AMD 290 UPGRADE?

[mr griffin]

Hi,

I am looking at refreshing my water cooled 480 sli set up. I have been offered a water cooled 290 that I could replace them with. I game at 1440p and am wondering if a single 290 would be much of an upgrade or just a sideways move?. I prefer nvidia gfx cards as given a choice and no budget constraints but at this point in time don't want to spend big money on a 780 ti sli setup. My last AMD card was a the 4870 x2 have not had an AMD card since as that was not a good card.

 

[humbug]

A small upgrade, not much though.

 

[LtMatt]

I think it would be more than a small upgrade, do it!! Add another later and enjoy silly high fps.

 

[Mr. May]

personally I would say it would be a fair jump up in smoothness as I went for 670's @1440p and it felt a lot smoother so for 480's would be quite a jump

 

[mr griffin]

I would only be running a single 290 not crossfire

 

[LtMatt]

I would only be running a single 290 not crossfire

You can add another at a later date though.

 

[Five.Stars]

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/1068?vs=1135

This compares a single 290 to a single 480. Assuming 100% SLI scaling, which is never the case, then the 290 would give pretty similar performance to the 480's. You can however, overclock the 290. You game at 1440p so the extra VRAM will be crucial as I guess at highest setting with AA a lot of game will take you over the 1.5GB of the 480's.

It is a definite upgrade, but propably not a massively noticeable 1 unless you are VRAM limited in certain situations. That said, it does give you the option of later adding a 2nd 290. Now 290 CrossfireX - that IS an upgrade!

 

[AshenEdge]

I'm in a similar boat I've been holding off an upgrade but come this time next month my 'treat myself' savings will reach critical mass so I will probably either be swayed by one of Gibbos deals or Matts mystical powers! Don't look at those winkies (possibly always good advice ) as I think they're the source of Matts powers I think a higher res monitor will be the final push for me to upgrade

 

[Mr. May]

I would only be running a single 290 not crossfire

I was at first sold my 670's for a 290pro then swapped that for 2x290x's

 

[arc@css]

I think you'll see a moderate maximum frame rate increase, but more importantly and most likely, even smoother performance along with much, much more video memory for more demanding titles / mods etc. I guess it depends how much you really want to move from two 480's?

 

[Uncle Petey]

I'm in a similar boat I've been holding off an upgrade but come this time next month my 'treat myself' savings will reach critical mass so I will probably either be swayed by one of Gibbos deals or Matts mystical powers! Don't look at those winkies (possibly always good advice ) as I think they're the source of Matts powers I think a higher res monitor will be the final push for me to upgrade

Matt wishes everyone would look at his winkie.

 

[thefogo]

480 SLI is similar to a 7970Ghz in performance so you should see a decent performance increase.