Decisions ~ Upgrading in 2014

[guitaristanime]

Hello,
With the recent trend in video games, generally I don't think PC games are getting much more demanding for the moment.

My setup is the following:
Sapphire HD 7950 3072MB
Intel Core i5-3570K
Gigabyte Z77-D3H
PC Power & Cooling Silencer Mk III Series 500W
Xigmatek Midgard II Gaming Tower Case
GeIL Black Dragon 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz
Alpenföhn Matterhorn Pure Edition CPU Cooler

I recently bought a 1440p monitor and I would like to play games on the highest settings where possible and also recycle my graphics card before the resell value drops (currently ~£90 on eBay).

I have 4 choices as I see it:

• Over-volt & overclock 7950
• Buy a GTX 780 Ti
• Buy a GTX 970
• Save for a while and buy a GTX 980

Please impart your wisdom upon me

 

[SamuearlJackson]

One option you haven't considered is to sell the 7950 and to pick up a second hand 290 or 290X (or even a brand new one and sell the game codes), although your PSU may need an upgrade to run one.

I also think getting a 970 now with the option of upgrading to 970 SLI (with a new PSU too) in the future would be a good choice.

 

[ShivP]

Sell 7950, get a 970. 970 has decent performance at 1440p and the 280 will struggle at decent settings at that res

 

[guitaristanime]

Thank you both for your kind advice.

 

[snips86x]

Buy another 7590 or a 7970 and a new PSU for crossfire?

 

[randal]

Similar spec here, but I went for a 780Ti upgrade. I'm struggling to find a reason to upgrade myself as it eats up everything I throw at it. Might get a 3770k and another 780 next year.

 

[ShivP]

Buy another 7590 or a 7970 and a new PSU for crossfire?

His mobo will do only 4x crossfire so it'll be a bit bottlenecked won't it?

 

[TheGentry]

The 780ti is on offer atm and will out do the 970 but 970 seems better at higher resolutions and can overclock to 980 standards

 

[guitaristanime]

Yeah I think I'm pretty decided on the 970. On the whole I'd prefer to stay away from SLI/CF setups as they can be a pain to manage and upgrade in future. But thanks for the suggestions, I had considered getting another 7950 but do that many games really take advantage of multi-GPU setups, BF4 and Crysis 3 are the only two that it would benefit me for right now.

 

[CrixxzeH]

GTX 970 @ stock (If you can run with your PSU)

If not, buy a new psu..

Overclock your 7950 untill you can get a GTX 970, SLI or GTX 980.

 

[DaleTheWhale]

His mobo will do only 4x crossfire so it'll be a bit bottlenecked won't it?

Won't make too much difference at all!
PSU should handle a 970 without issues.

 

[ShivP]

Won't make too much difference at all!
PSU should handle a 970 without issues.

Talking about 7950 crossfire, iirc isn't 4x quite restrictive?

 

[guitaristanime]

Gonna see what deals OC offer overs Christmas I think, my PSU has to go back via extended warranty to America as thats where PC P&C's RMA center is so once that's sorted I will see where we lie with prices