Questions for GPU experts

[hobib_ali]

Hi

Need to buy a new GPU.

So there are some questions for the guys who knows, plz and thank you

After having a quick look, it turns out that the Nvidia 780 has more Stream Processors than the 980! for example the 780 has 2304 Stream Processors, the 780ti has 2880 Stream Processors, but the 980 only has 2048, a reduction.

That looks like the 780ti is more powerful than the 980 right?

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Also a single 980 is quite expensive, seeing that you can nearly get 2
r9 290s, if i add in 100 quid, what would you do ?

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So the r9s have been out for like 18 months now right? is there any info on any new cards being released, I can wait a few months if it is worth it, as any new releases see's a reduction in price of the current latest cards i.e 980/r9 290

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So right now Ive got a Dell 27 inch on 2560x1440

I will sell that and then get a 4k monitor, but 1st I need to upgrade my GPU

Also this has caught my eye, its a MSI Radeon R9 290X Gaming Edition 8192MB for 330 quid.

But looking at the specs its very similar to the AMD Radeon R9 295 X2 8192MB Graphics Card

So the R9 290 8Gb is'nt far behind the R9 295 8Gb right?

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Last question

AMD Stream Processors on their cards are the same in strength as Nvdias Stream Processors right?

Thanks in advance for the advice and answers, Happy New Year guys.

 

[Klunt Bumskrint]

You can't compare stream processors over architectures e.g. Kepler vs Maxwell

So you cant really compare 780 to 980 or 290 that way. Also the 290 and 295x2 are very different, the 295x2 is 2 290x gpu's on 1 PCB

 

[Freddie1980]

Don't worry about stream processors go and just go and read the reviews and look at benchmarks.

I will point out that is I see your looking to get a 4k screen; 1440p is hard enough for a single GPU let alone 4K you really need to be looking at a SLI/Crossfire setup to run games decently with high settings so bear that in mind.

Given the discounts on AMD GPU's recently it's obvious that AMD has new GPU's coming out soon most likely towards the end of January however unless you really want the fastest and aren't worried about costs I would get 2x 290's and have done with it as they won't be getting much cheaper any time soon.

 

[ALXAndy]

780 and 780ti are 'full fat' Kepler. This means full fat memory pipeline and so on. The GTX 980 has a cut back memory bus.

But.

The 780 and 780ti only have 3gb vram, so any benefit gained by the fatter memory pipe are somewhat lost in translation, given 3gb is cutting it too fine for some games at 4k.

This means that for SLI 4k Titan Black still rules the roost. Well, at least until Nvidia offer a full fat Maxwell.

For 1440p I would personally get whatever is cheapest (so the 780) but any more and you're looking at SLI.

Shame they don't still sell the 6gb 780 really and even more of a shame it was never offered with a stock cooler.

 

[slick rick]

I would go for X-fire 290x 8gb if you want to game at 4k to be honest.
The 295x2 has 8 gig vram but only 4gb usable as it is a dual GPU card, I use mine to game at 4k 60hz and its OK in most situations but games like Watch dogs and Shadow of Mordor with ultra textures would benefit from the extra vram headroom and this will only get worse as time goes on I should think.

 

[ALXAndy]

I'm quite surprised at AMD, because they have seen the importance of VRAM when Nvidia balked at it.

AMD were doing 2gb cards back when Nvidia thought 796mb or there abouts was enough.

But 4gb just doesn't really cut it for 4k. It's literally just about enough, with the risk of one game coming out and making it irrelevant.

If you're going 4k then as suggested, either buy a set of 8gb cards or if you're Nvidia only then go with some Titans. Sure, the high price kinda sucks but at the end of then day it's better than seeing two GPU cores go to waste because they can't do what you want them to.

I was given two GTX 295s once. Well, one I got for free and the other I paid about £90 for. They were fantastic cards, and, even Quad SLI was fixable if you disabled throttling (they used to cut cores back but didn't enable again properly).

Then BF3 came out, and they were rendered (very pretty I may add, still a feat of engineering) rather fancy paper weights. Even at the very lowest setting I was getting texture streaming* and couldn't aim properly.

Texture Streaming is Nvidia's answer to when you run out of VRAM. It puts a paging file on your PC and uses the hard drive to make up for VRAM. Sadly the idea is woefully flawed, and when you start paging from the hard drive you get savage input lag, causing massive delays between the mouse and what's going on on screen.

Nvidia have really cut it fine on the 970 and 980, and they've done that to keep you coming back.

Which is why I bought Titans.

 

[hobib_ali]

this 4k stuff, to much bad feedback as 4k seems like its not ready yet, Then i might hold on to my dell 1440 27inch, or get a 32inch 1440 monitor, that way I can get 1 decent card to run it on,

there isnt any 4k games out, until gtaV PC.

So im looking at:

2 x sapphire r9 at 249 a pop or
1 x XFX r295 at 529 or this has caught my eye with a lot of interest

1 x Sapphire Radeon R9 290X 8192MB at 329 quid !! i just dont like the stock cooler,

what you guy think?


edit:

oh i see on google that the r9 390 is being released in the next 4 to 6 months? its a true 4k card ? this puts me off spending money right now when windows 10 dx12 is around the corner...

 

[kaku]

I don't think we'll see 4K at framerates comparable to what we're used to at the moment with 1080 or 1440p for a while, probably generation after.

390 are supposed to be fairly soon, less than 6 months I would guess.

 

[Mei]

lol I hope less than 3months for AMD's sake
the gossip on them is pretty thin tho
they talked about them for a good 2months before last time

doesn't make much sense them being so quiet!