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Should I get a 7970?

Trojan Horse

Trojan Horse

Trojan Horse

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27 Jul 2012
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I currently have a Phenom II X4 965 BE @ 3.9GHZ. 500w OCZ PSU, am3+ mobo, and 8gb corsair vengeance ram.

My graphics card is a 6950 and I want to know if I should upgrade to the 7970 firstly

I will be upgrading to the FX 8350 Pile Driver or w.e in the near future along with another monitor (2x 1920x1080)

will there be any bottlenecks or anything?

I have a 3tb seagate barrucada and a 128gb SSD so my system is really quite adequete for my needs of gaming and photoshop, a little video editing and recoding. is the improvements in my new cpu worthwile?
 
so my system is really quite adequete for my needs of gaming and photoshop
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Answered it yourself there really. If you are happy with how it runs then I would leave the GPU until you have upgraded the rest of the system and then re-assess.
 
Aye but my question is will it be good enough or too much for 2x 1920x1080 monitors. I might be gaming on BOTH I might instead just use second one to view maps and useful things e.g if i use 2 monitors will the second one tax the gpu just because it is connected?
 
A 7970 is enough to max nearly every game on a single screen, and mine was quite happy running most games at decent settings on 3 screens (you usually have to knock AA back, but most other settings can stay at top - Crysis 3,Tomb Raider, etc aside). Which games are you planning on playing on 2 screens as most don't work too well as the centre of your view is actually a bezel?

A second screen will require some GPU power and VRAM to run, but if you're not running a game on the second screen then it's going to be too little to measure on any modern GPU. Think of adding a child into the passenger seat of your Ferrari - technically the car will be slower due to the extra weight, but it's never going to be enough to actually notice.

Edit - that said, if your 6950 fulfils your needs, I'm with MOOGLEY. Hang fire and your money will get a better card in 12/18 months when never games are starting to tax your current card.
 
first cpu will bottleneck that card quite a bit

second youll probably want a better psu.

7970 is twice as fast as your current card.
 
Thanks Stu.

Yeah I realize your point on two monitors which is probably why I won't be gaming on the 2nd one. I'm going to upgrade the rest slowly, but do you really believe I need a better PSU Dg?

I've done a little research on PSUs prior to buying them and 500w is really a lot even though some gamers are obsessed on getting 1k PSUs... I'll never reach 100% usage on GPU and CPU.. ever?

Let's say I get 200w from the phenom II x4 965 because its at 3.9ghz, and 250w from the 7970 and 50w from my hard drives (3, no optical drive) I'll still be under 500w? I own a good PSU so It should deliver properly.

Would a new FX 8350 be a huge improvement? I want to upgrade my CPU and then... just forget about it, you know..

Some games my 6950 does not too do well in, for example in dips quite a lot in intense firefights on BF3. I can't seem to get the 70+FPS everyone is talking about, but will that be just because of the maps I play? What maps are easiest for the cards? I get 60+ on Metro.
 
If you want to get a new CPU and forget about it, I'd wait for SR or go socket 1150.

FX8350 will be a decent upgrade, but an FX8350 still bottlenecks the 7970 in loads of games.

Phenom II will be a huge bottleneck though.

I'd rather not pussy foot around the subject of bottlenecks.
If you want something "that'll do" you wouldn't be looking at a 7970, which is why I find the "it'll do" logic a fallacy.

PSU is fine though.
 
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Yeah thought the PSU was fine.. people get over hyped and believe you need a 1k PSU for any setup... not true.

I'm not used to either your dormanstwon vocabulary or the OCUK terminology you used, so your going to have to simplify what you mean when you say that "it'll do" is a fallacy.. and why not explain the subject of bottlenecks? It should be important shouldn't it?

I want to stick with AM3+ though... I know it's silly but I just want to have an all AMD system, I know you can mixmatch and it offers no real advantage to just having AMD components.. but I'm just strange that way. Hopefully the SR stays AM3+ and doesn't stray onto the new FM3 chips or w.e they're called.

If I upgrade to the FX8350 or the SR what improvements would I actually notice? I don't care for benchmarks and only real world seconds.. otherwise I get paranoid with benchmarks and numbers lol.

Thanks for your intake, Marini.
 
The FX8350 in a fair few games will limit the performance to say, 90% of the 7970's potential (Some lower)

Why would you buy a 7970 if you're going to limit it when you could save money getting a 7950 for example?

