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Advice regarding a 1070 card

Maundie

Maundie

Maundie

Soldato
Joined
20 Oct 2010
Posts
4,768
Good evening fellow forumites, please be gentle as it's been sometime since I looked at graphics cards but I've been tasked with sorting out a gaming rig for the neighbours son's Xmas present (he's 15 and it will be his 1st gaming machine as normally he plays on PS5), I've told them that now is a terrible time to be buying components but obvs a teenage boy wants what a teenage boy wants and I was wondering if my spare Gigabyte G1 Windforce GTX 1070 would be a decent enough card to tide him over for a while (they only have approx £900 and a new card is roughly £350-400 of that, he won't be playing top titles at max resolution but as I only really play American Truck Simulator and Warhammer 40k Dawn of war I am sort of out of the loop of the graphics card scene.

I'm trying to save them a bit of money by re-utilising my spare card (I actually have a 16Gb RX 6900XT in my rig currently which is probably not being taxed at all which I could swap should the 1070 not be any good for him) and then at a later date he can choose to upgrade should he wish so was hoping someone can let me know I'm not being a complete plank by using old hardware, the rest of the build I'm basing around AM4 chipset with 3200mHz RAM as prices are proper lol worthy.
 
Without knowing exactly what he wants to play, it's hard to say whether it will be ok. I use a 1070ti (about 10% quicker iirc) and assuming 1080p then generally:

AAA next gen games, bridge too far.
AAA last gen/cross gen games, fine
Esport titles (cs2, valorant, overwatch, fortnite) fine, Marvel rivals is a bit of stretch because it's unoptimised UE5 slop.
Indie games mostly fine.

If he just wants to play the latest friendslop games with his mates or esports titles, perfectly fine card to use until a swap to something better at a later date. If being 15 he is going to see some AAA title that's not available on ps5 (say something like gears of war e-day) and want to play, then will want something with a lot more power. If more than 1080p, then probably need something with a bit more grunt these days as well.
 
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I'd tell them to get on facebook market place you can get some really decent PCs for 900 and WELL under with gpus like a 5060. This last 2 weeks alone I've seen an rtx4070 build go for 500 and a 2080super build for 250 quid. If you see something at a reasonable price and you're unsure about its capabilities ask here on the forum and people will tell you if it's worth it.
 
1070 should be fine enough. You can start with this and upgrade it later when he is more familiar with what he wants. I got a mini pc playing with integrated graphics (780m) and its mostly fine, I will upgrade it via oculink when required but most often it doesn't prevent playing.

There is a trend towards indie games and retro, a lot of people don't always need the most expensive spec which is ideal for a build right now. Cant tell till he tries, I wouldn't rush when it can be altered later anyway.
1070 is above what I have comparing quickly, in that case I vote its a good starter card to give
 
Thanks for the replies guys, we've a 'meeting' with him this evening to actually find out a bit more info but I did suggest using my 1070 to help towards the budget and he can always upgrade later (not sure how much he'll play it as he goes through phases)
 
1070 is a decent enough card and 8gb was a great amount in vram for the time time.

Its a 1080p, 60 FPS card generally....

Obviously depends on the game but ballpark that is what you are looking at.
 
He's really going to have to measure his expectations, a 1070 based rig is going to be notably slower than his PS5 for current games. You're looking at around a 2070 or 3060 to get on par performance GPU wise, and that's ignoring the benefits games released for a console enjoy in terms of optimisation.

Your best bet would be to see if you can source something second hand, maybe hit up the members market.

If he's wanting a gaming pc as an upgrade to his current ps5 experience for AA/AAA games and even a lot of more demanding indie titles he's unfortunately very much going to struggle with that budget.
 
Gray2233 said:
He's really going to have to measure his expectations, a 1070 based rig is going to be notably slower than his PS5 for current games. You're looking at around a 2070 or 3060 to get on par performance GPU wise, and that's ignoring the benefits games released for a console enjoy in terms of optimisation.

Your best bet would be to see if you can source something second hand, maybe hit up the members market.

If he's wanting a gaming pc as an upgrade to his current ps5 experience for AA/AAA games and even a lot of more demanding indie titles he's unfortunately very much going to struggle with that budget.
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Yeah I know, I was just trying to save him some budget, if we can save not buying a £350+ card to start and get better CPU and MB then at a later date 'if' he is starting to use it a lot then it maybe worthwhile forking out for a newer card but at the moment I think come April it's not going to be used again
 
Maundie said:
Yeah I know, I was just trying to save him some budget, if we can save not buying a £350+ card to start and get better CPU and MB then at a later date 'if' he is starting to use it a lot then it maybe worthwhile forking out for a newer card but at the moment I think come April it's not going to be used again
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To be honest, coming from a PS5 unless all he's wanting to do is play esports/indies with his mates, I'd be wanting to buy into AM5 ASAP.

Find out exactly what he wants to play, he might be better off with a Steamdeck or something.

Also consider that presumably he'll need a mouse and keyboard on top and potentially a monitor. I'd also be hesitant to help with a build like this as you're going to be the first point of call should anything go awry, and if he's the one cocking things up it could lead to unwanted friction between you and people you live next to.
 
Maundie said:
Yeah I know, I was just trying to save him some budget, if we can save not buying a £350+ card to start and get better CPU and MB then at a later date 'if' he is starting to use it a lot then it maybe worthwhile forking out for a newer card but at the moment I think come April it's not going to be used again
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I agree. I'd just give him the 1070. Not worth dumping a lot of money into something that might not even get used properly.
 
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