Another AMD vs Nvidia thread

[Armadillo]

Thanks all, lots of good advice, which has led me towards the 390 camp (rather than the 390X).

There seems to be a range of roughly £80 in the 390s at the moment - £229 for the PowerColor, up to £289 for the Asus Strix, with the MSI and Sapphire sat somewhere in the middle. Any thoughts on which is the best way to go, taking into account RMA/warranty service, extra features etc? Clocks seem to be fairly consistent across the board.

Powercolor is cheap for a reason.

Based on my dealings with them, I would never touch one again. If it works, great. If you actually have an issue, then I wish you luck.

 

[kunoichia]

Go for the MSI 390, bought one myself a couple days ago.

Deadsilent when gaming and havent seen it go above 67 degrees on stock clocks.
Overclocked it to 1225/1700 and was 71 maybe.

Plus its a sexy looking card for what its worth with a nice looking backplate.

Only negative is the **** games you get with it atm.. ( Sid Meier's Civilization: Beyond Earth and Dirt Rally)

 

[Sencha]

I'd just get something cheap now and sell it once the next cards are out.

 

[Dave2150]

+1 for the 390.

+1

 

[Kaapstad]

I like the 390Xs.

 

[nashathedog]

Hi all,

Struggling to make the decision between the KFA2 GTX980 8Pack edition 4GB @£359.99 on OcUK, and any one of the R9 390 8GB edition, which can be had for as much as £150 cheaper on OcUK as well.

Any thoughts?

Everyone saying do not buy the 980 seems to be ignoring how much card you are getting for the money, The current sale price for the 8 pack version of the 980 HOF makes it a steal. If I was buying my graphics card now it would be a no brainer, I'd get the 8 pack 980 instead of my Fury. It's about 80 quid cheaper and once manually overclocked more often than not I bet it's faster for gaming.

 

[VincentHanna]

Yeah but a 390 is £220 instead of £350....

 

[nashathedog]

Yeah but a 390 is £220 instead of £350....

We all know the 390 is the current price/performance king for a lot of us but a 980 HOF for 350 is a bargain. What I mean is if I was buying a card now and had up to 450 which is around what I spent on my Fury Tri-x a couple of months ago I wouldn't go with the Fury or a 390 or 390x. If the black 980 HOF had been at that price then I would have got that.

 

[Marine-RX179]

We all know the 390 is the current price/performance king for a lot of us but a 980 HOF for 350 is a bargain. What I mean is if I was buying a card now and had up to 450 which is around what I spent on my Fury Tri-x a couple of months ago I wouldn't go with the Fury or a 390 or 390x. If the black 980 HOF had been at that price then I would have got that.

Unfortunately the 390X and 980 actually found themselve in an odd spot on the market at the moment. I mean for anyone in the market to get a new graphic card right now, they should go 390 at mid-level, but if they want something faster, go all the way to a GTX980, and not bother with the graphic cards in middle (390x/980).

Also whilst the 980Ti has more or less proven its Asynchrounous compute capability, for the mid-range Maxwell such as the 980 and 970 there's still some concern regarding their performance.

 

[VincentHanna]

We all know the 390 is the current price/performance king for a lot of us but a 980 HOF for 350 is a bargain. What I mean is if I was buying a card now and had up to 450 which is around what I spent on my Fury Tri-x a couple of months ago I wouldn't go with the Fury or a 390 or 390x. If the black 980 HOF had been at that price then I would have got that.

If I had £350 i'd save £100+ and get a 390.

If I had £450 I'd save up another £50 and get a 980Ti

 

[Arterion]

We all know the 390 is the current price/performance king for a lot of us but a 980 HOF for 350 is a bargain. What I mean is if I was buying a card now and had up to 450 which is around what I spent on my Fury Tri-x a couple of months ago I wouldn't go with the Fury or a 390 or 390x. If the black 980 HOF had been at that price then I would have got that.

Fair, but we're talking a more than 50% price increase over a 390 - is the 980 8Pack going to give anywhere near 50% better performance?

 

[Freddie1980]

If you into overclocking and benching there is an argument to made for the GTX980 HOF given that it has the 8 pack branding/association. I guess it could be a viewed a value option for dedicated overclockers who won't/can't buy the ridiculously priced EVGA Kingpin cards. For day to day and normal gaming and with overclocking as an nice to have/after thought the 390 is the card to get.

 

[Marine-RX179]

If I had £350 i'd save £100+ and get a 390.

If I had £450 I'd save up another £50 and get a 980Ti

Fair, but we're talking a more than 50% price increase over a 390 - is the 980 8Pack going to give anywhere near 50% better performance?

Just to add to your points:

Spending extra £100 over the 390 to get a 390x/980 will get you around 5-8% extra performance; spending extra £150 over the 390x/980 getting the 980Ti would get you extra 35-40% performance.

Conclusion, you'd have to be nut to pay the extra £100 for the 390x/980, but not the extra £150 for the 980Ti

 

[Insanties_birth]

Agreed, 390 is a much better choice and even with the price cut the 980 is a poor choice to be honest. It's only good value in the sense it used to be higher price but factoring in where it sits against other cards? Still a worthless move. Save up for 980ti or go for the 390. Considering the huge difference in price though it seems a lot more realistic to recommend the reasonably price (and in your budget) 390 than to do the usual stupid action of recommending you find tons more money just to get the ti.

980 isn't worthwhile, if you're going to spend more then save for 980ti but if not then just go 390.