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Poll: The Vega Review Thread.

What do we think about Vega?

  • What has AMD been doing for the past 1-2 years?

  • It consumes how many watts and is how loud!!!

  • It is not that bad.

  • Want to buy but put off by pricing and warranty.

  • I will be buying one for sure (I own a Freesync monitor so have little choice).

  • Better red than dead.

Results are only viewable after voting.
Informed,
ubersonic said:
Something I have noticed in this thread is that there are quite a few people determined to hate Vega, not just for it's flaws and launch mistakes but simply because it's an AMD card which is kinda sad. However the fact remains it was a great choice at £450 and is still a pretty decent option at £550 for many people (which probably explains the cards selling /shock) but as most of those people had resigned themselves to hating it before it launched I guess they're blind to that.

However as there's so much negativity going on I figured I would explain why I chose to buy one based on reasoned analysis in the hope it may help any open minded individuals:

I made the decision a few weeks ago that I would be buying a new GPU on Monday to replace my 980ti because there was no way I was going to wait 8 months just to see what Volta brought to the dance. This meant my choices were (quite obviously) limited to cards better than the 980ti. So the list of contenders was the GTX1080, GTX1080ti, Titan XP, Vega 64 and Vega FE. The VFE got dumped almost immediately because it's essentially the same card as the V64 but with extra RAM that I don't need, simple job. Due to that I also dropped the TXP because even though it's slightly faster than a (reference) 1080ti, I again didn't need that much VRAM at that much extra cost. This narrowed it down to the GTX1080, GTX1080ti and V64.

Looking at it objectively, the leaked reviews showed the V64 trading blows in games with the 1080 and losing to the 1080ti, given the past history of AMD cards it was safe to expect that future drivers would extend a lead over the 1080 however expecting it to match the 1080ti would be wishful thinking. In non-gaming use the V64 appeared to trade blows with the 1080ti and sometimes the TXP while leaving the 1080 in the dust. At this point it was fairly even with all cards having plus and minus points (price wasn't yet known) so focusing on minus points for the V64 it was known it would use more electricity (and thus generate more heat) than either of the Geforce cards on my list, I calculated it out to be an additional £20-30 a year running cost. As my room is air conditioned (and also has a window if that breaks) a bit of extra heat wasn't important to me, and neither was 7p a day extra electric.

So I then switched to features, last time I bought a GPU I was playing a lot of Borderlands and Metro games so PhysX was important to me, today I am not so it's not that much of a concern (I know BL3 and a new Metro game are in development, but they haven't announced PhysX support and won't arrive before Volta anyway). So what other features are relevant then? well AMD has FreeSync and Nvidia has Gsync. My primary monitor supports neither but if I do upgrade it at some point there are significantly more FreeSync choices than Gsync (as with time FreeSync seems to be becoming a standard thing on high end monitors not just a feature), the fact this GPU choice may influence/limit a future monitor upgrade did make the Vega card more appealing (as it would result in the greater pool of monitors to choose from) however I didn't give it too much credit as I am not currently looking to upgrade my primary monitor on this PC.

So that only left price.

I knew from my comparisons that to a buyer in my position the 1080ti was a better card than the V64 which was a better card than the 1080, so the only remaining factor was price, then on Monday that dropped and (at launch) the reference V64 was the same price as a reference 1080, so that was the 1080 dead and I was down to two. With it now a two horse race between the 1080ti and V64 I had to ask if I felt like paying >40% more for a <40% gaming FPS increase that was guaranteed to drop over time, I wasnt so I bought the V64.



And there you have it, yes the V64 most definitely has it's flaws and it's issues, yes if you own a G-Sync monitor it's a terrible option, yes if you do nothing but play games it's no better than a GTX1080. But trying to pretend it's a terrible card and wasn't a great buy for many many users at £450 (and still is at £550 for many) is just disingenuous and makes you look silly.
Click to expand...

Balanced, even-handed, unbiased - don't you know this is a graphics card thread!? :)
Good post.
 
Rezident said:
Informed,


Balanced, even-handed, unbiased - don't you know this is a graphics card thread!? :)
Good post.
Click to expand...

