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New graphics card questions!

kaotikuk

kaotikuk

kaotikuk

Associate
Joined
5 Feb 2012
Posts
881
Hey, so im thinking of buying a new card!

At the moment im on a 290, with a 1080p 120hz monitor. Ive been thinking for ages whether to just get a 1440p monitor and keep the 290 but then i dont think id be happy with the performance? like the 290 probably wouldnt drive it well i guess. As after playing the division and not getting the performance i wanted i figure it would be a lot worse at 1440p!

So im thinking of just buying a top of the range card, and just keeping my current monitor as i suppose its still pretty good and at least il be able to max out games with good performance this way?

So not sure whether to get a 980ti, or just get a 980 then maybe another ssd for my games. Is a 980ti pure overkill for 1080p? but at least its more future proof if i decide to change monitor down the line?
 
Personally, if I had a card as good as the 290 I wouldn't be upgrading right now, when we're so close to potentially game-changing cards from both sides. A 980 isn't going to be a huge performance jump from a 290 at all, certainly not enough to justify the cost of one IMO, which pretty much leaves just the 980 Ti. I wouldn't say one of those is overkill for 1080p... in fact, it's the only card on the market which can run Rise of the Tomb Raider maxed out at a solid 60fps at 1080p.

Whether you want to make that kind of investment or not right now with things so up in the air is up to you of course. I'd just overclock the snot out of the 290 and wait myself, but others will disagree.
 
Games like The Witcher and the latest Tomb raider will only get about 60-80 fps at 1080p with ultra settings from a 980ti . As for overkill i dont think so but others will diagree and it will accomadate your move to 1440p if you decide in the future.

You can get a 390x for £300 on Overclockers if you dont wanna go for the 980ti thats what i would get.
 
^
The 290 isn't much slower than a 390X, it's basically a 390 with 4Gb instead of 8Gb.

In before 'get another cheap 290 and CrossFire'-more hassle than it's worth getting titles to run properly-release day profile support can be terrible especially on GW's which most AAA titles are these days.

980Ti is as likely being future proof as Kepler is to Maxwell-780Ti= to or<970=not very future proof when a £270 is = to or >£550 when it gets replaced, basically Nvidia call the shots on driver support with regard to future proofing and it's highly arguable whether they are 'nudging' you to upgrade or not.

980 isn't that much faster than your 290, couple of higher settings at most or ~15-20% higher fps on same settings.

Unless ~£500 is chump change, sit it out and wait for Pascal/Polaris is your best bet imho.
 
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You've got a good card and a good monitor. New DP 1.3 monitors and cards are due to be released later this year so if you can hold off for 6 months, you're better waiting.
 
Hmm ok makes sense. Thanks for the advice.

Do you think i should just buy a 1440p monitor for now instead then? it would probably be a freesync one so id be committing to AMD's future cards but ive always had AMD so no bother there. Can anyone whos gone from a 120hz monitor at 1080p to 144hz at 1440p tell me if its worth it? Ive read a lot on different sites with some saying they notice the difference and others not so not sure!!
 
120-144hz isn't a big jump, but in my case moving to a gsync monitor was quite an improvement over my previous 60hz screen. Freesync is pretty much the same as gsync.

Also, as others have said, sit tight with your current card. 980ti is a great card but uts a lot of money to shell out with new cards on the horizon.
 
I agree with what others have said about waiting it out for Polaris/Pascal, but if you're set on upgrading now, then I think you should get the 980ti. Whilst it's probably overkill for 1080p gaming, if your next upgrade is going to be a 1440p monitor then you'll end up making good use of the GPU grunt. You should probably decide from now though whether you want to be tied into Nvidia's or AMD's ecosystems though, as your GPU choice will impact your decision on whether you get a Freesync/Gsync monitor.
 
tommybhoy said:
I went 120hz monitor at 1080p to 144hz at 1440p and went back
Click to expand...

A good 120/144 hz 1080p panel at least allows you run that native when a titles overly demanding and use 1440 via vsr when it's not.

Personally I want to go IPS and maybe 21:9 so I will upgrade to that or 1440 next gen but this gen is lacking the grunt and dual card isn't worth it like you say.

Next gen hopefully.
 
It should be do-able in an ideal world, but with the vendors deciding IQ cost, we'll get some more high cost effects to take us back to similar fps where we are now.:(
 
I would not spend £500 right now for any card when the next gen pascal/Polaris are a few months away. The £500 gpu will drop to £300 or less if the new cards are faster by more than 30%.
 
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