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7990 Upgrades

smogsy

smogsy

smogsy

Soldato
Joined
9 Dec 2006
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Not going for an upgrade right now, just looking at my options.

What card is upgrade from a 7990, that can handle 3+ Screens at once & only takes up a single PCI-E 16x?

when I mean handle I mean just desktop apps on 3 screens & gaming on 1 screen.

im guessing only 290x2 or 780TI x2?

cheers
 
Nothing yet.

you need to wait for the AMDs R9 290x2 or Nvidia 780x2, or if you are crazy/rich enough you can get a Titan Z for 3000 when it comes out :)
 
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Looking at the mpower it looks like it should take another card, the cheap shorter term option would be to throw a 7950/280 or 7970/280x in with the 7990 for trifire
 
There is nothing worth upgrading from a 7990 currently and I would hazard a guess that even a dual 290 or dual 780 card wouldn't even be a big enough upgrade to warrant it, if thinking rationally - which I understand is difficult if you have the itch.

Performance wise, the 7990 is currently still the king (Titan Z not included lol) and even though it will undoubtedly shortly be dethroned, it is going to be a costly upgrade for maybe a 30-40% increase in performance. Whilst that might seem a decent level of performance jump, in reality when games are getting 100+ fps as it is with the 7990, is another ~20 frames-per-second really going to be all that noticeable?

I have 2 7970's. I will be keeping them without a shadow of a doubt (as long as neither breaks *touch wood*) until 20nm makes an appearance. And even then, I wont be replacing them until such time as a single gpu can out perform them.
 
Woah $1500 rumoured price!

So AMD produce a chip where temps are very difficult to control and in order for a dual gpu to be implemented, require a hybrid cooling solution... So charge an additional $500 over what their previous dual-gpu cards???

You could buy 2 290X's complete with full cover blocks and put together a custom loop for not much more than that and I guarantee, it would be kept a lot cooler than some hybrid solution!
 
You could buy 2 cards for less but the OP did spec a 1 x16 pci-e slot solution.

There aren't many boards with more than one true Pci-e 3.0 x16 lane bar the workstation boards such as the asus WS. Barely any AMD boards are PCI-E 3 but I guess the arguement as to whether PCI-E 2 is suturated yet is still a question. Dual 512 bit cards through one lane may be close.

I only bought my 7990 as it was a dual card solution for the board I had and without upgrading the board and CPU it was the best option. If you are going dual GPU then you spec the board accordingly. 7990 was cheapest solution at the time without upgrading board & cpu for me.

As for the cooling, well yeah the R9's run hot but as many choose to cool CPU's with off the shelf closed loop coolers it's only logical for GPU's to succumb. Kraken G10 as a good example. A proper dedicated water cooling loop requires a fairly big case, are relatively expensive and are for enthusiasts who will squeeze every last drop of performance from their kit.

Add on the cost of a case to take a full WC loop, the WC loop itself and the extra for 2x PCI-E 3 x16 lanes board I wonder if the r9 295 price may look a bit easier to swallow. Of course it looks expensive if you already have a WC loop etc.

As I had the 7990 my mobo and CPU requires an upgrade anyway as I reckon that 295 would soak up my 1x PCI-E 2.0 x16 slot. My predicament is do I get a 4k monitor first or the rig to run one?
 
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