Question about 880 and 256 bit bus....

[oldestgregg]

So I fancy upgrading when these cards hit the stores but Im a bit weary of the small bus size. Has it been confirmed they will only have a 256 bit bus or could it be 512? My main concern is, will it hinder me at 1400p at all? I wont be going 4k until IPS panels are affordable so by then the 980 will no doubt be around but with even the new cod game wanting 4gb of VRAM Im keen to upgrade from 780s.

Side note- COD wants a 760 with 4gb of vram for rec specs Talk about poor optimization but it seems its the norm now for devs to just require stupid specs for very little reason other than they cant be bothered to optimize

 

[TonyTurbo78]

no noting has been confirmed yet regarding any accurate specs. My guessing it 256bit bus will be fine for 1440, but if 4k is in your thoughts further down the line, maybe wise to hang fire a while. I know you said you're not interested in 4k yet, but it's all about future proofing and saving money where possible.

Just wait and see what comes in the way of news, should only be a few weeks away now until we hear the full story on what's what

 

[Rusty0611]

Depends on the speed of the memory really. If it's similar to this time round then it will start to impact performance at 1440 over say a similar speed 384/512 bit bus

 

[oldestgregg]

Depends on the speed of the memory really. If it's similar to this time round then it will start to impact performance at 1440 over say a similar speed 384/512 bit bus

I'm not sure I can convey why I mean rusty....... say its 30 per cent faster than a 780 and running at the same speeds, how would the bus limit it in any way? Apologies if that seems stupid or nonsensical!

Does that mean that although its 30 percent faster it might not be at 1400p?

As for future proofing I will buy the 980 so I'm in it for the now and for 1400p as until I can afford an IPS 4k panel I won't be switching from my trusty dell 1400p

 

[Disco_P]

I would take cod's recommended requirements with a pinch of salt. Ghosts recommended a 780 and I severly doubt that that was true.

 

[Marine-RX179]

I'm not sure I can convey why I mean rusty....... say its 30 per cent faster than a 780 and running at the same speeds, how would the bus limit it in any way? Apologies if that seems stupid or nonsensical!

Does that mean that although its 30 percent faster it might not be at 1400p?

As for future proofing I will buy the 980 so I'm in it for the now and for 1400p as until I can afford an IPS 4k panel I won't be switching from my trusty dell 1400p

While the bus size might have some impact, I guess it would probably be more down to the memory bandwidth than the bus size itself.

If you look at the Sleeping Dogs benchmark thread for example, the GK104 cards (GTX670/GTX680 etc) suffer a greater performance hit than cards with higher memory bandwidth due to their larger bus size (i.e. 79xx, GTX780, 290 etc) because for the extreme AA settings it uses SuperSampling (which is render at high resolution and then scale back down).

 

[DarrenM343]

I know you said you're not interested in 4k yet, but it's all about future proofing and saving money where possible.

I'm not sure it's possible to future proof unless you just buy the best you can afford which will last that little longer before an upgrade is required.
I'm not even sure the 8** cards or AMD equiv cards will even be that good for 4k res. I'd rather wait until I upgrade to 4k before buying card(s) for it - they're likely to be better performing at that res buy then.

 

[Kaapstad]

I'm not sure it's possible to future proof unless you just buy the best you can afford which will last that little longer before an upgrade is required.
I'm not even sure the 8** cards or AMD equiv cards will even be that good for 4k res. I'd rather wait until I upgrade to 4k before buying card(s) for it - they're likely to be better performing at that res buy then.

Anyone thinking about future proofing at the moment is wasting their time. Unless they can get their hands on a genuine DX12 card (not seen any yet) what ever they buy is going to be obsolete in about 12 months time.

 

[Marine-RX179]

I'm not sure it's possible to future proof unless you just buy the best you can afford which will last that little longer before an upgrade is required.
I'm not even sure the 8** cards or AMD equiv cards will even be that good for 4k res. I'd rather wait until I upgrade to 4k before buying card(s) for it - they're likely to be better performing at that res buy then.

Yea. I honestly think now might not be the best time or still too soon to upgrade to 4K, unless you are prepared to drop at least around £850+ on graphic cards alone (And that's with two GTX780 6GB- which won't have enough GPU grunt to turning up the settings for the more demanding games).

When the actual "next gen" 20nm (or 16nm if they are deciding to skip 20nm) GPUs, then it may be a good time to upgrade to 4K.

 

[James J]

I wouldn't worry about the 256bit bus unless you are gaming at 4k. The 580 gtx used a 384bit bus then the 680 used the smaller 256 bit bus, yet was still faster. We already know maxwell is pretty damn quick due to the benchmark results from the 750 ti card versus anything else at a similar price point on the market. Due to that, I think it'll be a decent card for anything under 4k.

 

[Yaayuh!]

Wouldn't worry about the bus size unless wanting 4K performance. Even then, I wouldn't worry too much.
I'd advise just to wait for the card to be reviewed.

