• Competitor rules

    Please remember that any mention of competitors, hinting at competitors or offering to provide details of competitors will result in an account suspension. The full rules can be found under the 'Terms and Rules' link in the bottom right corner of your screen. Just don't mention competitors in any way, shape or form and you'll be OK.

970 sent back, what GPU to do?

gradyhawks

gradyhawks

gradyhawks

Permabanned
Joined
19 Nov 2011
Posts
1,572
Posting for a friend of mine who is looking for some advice.

He bought a 970 back in November when there was a decent price on one, £250 back then. After about 2 weeks of having it, he kind of regretted it. The cooling was sub-par and it was a custom PCB so he couldn't even water cool it, but he wasn't allowed to send it back.

Zoom on now, and he has sent his 970 back due to the 3.5gb Vram problem and is wondering what to have instead. He was considering a 980, but they are damned expensive for what you get (imo). With 380's around the corner and 390s in the summer, my advice was to just get a 2nd hand/b-grade 280 or something. He is currently only using 1080p at 60hz with the eventual plan to get a 1440p 144hz.

My thinking was that getting something like a 290x or a 980 would be wasted until he can get that monitor, so just settle with a £100 280 until either 380's or 390's. He is planning on getting said monitor in the summer anyway.

What is your advice?

Cheers,

Grady
 
290 /x would be a great card for 1080p. A 8gb version would be a good buy if changing to a higher resolution monitor in the future.
 
+1 for a standard R9 290 (non-X). It'll provide plenty of grunt at 1080p 60Hz then when your friend makes the jump to 1440p/144Hz he should be able to pick up another relatively cheap second hand to go Crossfire to get the most out of the monitor.
 
Only bother with the 8gb versh if you're gonna Xfire with another 290, theres not enough grunt available to warrant the extra 4gb over a stansard 290X.
 
gradyhawks said:
Posting for a friend of mine who is looking for some advice.

He bought a 970 back in November when there was a decent price on one, £250 back then. After about 2 weeks of having it, he kind of regretted it. The cooling was sub-par and it was a custom PCB so he couldn't even water cool it, but he wasn't allowed to send it back.
Click to expand...

Guys if you look at the ops post he was unhappy with his 970s cooling so now everyone on this thread recommends Hawaii cards :D I would love to know what make of 970 it was because when I had my Gigabyte G1 970 it was the most cool and quiet card I've had.

If the friend was unhappy with a 970 at 1080p then there's not much hope of getting better with a Hawaii card, it's much of muchness ingame at that resolution. My 970 at 1080p was perfect so I would suggest to just get a stopgap card until newer cards arrive.

If he does take the plunge with a Hawaii card then look at the Tri-X, Vapor-X or PowerColor brands for the best cooling, even though they are bigger than your average card and may take up more than two slots. I would avoid the MSI solution for lower temps than a 970 because I think thats almost impossible.
 
Last edited:
Very much a sidegrade at 1080p imo, having first hand experience of a 970 and 290X GPU. At higher resolutions I could see the benefit of a couple 8GB Vapor-X :p
 
Last edited:
3.5 of a faster card yes :D

do you have a slower card that produces heatwave heat but a true 4gb :p

or a cooler faster card .


you better off either picking up a 680 gtx or 7950 second hand and waiting. than buying a 290 from a 970 gtx.
 
~>Dg<~ said:
3.5 of a faster card yes :D

do you have a slower card that produces heatwave heat but a true 4gb :p

or a cooler faster card .


you better off either picking up a 680 gtx or 7950 second hand and waiting. than buying a 290 from a 970 gtx.
Click to expand...

Depends how you setup your games. My reference 290 is cool and quiet at 65c and 50% fan speed using v-sync :p Can game without the need for headphones ;)

Mal X said:
no way, i have 970 SLI on my 1080p .... the only thing you'll waste is your money :D

on 1080p you're nowhere near the 3.5 RAM limit, people need to do their homework before RMAing their cards
Click to expand...

It's not just about the use of 3.5GB, false advertisement - I'd see returning these more as principle!
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom