Make a decision for me!

Bwaaa · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:08

Right guys, currently debating what to do. I need a graphics card for my new build and not sure which one would best suit. Ideally I want to run BF3, Skyrim and 250 FPS CoD4 (promod) at 1920x1080 on high settings, not interested in Eyefinity or Nvidia 3D and want the option to Crossfire/SLI in the future with a 650W PSU. (PSU is a given, will not change.)

I'm stuck between these 3 at the moment -

MSI ATI Radeon HD 6950 OC Twin FrozR III Power Edition 2048MB
MSI GeForce GTX 570 OC Twin FrozR III Power Edition 1280MB
MSI GeForce GTX 560Ti OC Twin FrozR II 1024MB - Probably use the extra £££ for a SSD for my OS if I end up with this.

As you can probably see i'd rather stick to MSI gear as i've never had a problem with them and the Twin Frozr design as i'd like to keep it as cool as possible.

So anyway, how important is the extra VRAM of the 6950, and how overclockable are the 3 cards? Not even sure if the cards will Crossfire/SLI with a 650W PSU but its worth a try I guess.

Flashheart · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:23

I'd take the 6950. Better to double up with, and will overclock well. As they all will with that cooler.

JAPears · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:31

570 has my vote

Cleeecooo · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:32

Sorry, not really helping but...

560Ti and SSD

That's one vote for each!

EDIT: See my post below

trisp · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:33

6950....

reads what he just posted^^ and realises there was a third choice ....

ssd and gpu !! to get better performance overall if you are gonna put games on the ssd!! if not 6950

Cleeecooo · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:43

Let me try and explain advantages and disadvantages of each card.

Firstly, a heirarchy (for 1080p):

GTX 560Ti
6950
GTX 570

The 560Ti can be equal to an OC'd 6950 when OC'd to its max

The 6950 is a good card however people have been complaining about drivers and things (never had a problem myself) but I do prefer nVidia drivers, mainly because I am more familiar and used to them. With the 6950, 3D is out of the question because the 3D drivers are absolutely ****. I have tried them with both my 6970 and 580 and have been disappointed (iZ3D and DDD). At 1080p the extra VRAM is useless. 1GB is sufficient for the vast majority of games.

GTX 570. Card i the best at 1080p out of the ones you've selected. nVidia 3D is a really great experience however some say that it's more like a novelty item (like the Wii 0 not so good when the initial awesomeness wears off). 570 is a pretty cool card and the cooer is good.

560Ti. I would personally recommend THIS one over the MSI one you chose. The coolers are similarly performing and the EVGa one has a slightly larger OC. The main reason I say EVGA is because IMO, they have the best RMA and warranties. Another brand to consider is THIS one. Gigabyte have excellent RMA and have UK RMA (as do MSI) and the cooler is the quietest on the market IIRC. MSI have the coolest coolers, Gigabyte the quietest and Asus the biggest

The advantage of the 560Ti is that you get an SSD aswell and once you have an SSD, you an't go back to a normal HDD

The 560Ti has the potential to equal an OC'd 6950 but will nearly certainly come very close to one.

To sum up, 560Ti and SSD get my vote - hope I helped

harmony · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:47

If you are aware of vram usage maybe take a look into this.

6950 2GB is best for CrossfireX as it has the vram to do it.
GTX570 doesn't have much vram, and furthermore your PSU may not be good enough to handle a pair.
560 Ti 1GB is a bad option for SLI as it will be bottlenecked by vram.

SSD is also a nice option to have - considering getting a 560 Ti for now and sell it for upgrade to the 28nm cards in a couple of months.

Bwaaa · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:49

Well thanks for that, very helpful. Leaning towards the Gigabyte 560Ti right now, a quiet card is pretty important as the tower is about a foot away from my head. Though a few reviews are saying that the stock OC is unstable, pretty sure I could remedy that myself. Looks great with this weeks price drop though so I think i'll be picking that one up, thanks a lot

Cleeecooo · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:50

harmony said:
If you are aware of vram usage maybe take a look into this.

6950 2GB is best for CrossfireX as it has the vram to do it. Whilst true, the 570 also has the VRAM needed
GTX570 doesn't have much vram, and furthermore your PSU may not be good enough to handle a pair. 1.3 GB is more than enough for 1080p
560 Ti 1GB is a bad option for SLI as it will be bottlenecked by vram. 1GB is currently enough for 1080p. not as good for long term though

SSD is also a nice option to have - considering getting a 560 Ti for now and sell it for upgrade to the 28nm cards in a couple of months.

My responses in red

Bwaaa · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:50

Yea it'll be a while before I can Crossfire/SLI so I may just upgrade to a new single card when the time comes anyway.

Cleeecooo · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:51

Bwaaa said:
Well thanks for that, very helpful. Leaning towards the Gigabyte 560Ti right now, a quiet card is pretty important as the tower is about a foot away from my head. Though a few reviews are saying that the stock OC is unstable, pretty sure I could remedy that myself. Looks great with this weeks price drop though so I think i'll be picking that one up, thanks a lot

no problem

The MSI is also very quiet, but apparently over 60% fan it's quite loud.

EVGA do have the best CS though

Cleeecooo · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:52

Bwaaa said:
Yea it'll be a while before I can Crossfire/SLI so I may just upgrade to a new single card when the time comes anyway.

new gen of cards are supposedly de in a few months. May be worth waiting. The 560Ti is a nice stop-gap card until then though

Randomface74 · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:52

Your Crossfire requirement on that PSU is unrealistic.

Go with a single 570

Cleeecooo · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:54

billysielu said:
Your Crossfire requirement on that PSU is unrealistic.

Go with a single 570

could do 560Ti SLI if it's a good 650w (Corsair)

Randomface74 · 31 Jul 2011 at 17:57

Yeah but I wouldn't trust it with BF3 on high.

harmony · 31 Jul 2011 at 18:05

Cleeecooo said:
My responses in red

Then allow me to quote the lag spikes in Metro 2033 again and again...

You think Metro 2033 too extreme as an example? Funny enough, today I have just finished another game made in China. Though it's in DX9 using the Gamebryo engine (same as FNV and Oblivion), I saw lots of complains about poor optimizations, and I've discovered this at 1920 res:

Still insists? Then do the following 2 things:

1) Phone Jen-Hsun Huang and tell him to use 1GB vram for Kepler flagship cards, because you think it is a waste for 1080p to use more than 1GB;
2) Prove that you will buy 1GB 28nm cards in the future (if there are any).

Bwaaa · 31 Jul 2011 at 18:16

billysielu said:
Your Crossfire requirement on that PSU is unrealistic.

Go with a single 570

650W is more than enough for Crossfire 6950's according to Anandtech benchmarks under stress testing. Just wasnt sure about the nvidia cards.

Cleeecooo · 31 Jul 2011 at 18:23

billysielu said:
Yeah but I wouldn't trust it with BF3 on high.

Neither would I

harmony said:
Funny enough, today I have just finished another game made in China. Though it's in DX9 using the Gamebryo engine (same as FNV and Oblivion), I saw lots of complains about poor optimizations, and I've discovered this:

Still insists? Then do the following 2 things:

1) Phone Jen-Hsun Huang and tell him to use 1GB vram for Kepler flagship cards;
2) Prove that you will buy 1GB 28nm cards in the future (if there are any).

No fair! You can't use Metro/Crysis!!! I'm talking about most games

I never said that 1gb is enough for everything. I'm trying to make my point that 1GB is still enough to make nearly all games playable at a decent frame rate at 1080p currently. It will still be good for some time to come. I'm not saying at all that 1gb will always be enough but atleast until the next gen of consoles and games, it will be good enough at 1080p for playing any game at a playable frame rate (obviously depends on the card)

For the flagship cards, you pay the price tag because you will obviously be using higher reses or want the best performance and that is when 1gb isn't enough. I have never claimed that it as enough for metro at 2560x1600 over 3 screens.

I will not buy 1GB 28nm cards. Why? because I am one of the people that pays for the flagships

I was going to buy a 1gb card and SLI two 560Ti's but didn't because there weren't any nickel plexi waterblocks available - that was the only reason

Let me repeat my point. 1GB is CURRENTLY enough to make all our CURRENT games playable at decent FPS eg 30+ FPS and that's when you don't have full AA and we are talking about 1080p. 1GB will be enough for some time but eventually you will have to keep turning down the settings. This is ok unless you want to keep your card for 10 yrs :eek:

harmony · 31 Jul 2011 at 18:28

Cleeecooo said:
Neither would I

No fair! You can't use Metro/Crysis!!! I'm talking about most games

I never said that 1gb is enough for everything. I'm trying to make my point that 1GB is still enough to make nearly all games playable at a decent frame rate at 1080p currently. It will still be good for some time to come. I'm not saying at all that 1gb will always be enough but atleast until the next gen of consoles and games, it will be good enough at 1080p for playing any game at a playable frame rate (obviously depends on the card)

For the flagship cards, you pay the price tag because you will obviously be using higher reses or want the best performance and that is when 1gb isn't enough. I have never claimed that it as enough for metro at 2560x1600 over 3 screens.

I will not buy 1GB 28nm cards. Why? because I am one of the people that pays for the flagships

I was going to buy a 1gb card and SLI two 560Ti's but didn't because there weren't any nickel plexi waterblocks available - that was the only reason

Let me repeat my point. 1GB is CURRENTLY enough to make all our CURRENT games playable at decent FPS eg 30+ FPS and that's when you don't have full AA and we are talking about 1080p. 1GB will be enough for some time but eventually you will have to keep turning down the settings. This is ok unless you want to keep your card for 10 yrs

You have probably forgotten how long did 8800 GS 384MB and 8800 GTS 320MB last. The same fate awaits for 560 Ti 1GB today.

If you read my post - I posted a game using the same engine as Fallout 3 and Oblivion - not Metro/Crysis - why do you still insist that there is no other game being able to benefit from more than 1GB?

Cleeecooo · 31 Jul 2011 at 18:32

harmony said:
You have probably forgotten how long did 8800 GS 384MB and 8800 GTS 320MB last. The same fate awaits for 560 Ti 1GB today.

sorry, that was before my time being interested in comps.
My 8800GTX 768mb is still running strong though

Mafia 2 is playable (quite well) as is FSX.