 

[oldestgregg]

I would take cod's recommended requirements with a pinch of salt. Ghosts recommended a 780 and I severly doubt that that was true.

Its an example really that more and more devs are lazy and do not optimize. Also a 760 for max settings isnt a stretch by any means. Ghosts also wanted 8gb of ram when release which it used all of until it was optimized

 

[Silent_Scone]

Wait for benchmarks

 

[Marine-RX179]

I wouldn't worry about the 256bit bus unless you are gaming at 4k. The 580 gtx used a 384bit bus then the 680 used the smaller 256 bit bus, yet was still faster. We already know maxwell is pretty damn quick due to the benchmark results from the 750 ti card versus anything else at a similar price point on the market. Due to that, I think it'll be a decent card for anything under 4k.

But the situation is not the same as last time- the transition of GTX580 to GTX670/680 gone from 40nm to 28nm, and the GTX670 retained the same memory bandwidth as the GTX580 due to higher memory clock; the GTX780 to GTX880 would be a) remaining on 28nm and b) might have lower memory bandwidth and lower number of CUDA cores. The GTX880 NEED the point b) not to be true to offer any meaningful performance.

 

[James J]

But the situation is not the same as last time- the transition of GTX580 to GTX670/680 gone from 40nm to 28nm, and the GTX670 retained the same memory bandwidth as the GTX580 due to higher memory clock; the GTX780 to GTX880 would be a) remaining on 28nm and b) might have lower memory bandwidth and lower number of CUDA cores. The GTX880 NEED the point b) not to be true to offer any meaningful performance.

I didn't state that there was a fabrication difference though. Maxwell is far more efficient than anything on the market today and using the 750 ti performance per watt as a guide, its not exactly going to be slow! Nvidia wouldn't release a new card that is barely an upgrade over the current stuff, especially when its in the next gen of cards branding, as they'd just open the door to AMD to release a monster of a card and plow their market share into the floor.

 

[Rusty0611]

I'm not sure I can convey why I mean rusty....... say its 30 per cent faster than a 780 and running at the same speeds, how would the bus limit it in any way? Apologies if that seems stupid or nonsensical!

Does that mean that although its 30 percent faster it might not be at 1400p?

As for future proofing I will buy the 980 so I'm in it for the now and for 1400p as until I can afford an IPS 4k panel I won't be switching from my trusty dell 1400p

It would just mean (in that scenario) that it wouldn't be 30% faster at a higher resolution.

The speed and width combine to give the bandwidth - it's that what's important really not the bus width in isolation. Don't worry about the specs. Just have a look how it performs at 1440 once released. That'll tell you what you need to know.

 

[Silent_Scone]

It would just mean (in that scenario) that it wouldn't be 30% faster at a higher resolution.

The speed and width combine to give the bandwidth - it's that what's important really not the bus width in isolation. Don't worry about the specs. Just have a look how it performs at 1440 once released. That'll tell you what you need to know.

It will be within 10% faster than a 780Ti as a minimum. Nvidia aren't stupid.

But bandwidth, even if it were 2Ghz out of the box that still only equates to 256gb/s.

 

[oldestgregg]

It would just mean (in that scenario) that it wouldn't be 30% faster at a higher resolution.

The speed and width combine to give the bandwidth - it's that what's important really not the bus width in isolation. Don't worry about the specs. Just have a look how it performs at 1440 once released. That'll tell you what you need to know.

Thanks Rusty my man,sounds right to this layman

I sold a 780 so Im down to 2 now and ive just been offered 270 for one. As most of the games I wanted to play have been pushed back to next year it just feels like the power I have is wasted and by the time its not they will be less valuable. Add to the fact I own all 3 of the new consoles with less time to play them so I want to keep to a single card as I just want to plug and play. I like to play games as they released and the last few big releases have been rubbish using dual cards (titanfall,splintercell,watchdogs and COD from memory) so Ive ended up playing on one card anyways as I cant wait for the sli fix down the road.

I know it wont be the power of 780 SLI but I dont mind knocking things down slightly if it runs nice and smooth and I dont have to faff most of the night when I sit down to game.

 

[Tonester0011]

I'm not sure I can convey why I mean rusty....... say its 30 per cent faster than a 780 and running at the same speeds, how would the bus limit it in any way? Apologies if that seems stupid or nonsensical!

Does that mean that although its 30 percent faster it might not be at 1400p?

As for future proofing I will buy the 980 so I'm in it for the now and for 1400p as until I can afford an IPS 4k panel I won't be switching from my trusty dell 1400p

The bus size limits the bandwidth, as with the 680. It performed better than the 7970 @1080, but when the resolution increased the gap changed so the 7970 was a better card.

Back when Greg was on 3x1080 and 2x680s, he done his performance charts. I matched his benchmarks but with my CF7970s. Single screen he was beating my scores, at 3 screens i demolished.

Pretty sure i remember Rusty doing the same when he switched from SLI680s to CF7950s?? Showed the same gains.

 

[Resa69]

Nobody is sure that it will be on a 256 bit bus, if it is then id much rather go for a r9 290