A lot of people use "You won't see the difference with the bottleneck" which is a fallacy, as then why buy the card?
 
Thanks for that, it's really helped clear my mind.. I can save, quite easy £80 now and feel great about it!

Is there any specific brand or model of the 7950 which would be best? Any on sale on OcUK and such for a good one? I'm particularly looking for one quieter than the rest, probably wont overclock because like you say, I won't see the difference.

What is the performance difference between those cards, and I've heard many times you can overclock the 7950 to reach and even beat the 7970, is this actually possible, EASILY? Like for example, someone such as myself could actually do without ridiculous watercooling setups? If so I'll be looking at purchasing some decent silent outtake fans purely to help the overclocks.. :)
 
Save your money and get an 8320 and overclock it - the 8350 isn't really worth the extra unless you refuse to overclock.

The 7970 is a great deal at the moment, but I'd consider 2x7950s if you're going to run on two screens. If you get the cheaper one it's currently £360 for the two. If that's too much then a 7970 overclocked will be better given the higher resolution.

One question though - you said you're upgrading to the 8350, but are you sure your board can take it?
 
This card looks much better.. I know I'll never see it ever again, but it should be better cooling (2 fans) and ... looks better? haha http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-190-MS

Don't want to dip into Nvidias range, can't take advantage of free 3D!

The graphics card will couple well with my MSI 990XA-GD55 mobo (I think my board will be able to take it teppic, it is AM3+, or do you mean 'take it' as in overclocking power or something?)

I'm taking a look and well I can only say god bless OcUK and AMD? I get to choose 3 free games with every 7950 courtesy of AMD, and get 3 games from OcUK? Am I correct in saying this?

Free Games 1 -http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=XX-002-AM&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=1673
More Free Games - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=XX-007-AM&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=1673

I do receive them on a card or something so I can sell them and just make my money back, right?

Something I don't know about... are MSI's graphics card warranty decent? As long as they offer a no quibble replacement or anything, preferably an advance replacement would the best option if they had it.
 
Not sure about the warranty or games voucher questions - best to check in the CS forum.

The 7950 Twin Frozr is the better card, just obviously a bit more expensive.

Your board should take an 8320/8350, but I don't think you'll be able to overclock it unfortunately.
 
teppic said:
Not sure about the warranty or games voucher questions - best to check in the CS forum.

The 7950 Twin Frozr is the better card, just obviously a bit more expensive.

Your board should take an 8320/8350, but I don't think you'll be able to overclock it unfortunately.
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Whaat!

I haven't actually bought the board yet, it's due on the 30th. Won't I be able to get 4.5-4.2Ghz on the FX 8320? Nothing extreme with my Hyper 212 Evo.

What motherboard should I purchase for under £100 to get those speeds, or a better cpu cooler/more fans?
 
Thanks for the help,

These are my mobo needs: I have 3 HDDs (2 internal crap seagate barrucadas at like 160gb per, and a 3tb seaguate expansion external, that i might rip out and turn internal) so Sata 3/6gb please..

don't know the difference between the 970/990fx chipsets? (or difference at all infact) so please care to explain.


what are the differences between these mobos:

best - Asus M5A97 EVO R2.0
cheapest - Asus M5A97 LE R2.0
medium opt - Asus M5A97 R2.0
 
970/990X/990FX differences are just basically Crossfire and SLI support, in increasing amount.

Generally 970 means minimal support, 990X usually gives 8x8x performance, and 990FX 16x16x performance.

The Asus EVO boards are the only cheaper options that are good enough for 8320/8350s if you want to overclock. The other two Asus boards have a poorer VRM design (the LE doesn't even have a heatsink!).

What to look out for is in the specs, on the EVO:

ASUS Digital Power Design :
- Industry leading Digital 6 +2 Phase Power Design

On the others:

ASUS Power Design :
- 4 +2 Phase Power Design
 
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Alright thanks,

I just realized how late It is and the fact I'm still up googling my eyes at computer hardware. And the fact you're still up helping me google my eyes at the RIGHT computer hardware! :)

I will probably go with the EVO, all those I/O connections are ... real nice ;)

Are there any nice features or disadvantages to this motherboard that I should be aware of? I'm going to take a look at the specs and things on the manufacturers website.
 
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