RX 480 FreeSync vs GTX980ti

[Randal'Thor]

Hi guys.

I'm looking into setting up a new pc and just trying to decide on a graphic card and monitor. I guess i was thinking about spending about £450 for the 2. Am i best buying a more expensive monitor with FreeSync and a RX480, or buying a cheeper monitor and buying a second hand GTX980ti or a GTX1070?

Gigabyte Radeon RX 480 G1 Gaming 8192MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card
£210
AOC G2460PF 24" 1920x1080 TN FREESYNC 144Hz 1ms Gaming Widescreen LED Monitor - Black/Red
£230

or

Acer G246HLF 24" LED HDMI DVI Gaming Monitor
£120

Am i best putting more money into the Monitor or GFX card and how much does FreeSync help cheeper card perform? Will mainly be for FPS gaming.
Thanks for any help

 

[tommybhoy]

480+144Hz FreeSync is way better than 980Ti/1070+60Hz although heard the Gigabyte 480 cooler is crap and loud, if I was buying one it'd be the Strix.

Even though the 980Ti/1070 fps will be considerably higher than the 480, without question I'd take less fps over judder/hitching/tearing/blurring/lag.

 

[Davanius]

480+144Hz FreeSync is way better than 980Ti/1070+60Hz although heard the Gigabyte 480 cooler is crap and loud, if I was buying one it'd be the Strix.

Even though the 980Ti/1070 fps will be considerably higher than the 480, without question I'd take less fps over judder/hitching/tearing/blurring/lag.

Very true. I had both 1070 and 480 with a freesync monitor.

The 480 and freesync was so much nicer to play on as it was as smooth as butter.

Now with the Ryzen 1600 it's as smooth as ice.

Stay away from the Gigabyte 480. Asus and Msi are better and even the Powercolor is too.

 

[Toss3]

Hi guys.

I'm looking into setting up a new pc and just trying to decide on a graphic card and monitor. I guess i was thinking about spending about £450 for the 2. Am i best buying a more expensive monitor with FreeSync and a RX480, or buying a cheeper monitor and buying a second hand GTX980ti or a GTX1070?

Gigabyte Radeon RX 480 G1 Gaming 8192MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card
£210
AOC G2460PF 24" 1920x1080 TN FREESYNC 144Hz 1ms Gaming Widescreen LED Monitor - Black/Red
£230

or

Acer G246HLF 24" LED HDMI DVI Gaming Monitor
£120

Am i best putting more money into the Monitor or GFX card and how much does FreeSync help cheeper card perform? Will mainly be for FPS gaming.
Thanks for any help

Crossover 27" 1440p (needs an overclock, but low input lag and IPS) + GTX 980 Ti.

 

[RSR]

What about waiting for the RX580's which should go on sale next week?

 

[Poneros]

Best thing you can get in a monitor is making sure it's NOT TN-panel. Nothing else is as good as the difference between VA/IPS and TN. As for 480s, I'd say avoid Gigabyte & MSI, even Asus & Sapphire really. XFX & PowerColor are where it's at.

 

[Randal'Thor]

Great thanks very much. I wasn't sure how much of a difference freesync would make but sounds like it well worth it. I'll wait till next week and have a look round for a monitor. Any recommendations on a VA/IPS monitor for the same sort of price?

 

[hornetstinger]

Best thing you can get in a monitor is making sure it's NOT TN-panel. Nothing else is as good as the difference between VA/IPS and TN. As for 480s, I'd say avoid Gigabyte & MSI, even Asus & Sapphire really. XFX & PowerColor are where it's at.

TN has it's advantages- gaming, fast response and decent black levels, even backlight

 

[Poneros]

TN has it's advantages- gaming, fast response and decent black levels, even backlight

Sure, but the question is, can you actually tell the difference in terms of response times? Half the people can't even feel the difference between 60/75 hz and 144hz.

 

[Perfect_Chaos]

Sure, but the question is, can you actually tell the difference in terms of response times? Half the people can't even feel the difference between 60/75 hz and 144hz.

I've seen some people say that before and i find that hard to believe personally. They always say stuff like it only benefits fast paced games, which isn't really true.

 

[Rroff]

Sure, but the question is, can you actually tell the difference in terms of response times? Half the people can't even feel the difference between 60/75 hz and 144hz.

Not just that typically a TN will have better clarity in motion than your average IPS (though some are quite good) let alone VA which can have quite poor transitions for certain pixel colours. Which can make a big difference for gaming.

 

[nashathedog]

You need to look into the monitor situation before buying one as there's a lot of Freesync monitors that do not support Freesync very well,
The easy solution is to only buy a Freesync monitor that supports LFC (Low Framerate Compensator).

 

[orbitalwalsh]

G1 cooler is just fine, cool major components are actively cooled under the main heatsink unlike other brands

Nothing worse then having an expensive card that can't stretch its legs, like being a Hyper car to drive to tesco on a 30mph road..

 

[r7slayer]

Sure, but the question is, can you actually tell the difference in terms of response times? Half the people can't even feel the difference between 60/75 hz and 144hz.

I don't know how. When i did a driver update it some how changed my monitor res back to 60hz and i was scratchin my head why it felt choppy at desktop surfin the web etc. Then when playing games it kept locking to which i noticed straight away cos it was not as smooth especially in fifa17. Then realised my monitor was at 60hz reverted it back to 120 in desktop and fastest in games.
That to me tells me i could not go back to 60hz. Its why i am sticking to 1440p and not looking for 4k yet.

At op ive not tried freesync but ima guess its just like gsync. For me its not a massive difference but its noticeable. Especially at lower frame rates it just makes it feel smoother. When fps used to drop from 70+ to like 40+ or roughly a 20 fps drop cos of explosions ect i used to notice the drop bit like stutter but now its smooth. Its the same as high refresh rates once you've used it you find it hard to go back.