Balanced? Unbiased? He's basically implying most people against Vega are AMD haters, which for me can't be further from the truth! Yet I think Vega64 is a complete shambles and failure.
 
Rezident said:
Balanced, even-handed, unbiased - don't you know this is a graphics card thread!? :)
Good post.
Click to expand...
Thanks, I've never really been one for over the top brand loyalty/bias, I just buy whatever best meets my needs for the best value, two years ago it was my 980ti, on Monday it was Vega, maybe next time it will be Volta/Navi.
 
spikerules said:
How do you mean? The performance and value are off compared to the competition... aren't there 1080's with lower power consumption and higher performance out there for £480?
Click to expand...
Sure now the markets flooded with AIB partner cards, and retailers do round robin short-term discounts to get attention on the price comparisons sites. Typical price is a chunk higher.

I would say that when looking at the cheaper models you are less likely to get a card with as strong a build and component quality as the reference V56/64. Not that that helps price/perf, but AIB parners do sell cards with stronger power delivery for a premium and by all accounts the ref V56/64 is very good.
 
I don't think the £450 Vega64 was that bad a deal,especially if you have a FreeSync monitor,and AMD does have a tendency to get decent improvements in performance over time - not an outstanding deal,but if my experience of a GTX1080 is anything to go by it should be a good upgrade over something like a R9 290/290X. OFC,I prefer the GTX1080 as I like my SFF rigs,so each to their own.
 
People are kind of forgetting that we had the MSRP from AMD ages ago.

$399 for Vega 56
$499 for Vega 64. (These sold out in minutes)
$599 for Vega 64 Pack with two free games
$599 for limited Silver Vega 64
$699 for Liquid Vega Pack.

AMD can only suggest a retail price, they can't enforce it.

We've spoken to AMD UK and they've told us they know nothing about any launch rebates, stating they're only able to provide a suggested etail price (SEP) to online shops and can't actually enforce any pricing at all
Click to expand...

The problem with the pricing is that they didn't have the Packs available in every country. It was an attempt to stop Miners getting their hands on cards, do they think that there are no miners in Europe?

And when they have new stock ready to go, are they going to stick with the packs? or are they going to make single cards available to buy? The pack pricing really screws up the UK price. And when you get gouging because of demand, it's even worse.
 
melmac said:
People are kind of forgetting that we had the MSRP from AMD ages ago.

$399 for Vega 56
$499 for Vega 64. (These sold out in minutes)
$599 for Vega 64 Pack with two free games
$599 for limited Silver Vega 64
$699 for Liquid Vega Pack.
Click to expand...

Only OCuk dispute this. I don't wish to speak for Gibbo, but he has been absolutely blunt and said the RRP is not what you have written above. We've asked if AMD can tell us, they've either forgot or are too embarrassed to admit they hoodwinked (lied) to the public.
 
pagepack said:
Only OCuk dispute this. I don't wish to speak for Gibbo, but he has been absolutely blunt and said the RRP is not what you have written above. We've asked if AMD can tell us, they've either forgot or are too embarrassed to admit they hoodwinked (lied) to the public.
Click to expand...

Not sure that's what he actually said. I read the $599 for air as being for the Vega 64 pack, as that's available (with the 2 free games, albeit there's nothing now about a $100 hardware discount).
 
melmac said:
People are kind of forgetting that we had the MSRP from AMD ages ago.

$399 for Vega 56
$499 for Vega 64. (These sold out in minutes)
$599 for Vega 64 Pack with two free games
$599 for limited Silver Vega 64
$699 for Liquid Vega Pack.
Click to expand...

Videocardz posted a week ago that the MSRP would rise from $499 to $599 for Vega 64, which was before the release date and all the current drama.

I'm not saying it is a good thing to do, but it was known about beforehand.
 
pagepack said:
Only OCuk dispute this. I don't wish to speak for Gibbo, but he has been absolutely blunt and said the RRP is not what you have written above. We've asked if AMD can tell us, they've either forgot or are too embarrassed to admit they hoodwinked (lied) to the public.
Click to expand...

Ocuk Dispute this, and AMD UK dispute that... It's going to be interesting to see if the truth will come out.
 
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