Battle of the GPUs: Is power efficiency the new must-have?

[shankly1985]

Low power less heat, more overclock =

Not really, less heat Yeah but you still limited by the core temperature.

 

[Gregster]

Not really, less heat Yeah but you still limited by the core temperature.

I am not following? Can you elaborate please.

 

[OptimaLnrg]

As long as less power = less noise I am happy. I can't be doing with a loud-ass PC that renders a console port 5FPS higher than a quiet one.

 

[Tonester0011]

I am not following? Can you elaborate please.

I think he's trying to say the overclocks on Maxwell are limited by temps, which we all know isn't true. They don't scale on ambient. The 980s on water are no better than on air. From a benchmarks POV.

 

[arc@css]

It's preferable for my tastes, though not essential. What I look for is quiet operation at idle. That's the bottom line as far as I'm concerned.

 

[nitram100]

No.

 

[r7slayer]

Low power less heat, more overclock =

No because Nvidia cards are always restricted to hell and you have to mod the bios to even be able to overclock that little bit more so you can only overclock as much as Nvidia lets you.

Anyways don't make power efficiency a thing because we all know how it runs with Intel at the moment all they care about is power efficiency more than performance increase at the moment.

When this starts rolling into GPUs people will start crying! Where they focus more on efficiency rather than performance increases.

 

[GoogalyMoogaly]

All this talk about power efficiency not being important and all that.

I wonder if the 980 had come in needing 2 x 8-pin power connectors and drew nearly 400W (or more after OC) if the same people would still be saying it didn't matter or if they'd be saying how awful it was and how it means more heat...

EDIT:
were there any complaints about the 480's power usage and heat back at the time?

 

[almighty15]

Not really, less heat Yeah but you still limited by the core temperature.

Not on the 970/980 you're not.

 

[Nexus18]

EDIT:
were there any complaints about the 480's power usage and heat back at the time?

There was a lot of **** taking about it i.e. "the way it is meant to be cooked/grilled" and George Foreman grill memes

Spoiler

But at the end of the day, no one really cared that much when it came to deciding between that and AMD's top end GPU, at least not the same way that people seem to do now.....

 

[arc@css]

EDIT:
were there any complaints about the 480's power usage and heat back at the time?

Erm...yes.

 

[setter]

And as a former 400 series owner, (470 sli) i was one to complain a little ill be honest. Not to mention they were loud too. But stick on a pair of noise cancelling headphones and you didnt hear them. I forgave theese little niggles as they were fantastic overclocking cards. 850mhz core iirc on the pair i had.

 

[shankly1985]

Not on the 970/980 you're not.

So what are you limited by on 970 or 980? Voltage control?

 

[arc@css]

Actually, I should mention that although my GTX480 was a juicy card, it was very quiet at idle, and not bad at all at load. I think the fact that it had a non-reference cooler had something to do with it. The non-reference design meant it consumed very slightly less power than a reference model.

 

[willb1967]

Relevant?

Not sure if any of this actually came into play but this article from a couple of years ago may be relevant: http://www.guru3d.com/news-story/eu-could-cripple-future-graphics-cards.html

 

[GoogalyMoogaly]

There was a lot of **** taking about it i.e. "the way it is meant to be cooked/grilled" and George Foreman grill memes

Spoiler

But at the end of the day, no one really cared that much when it came to deciding between that and AMD's top end GPU, at least not the same way that people seem to do now.....

Erm...yes.

Odd considering nobody cares about efficiency or heat... apparently...

 

[almighty15]

So what are you limited by on 970 or 980? Voltage control?

Pretty much, My 970's have full cover blocks and barely break 40c when under load and overclocking scales with voltage at these temperatures.

Problem is that custom BIOS's don't handle extra voltage properly ( Yet ) so I'm limited for now.

 

[gpuerrilla]

You don't spend £300+ on a GPU just to save pennies a day on the electricity bill, the whole efficiency deal is hype. Enthusiasts don't really care about it, it's just an aspect of the cards you can brag about, 'why my cards are faster than others and they save on my electricity bill too, how amazing is that?'

Ditto. Energy efficiency has its place don't get me wrong, but in an overclocking forum with guys smashing overclocks running 24/7 it is a bit ironic..

 

[Rofflay]

If a psu becomes 650w as standard which now it proably is fine for a 4770K and 980 overclocked system? Then your going to save money which is good. Your going to save money on the running costs per year as well. These are substanial savings maybe £40 on the PSU minimum and £20 per year on electric?


I am actually coming around to it a bit more, I just wish i forkd out less on my psu now i have the above and probably no where near using my AX860i.

 

[Sin_Chase]

Everyone stating they could not care less about about power efficiency cracks me up.

The big take away from efficient cards is less heat and less noise. I bet most of the "I DUN CARE BOUT EFFICIENCY" crowd do care about heat and noise.