heyaz]

I hope so. Last nvidia I owned was a 4xx I believe, which I accidentally melted by running some CUDA code and disabling the temperature gauge... somewhere around 130C it was game over :) I went to buy another card and at the time there were 4xx cards but none would power more than two monitors. I went with a 5970 that could power three. Last card I bought actually.

[Ualaa]

I play with two monitors.

My left monitor, is the active region in the full monitor (27" widescreen, 720x1080).
My right monitor has the other regions, displayed in roughly the top left quarter... which makes them rather small, but I can visually check if they're following or what not... and with instant swap between regions, that's good enough.

I also run Xsplit broadcaster, iTunes, Firefox and often a DvD on the right monitor.

[redmosez]

Ended up going with the GTX670 4g, I also kind of had an impulsive splurge and ended up updating my entire rig =/

running with extreme4 mobo, i7 3770k, 32 G of Ram, 250 gig SDD and 1T HDD

the upgrade has been great, now that I've upgraded I think I might give 5 boxing a shot.

[MadMilitia]

I'm curious as to how 5 boxing performance is with the 680 GTX in MoP. Is it a huge jump over the 460 GTX? I mean in 5 boxing terms will you see a difference?

CPU: I7 - 2600K @ 3.4GHZ
RAM: 16 GB DDR3
GPU: 460 GTX * 2
OS: WIN7 Ultimate SP1
Software: IsBoxer, InnerSpace
Layout: 1920x1080 (main), 1370 x 768 (slaves)

[Ualaa]

I don't think you'll have a bottleneck on medium to high settings.

The processor is good, and you can overclock conservatively if you want more performance out of it.
My i7-2600K went to 4.5GHz on air, very easily.

16GB is a massive amount of Ram for 5-boxing.

A GTX 680 is a little more powerful than my GTX 670.



Aside from Ultra/DX11, your system would be quite good.

My processor hit 60% and the video card was at 80% on GPU-Z (and used 3.6GB of 4GB), when I did a short Ultra/DX11 trial.
That was 5-boxing, with a 3930K and a GTX 670 4GB Superclocked card.
It used close to 10GB of ram, with 5x Warcraft, XSplit Broadcasting 1080p HD, 13 Firefox Tabs open, iTunes, Resource Monitor and GPU-Z going.

Shadows, Water Quality, Sun Shafts, Reflections, Spell Effects and Weather Effects are generally more video limited.
View Distance of characters and objects are generally more CPU limited.
At least in my experience.

DX9 is fewer resources than DX11.
You could reduce settings, until you reach a point where the game is smooth, if you have issues.

[MadMilitia]

I don't think you'll have a bottleneck on medium to high settings.

The processor is good, and you can overclock conservatively if you want more performance out of it.
My i7-2600K went to 4.5GHz on air, very easily.

16GB is a massive amount of Ram for 5-boxing.

A GTX 680 is a little more powerful than my GTX 670.



Aside from Ultra/DX11, your system would be quite good.

My processor hit 60% and the video card was at 80% on GPU-Z (and used 3.6GB of 4GB), when I did a short Ultra/DX11 trial.
That was 5-boxing, with a 3930K and a GTX 670 4GB Superclocked card.
It used close to 10GB of ram, with 5x Warcraft, XSplit Broadcasting 1080p HD, 13 Firefox Tabs open, iTunes, Resource Monitor and GPU-Z going.

Shadows, Water Quality, Sun Shafts, Reflections, Spell Effects and Weather Effects are generally more video limited.
View Distance of characters and objects are generally more CPU limited.
At least in my experience.

DX9 is fewer resources than DX11.
You could reduce settings, until you reach a point where the game is smooth, if you have issues.


Thanks Ualaa.

I guess the major difference here is I'm running 2 * 460 GTX, not a single 680 GTX. I know WoW doesn't benefit at all from SLI so would it be a better idea to get a 680 for rendering and one of the 460s act as PhysX dedicated?

I do notice a serious drop in FPS using a 30/15 on primary and slaves respectively when using the 'high' WoW setting. 30 (primary) drops to about 23. This is using DX9.


SLI setup is disabled and the second 460 is dedicated to PhysX.

[Ualaa]

In general, a single card is going to be better than two.
That includes cards like the 690, which are two cards on one physical board.

When boxing, the only advantage of more than one card is if you want more monitors.

Then again, SLI or Crossfire can be beneficial for non-boxed games too, if you play any of those.
Also, not sure if a PhysX card is useful for boxing or not, but it could be for other stuff so likely won't hurt.