GPU Upgrade for VR

[johnhaines]

I have a "Titan Envy Duo DC" bought here about 3 years ago:
Intel Core i7 4790K (Devil's Canyon) @ 4.6GHz Overclocked
Asus TUF Sabertooth Z97 Mark 2 Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard
GeForce GTX 970 OC Silent "Infin8 Black Edition"
Kingston HyperX 16GB (2x8GB) PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit
SuperFlower Leadex GOLD 1000W Fully Modular "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply

I have an Oculus Rift with two hand controllers that I want to use primarily seated for sims, e.g. Elite Dangerous, X Plane etc

I find that the GTX 970 copes in Elite Dangerous while in space but as soon as I approach planets the frame rate drops and I start feeling sick. I get the same issue in flight sims and pretty much any other VR game I try. Obviously a GTX 970 is the absolute minimum card for VR.

I do not have a massive amount of money to play with, maybe a budget of £500. My current thoughts are to get a GPU upgrade ... maybe stretching to an RTX 2070. This is based solely on wanting to get the best performance increase for my budget, especially in VR.

Is a 2070 my best option for the budget? If so, what brands/models can anyone recommend?

I have seen a few headlines about RTX cards failing / catching fire. Is this truly an issue or only something that occurs when pushing overclocking too far?

NB - I would rather have kit that works straight from the box than have to spend a lot of effort trying to overclock for small gains. Especially as I am never quite sure what I am doing when trying to overclock .

Thanks in advance for any help you can give,
John

 

[johnhaines]

Thanks for the quick replies. I'll start reading up on the Vega64, I am completely out of touch on AMD cards. I am going to look up the EVGA XC Ultra card as well; I like recommendations where people have used the kit. Three slots shouldn't be an issue as the only thing I use the slots for is the GPU.

 

[johnhaines]

Thanks, Slinky69.

Looking at the GPU hierarchy on the tom's hardware site it seems to suggest:

2080ti > 2080 > 1080ti > radeon7 > 2070 > Vega64 > 1080 > 1070ti > 2060

What I am not sure of is whether this hierarchy holds true with VR as well. Of the chipsets listed above, the 2080 and Radeon 7 are £150+ over my budget and the potential performance drop too much for me to consider the 1070ti or 2060. That seems to only leave the Vega 64 or 2070 as my real options. Does that sound correct?

What I haven't found in my searches is a review that focuses on VR performance to help me decide.