£200 Graphics Cards

[Jamielicious]

Is it just me or has there been very little for those with budgets or about or slightly under £200?

About 3 years ago the 660Ti and 7870 both offered something for the upper-mid range buyer.

Right now you've got loads of cards that perform about the same as each other costing just above £150 like the 960/380/280 and then you have at or above £250 the much faster 970/390.

Other than that brief period where some 290s were selling at £200-£210 mark there's been a huge gap in both price and performance that neither AMD nor Nvidia seem to want to fill.

So, will we ever see something worthwhile again at or just under £200 or is it case of waiting for 14nm?

 

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I agree - currently stuck on a GTX660,and a GTX960 or R9 285/R9 380 would be an upgrade,but not a mahoosive one!! Its almost like AMD and Nvidia would rather we spent £200 to £300 now!

Its the same with a few of my mates who feel the same,and I have decided to wait until Fallout 4 to see if I need a better card.

 

[subbytna]

Members Markey is the way forward squire but you need waaaay more posts to get access to it.

 

[Boomstick777]

290X goes for around £200, not a bad deal.

 

[Divine Pain]

Same.

I'm also looking for a htpc/lan gpu and the ones on offer doesn't scream worth to me. Maybe the upcoming nano from amd or a 950/960 ti coming soon? I don't know

 

[Jamielicious]

That's the thing, the 660 and 7870 cards are 3 years old and right now the only significant upgrades cost over £250.

Also to be honest the 660/7870 type cards are still doing alright at 1080p (my 2GB 7870 seems to love GTA5 even on V High Textures), so the main reasons to upgrade are to move up to 1440p or to get 90-144fps or for more VRAM. For all of those really a 780/290 is surely the minimum and right now neither exist for under about £220.

I can however see either Nvidia launching a 3GB 965 based on a cut-down 970 or AMD price cutting the 390.

Finally wasn't there also meant to be a better Tonga card coming (385?) that'd probably do the job.

 

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

The problem there has been no newish release which is a decent upgrade sadly.

The whole segment has been forgotten by Nvidia and AMD for £500+ cards.

Edit!!

I knew about the discount R9 cards but for a lot of systems,especially smaller ones they are really not that suitable.

A fully enabled Tonga GPU in the R9 380 would have been a useful upgrade but AMD stuck with the same gimped one in the R9 285.

 

[Andelusion]

I missed out on a vapor-x last week for £177 which was frustrating! If you're willing to spend some time googling you can get a bargain, it's boring as hell though

 

[Jamielicious]

It's a pity I'm nowhere near qualifying for the MM. ** Reference to a deleted post removed **

The MM is still an option for CAT-THE-FIFTH though.

 

[ToastedChip]

oops edited ^_^

 

[Snodge]

** Quote removed **

Remove this before you get warned by a forum admin, you aren't allowed to sell outside of the "MM" which is the members market for forum users with more than 1000 posts.

 

[sprite1275]

Ive got over 1000 posts but still cant have a look at the MM

 

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

It's a pity I'm nowhere near qualifying for the MM. ** Reference to a deleted post removed **

The MM is still an option for CAT-THE-FIFTH though.

The problem is with a SFF PC,such a high TDP card would only be viable with a decent blower cooler which the R9 290 series don't have and the cards are stupidly long(it will fit I suspect).

Something like a GTX965 or an R9 385 would be the kind of cards which would appeal to me. Sadly,I don't think Nvidia or AMD want such cards as they will be too close to a GTX970 or R9 290/R9 390.

 

[savagesam117]

Ive got over 1000 posts but still cant have a look at the MM

I saw your post in GD, that's brutal man, another 5 months!

There are some silly priced cards on second hand sites too! check them out if you don't have MM

 

[sprite1275]

I saw your post in GD, that's brutal man, another 5 months!

There are some silly priced cards on second hand sites too! check them out if you don't have MM

Tell me about it. I didnt even know what he meant by infractions until i saw he give me ONE months ago for a hotlink i posted.

Anyway the one who posted i needed to set up the trust was right. did that and now i have access to the MM

 

[kration]

This is a good thread, as I was very much in 7870 territory.

I then got a cheap 290 and there's nothing on the horizon that will tempt me away from it.

I've always been 'upper middle' when buying graphics cards, but I cannot see anything out there.

I think my next upgrade will be VR then a card that can cope with it...

 

[Jamielicious]

This is the longest I've gone without an upgrade but I do think the 20nm issues are a part of the problem, that made AMD uncompetitive so Nvidia could sell their Maxwell cards for more and then raise the price rather than lower them (970s are still about £20 above launch prices).

2006: 1600pro (256)
2007: 8800gts (320)
2008: HD4870 (512)
2010: GTX460 (1GB)
2012: HD7870 (2GB)
2015 or 2016???

 

[ukxenon]

I would save a d get the 970