Radeon 6990, or NVIDIA GTX 590?

fish2306 · 3 Oct 2011 at 15:54

Hi,
I'm building my new rig, and am now on to choosing my GPU but I can't decide between the radeon 6990 or the gtx 590, and I don't know which one will be best, value is no issue and I am not interested in SLI or Crossfire X, I was looking at the gigabyte models.

schnipps · 3 Oct 2011 at 16:01

I would go 6990 but you do realise they are crossfire and sli cards just bolted into 1? aside from space there is no benefit to going dual card over 2 seperate ones

Masterdeadly · 3 Oct 2011 at 16:08

Not interested in SLI or Xfire, 580 then.

fish2306 · 3 Oct 2011 at 16:12

schnipps said:
I would go 6990 but you do realise they are crossfire and sli cards just bolted into 1? aside from space there is no benefit to going dual card over 2 seperate ones

My mistake, I am interested in the crossfire x/SLI just not 2 physical cards, thanks

Jamiman · 3 Oct 2011 at 16:13

6990 is superior.

Masterdeadly · 3 Oct 2011 at 16:15

6990 for sure then

they're brilliant card but if your not watercooling it, make sure you have a load headset XD, 6990's are very loud.

JeffyB · 3 Oct 2011 at 16:33

6990

Also as well as being a single card solution the 6990 has highly binned cayman chips that can run at lower voltage making them overclocking beasts. There are downsides, the card is noisy under load though and is huge so make sure you have enough space.

rubin1961 · 3 Oct 2011 at 16:34

As above

mmj_uk · 3 Oct 2011 at 16:48

If you aren't going to go with 2 separate cards I think 6990 is a no brainer, GTX590 is nerfed compared to two physical 580's.

SheepBeast · 3 Oct 2011 at 16:51

the 6990 is a bit faster but much noisier (unless you're planning to watercool obviously). personally i'd go for the 590. it's still the 2nd fastest graphics card available and it's not like it'll struggle with anything for years

tommybhoy · 3 Oct 2011 at 19:03

^
It'll struggle keeping it's vrm's in one piece though.

Buy sli/xfire instead, in the odd chance that it was to break, you still have a working system to fall back to with a dual card setup.

It's also easier to sell on two cheaper cards than one expensive card.

Two good custom cooled cards will be quieter than a 6990 flat out as well unless you get one of these:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?p=20213093#post20213093

panyan · 3 Oct 2011 at 19:07

SheepBeast said:
the 6990 is a bit faster but much noisier (unless you're planning to watercool obviously). personally i'd go for the 590

in numbers terms 6990 wins

in real-world living 580 wins

w3bbo · 3 Oct 2011 at 21:35

6990 wins for me (I have all 3 setups - 6990, 590 sli and 580 sli). The only down side is it's the loudest of the three setups by a fair margin.

arc@css · 3 Oct 2011 at 21:41

I'd rather have a 6990 than a 590, that is unless nVidia have finally sorted the problem(s) out with it. Even then, if the drivers are better and it doesn't catch fire or go pop, the 590 is still slower than two 580's in SLI, so all in all, that's one card I doubt I'd even consider.

TAC4U · 3 Oct 2011 at 21:44

Now seems like a bad time to be splashing out, as new cards from both companies are due out within months / early next year. The 6990 is a powerful card but suffered from excessive noise from cooling and only modest overclocking potential; the 590 had its own issues and is not up to the performance of a 580 SLI setup. Both presented much better value when they were first released, yet if you're not interested in value there's always the £1249 580X2.

Helios1234 · 3 Oct 2011 at 22:00

HD6990 but it's stupidly loud.

Geekazoid · 3 Oct 2011 at 23:44

get 2 6970's or better yet any availibility of 2 referance 6950 unlock and CF them i know you need one card but think about it if you have the space 2 6970 are faster than a 6990 and run cooler too OR 6950 2 of them unlocked are best bang for buck

if you have to go for a single dual gpu card then a 6990 is has a little more muscle but loud as hell...

fish2306 · 4 Oct 2011 at 12:55

tommybhoy said:
^
It'll struggle keeping it's vrm's in one piece though.

Buy sli/xfire instead, in the odd chance that it was to break, you still have a working system to fall back to with a dual card setup.

It's also easier to sell on two cheaper cards than one expensive card.

Two good custom cooled cards will be quieter than a 6990 flat out as well unless you get one of these:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?p=20213093#post20213093

So will this reduce the noise problem that the 6990 faces?

arc@css · 4 Oct 2011 at 13:05

fish2306 said:
So will this reduce the noise problem that the 6990 faces?

Yes.