Should I get a 390 or wait 3 months for Polaris?

[kieran_read]

Basically as the title says, I'm currently using a 7790, and I'm more than happy to hold out for 3 months. (I've waited this long)

From what I've read AMD demoed yesterday Polaris 10 running Hitman at 60FPS which is higher than what a 390 can do. (Assuming it had the same settings)

I'm only playing at 1080p quite frankly it will be several years until I can afford a 4k monitor on the wage I'm living on in London so this level of card will be quite a bit future proofed, however as even the 390 can't play all games maxed out at a solid 60fps I'm wondering if I should just wait 3 months for Polaris 10.

What would you guys do?

A 970 is an option I guess too.

 

[Panos]

First of all, you should not compare GTX970 with R9 390. The R9 is miles better, because is has full DX12 support, and it will not run out of steam when a game demands more than 3.5GB VRAM. And is faster...

Now, what to get. It all depends. You cannot go wrong with the 390 but you cannot go wrong getting a Polaris 10.

 

[syks]

I would say if you can wait then wait,but, I'm in sort of the same position lol and I think I'm going to buy a 970 in a couple of months,with my setup it will be the max I can handle anyway and even then my cpu will hold back a 970 in some games,im interested in seeing the new cards that are due but I'm not going to jump on them straight away,i will be more than happy with a gtx 970 for a year or 2 at 1080p gaming until I will feel the need to jump on the pascal bandwagon

390 is a good card as well,if you prefer amd get one if you are not to bothered about rushing into a new card as soon as there released

 

[kieran_read]

Like I said I'm happy to wait, might do that, I guess even if Polaris flops (I doubt it will!) or isn't much different the 390 would drop in price and be even cheaper.

 

[syks]

yes I expect most cards will/should drop in price when the new cards hit

 

[mahius]

Colour me disappointed on the 970 hate, no reason to be mean. As I've always said, some games run better on AMD and others run better on Nvidia. I will admit, that the DX12 bencharks for Hitman are where AMD cards blow Nvidia out of the water, especially higher resolutions. However, DX12 in that game actually runs worse than DX11 (less framerate), so it's not yet fully optimised.

So if choosing between 970 or 390, it depends on the game and what OP wants in terms of noise/heat (970 is cooler/quieter with the right heatsink). FYI, I personally haven't noticed any performance issues during the one occasion hitting 4GB on my 970 (Space Engineers).

But if OP is asking whether or not to wait for Polaris, the answer is waiting is best right now. Even if one ends up buying the older card for whatever reason, it's more than likely that there's at least some price drop. Same thing happened when I bought my 970. I waited till 300 series launch day, saw 390 didn't perform as well in the games I'd play and OCUK dropped 970 prices that afternoon, thus I bought one.

Otherwise, I think OP may be in with a chance of getting a better card if polaris is priced right. The one demoed yesterday was on par with Fury X and I doubt they'd price it ~£500, considering the need to improve price-to-performance (otherwise it feels like nothing was gained from the new card release).

And if OP is concerned about hitting 1080p60 on a 390/970, that shouldn't be an issue. I run all my games 1080p60 just fine, with a few exceptions where the games are at DSR 1440p60. The 970 and 390 are currently the cards to get for being able to get that magic 1080p60. I hope OP wasn't judging things by Hitman DX12 benchmarks, because that's the odd one out.

 

[theMilitant]

The Polaris launch is too close to upgrade now in my opinion. I'd say it's worth waiting it out and hopefully getting a lot more bang for your buck.

 

[kieran_read]

And if OP is concerned about hitting 1080p60 on a 390/970, that shouldn't be an issue. I run all my games 1080p60 just fine, with a few exceptions where the games are at DSR 1440p60. The 970 and 390 are currently the cards to get for being able to get that magic 1080p60. I hope OP wasn't judging things by Hitman DX12 benchmarks, because that's the odd one out.

Not so much judging on the Hitman Benchmanks, more as though I will be running at a lower resolution than those tests so if the "mid range" (as Vega will be high end in 2017) can perform on par with the current high end that's the 390 I was thinking it maybe worth the wait as it's potentionally a sign of things to come, like others have said I'm on 1080p so even a 390 will blitz everything, I was thinking of trying to be just that little more future proofed.

 

[Perfect_Chaos]

If you will be getting an upper midrange card, and definitely know you won't be interested in the more expensive high end cards later on, then i would wait since they are probably only a few months away.

 

[pmc25]

Wait, or if you can find a good deal on a 390 or 290X go for it to tide you over.

970 isn't even an option now IMO, and hasn't been for a while at its pricing.

 

[kieran_read]

If you will be getting an upper midrange card, and definitely know you won't be interested in the more expensive high end cards later on, then i would wait since they are probably only a few months away.

I'll wait then.

I'm only playing at 1080p and I won't go to 4k for several years, and I guess these new mid range cards will be the new 1080p cards as the higher ones will be for 4k.