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**URGENT** Please help

Gonch

Gonch

Gonch

Associate
Joined
23 Oct 2011
Posts
6
Hi All

This is my first post after a lot of lurking and reading.

I've just built myself a new rig mainly for the upcoming BF3 but would like your expert opinion on which graphics card.

I was originally going to go for a HIS ATI Radeon HD 6970 IceQ Turbo 2048MB, but after too much research its now a toss up with a MSI GeForce GTX 570 OC Twin FrozR III Power Edition 1280MB.

The spec ive built is a 2500k on an MSI Z68A-GD55 (G3) with 8GB 2x4G Corsair XMS3 and a Crucial M4 256GB FW v 9.

My monitor is a 24" Samsung sync master with a max res of 1920x1200.

Both cards are the same price at the moment, so bearing in mind my monitors max res, whats your opinion?

Thanks

Fraz
 
I would get the 2GB 6970 due to BF3 using a lot of VRAM and 2GB would be more future proof, you could even add another 6970 for crossfire a year down the line.
 
Really its a toss of a coin but you could get a Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 6950 TOXIC 2048MB GDDR5 which has a dual bios that gives 6970 spec and will save you money.
 
DaZe said:
I would get the 2GB 6970 due to BF3 using a lot of VRAM and 2GB would be more future proof, you could even add another 6970 for crossfire a year down the line.
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+1 unless your going to be getting the Nvidia 2.5 evga 570, there is no point buying a card with less than 2gb of vram. As games are using a lot more vram nowadays.
 
As with BF3, no one knows what current cards are going to outperform each other apart from knowing that the toned down(essentially) beta version liked vram.

At a guess it's going to use even more vram if available to each particular card that it plays on with all the bells and whistles on.

On my setup which is the same as the op's apart from: 16GB ram, 2 ssd's, 128mb M4 for the OS and 120 Force 3 for games, 2x 2TB hd's, and a Samsung 1080p

Using my 6950>70 CrossFire, the beta used slightly more than 3.1Gb vram on a Samsung @ 1080p so your 1200p will probably use more.

£329 for a 2.5Gb 570 is mental when you could get either the 2GB 560/6950's and overclock them to 6970/570 speeds and more easily for ~£120 less!

Yes, the 6970/570's probably will hit 580 speeds, but the overclocked 6950/560's will be there or there abouts.

The toxics mentioned above when overclocked and unlocked can surpass stock 580's, have a look here: [H] (which leads me to believe that my 6950>70's are even faster as they both can go above 1GHz!:D).

I'm not saying go for the toxics as they have a hefty premium at the moment, but rather get either the 2Gb's 560/6950 and buy a ssd to load BF3 onto.

If I was looking for a card right now for BF3 it would have to be This one purely for the massive cooler which should give you more headroom for overclocking as it dumps all the heat out the case(regardless what it looks like cleecoo;)) and you get 2 games free!

Cleeecooo said:
The 570 generally outperforms it @ 1080p
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Nvidiot said:
Thought so, it worth the money in my eyes.
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:rolleyes:As self confessed fanbois, of course the 6970 would never outperform the 570!:p

You should wait until Tuesday to make up your mind though as performance benchmarks will be available as it's out on the other side of the pond first!:mad:
 
arc@css said:
At a resolution of 1920x1200 I'd more than likely share the same feelings as you. Beyond that though I wouldn't even entertain considering it.
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Its just that everytime I see a GTX570 review, test, GFX round-up the GTX570 is always ahead and at very high resolutions too.
 
arc@css said:
Yeah, similar for me as well. The 570 would be my choice over a 6950 or a 6970 but each to their own. :)
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Take this summary for example - http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/Mars_II/27.html

At every resolution the 570 is ahead and to be honest looks like a contender for the 6970.

It is strange that the card with less Vram stays ahead of the 2GB 6950 especially at the max resolution tested.
 
arc@css said:
At a resolution of 1920x1200 I'd more than likely share the same feelings as you. Beyond that though I wouldn't even entertain considering it.
Click to expand...

71bc9a33b7c8af848fe41cccd6dde227.jpg


From: [H]

Yes, it's hardly conclusive but the 6950 with 10fps minimums better than the 570 is quite a difference and it never went below 30fps.

The 570's performance looks even worse when looking at it from 39fps as well:

837e07e5efafdb3be6a4b876e318d0a9.jpg


Nvidiot said:
At every resolution the 570 is ahead and to be honest looks like a contender for the 6970.
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It should be, it's priced with the 6970's, not the 6950's.


Surveyor said:
But then at OcUK the cheapest GTX 570 is £255 and the cheapest 2GB HD 6950 is £206.

Is the GTX 570 £49 or 24% better?

The answer is no.
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Exactly what I was pointing out in my first post.
 
Surveyor said:
But then at OcUK the cheapest GTX 570 is £255 and the cheapest 2GB HD 6950 is £206.

Is the GTX 570 £49 or 24% better?

The answer is no.
Click to expand...

I agree It isn't 24% better with regard to maximum frame rates, but it might be worth the extra fifty notes to someone for other reasons such as better performance when AA is applied, better minimum and average fps, game dependent of course. Someone else might prefer the AMD card for a completely different reason to frame rates, e.g. power draw, - something that AMD seem to have a higher priority for, and something I wish nVidia would / catch up or improve on.
 
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