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Time for a much overdue gpu ugrade (Oh not another spec me thread)

davetherave2

davetherave2

davetherave2

Soldato
Joined
27 Mar 2003
Posts
2,710
So I have been plodding along with my system for many a year (just over 2 years for the main core of the system) and over that time have upgraded most of it to a fair standard. It's not bleeding edge by any stretch of the imagination.

My current rig is:

CPU: i7 5820K
MOBO: Gigabyte X99 SLI
RAM: 16 Gig (Quad DDR Team Elite 2400Mhz)
GPU: Radeon HD 7700 Series (I think it's a 7770 off the top of my head)
PSU: Coolermaster Real Power M1000 (Has been my work horse of a psu over the years)
O/S: Windows 10

So it has been some time since I really needed/required a gpu upgrade as I used the XBOX more than I do the PC for gaming these days and what gaming I did (StarCraft 2, Hearthstone, Civ 5) this worked fine for my needs. But occasionally I will get a non-responsive GPU event occur and then anything using video/gaming just dies and I have to force quit. Its random and I just think it maybe something funky happening in Windows 10 and this aging GPU (I have the same issue with an old 8800GTX)

So after playing the D2 Beta and my machine crying at the lack of lovely visuals and having to use the lowest possible settings just to get a an average 30fps for the most part I need to upgrade.

With the prices of GPU's at the moment the likes of the 1080+ range are just out there so was looking more at the 1060 range and just wondering if there really is the benefit of getting a 6gb card vs a 3gb card.

I also would like this card to perform well for streaming (as much as I like the ease of doing it from the XBOX the pc just gives me more options) so I need it to be fairly quite.

So what would be considered a decent investment at this moment in time or is the performance gain from the 1060 to 1070 really worth the extra cost (In some cases double the cost - so based on simple 5 year old logic I would expect double the performance) .

As much as I would love to be able to say "Which 1080 ti should I get?" I just can't justify that sort of price tag.


On a side note I'm not looking to Overclock this or anything I just want a straight replacement that will just work and make at least some of my games look a touch prettier.


Thanks for taking the time to help me out you beautiful people.
 
davetherave2 said:
With the prices of GPU's at the moment the likes of the 1080+ range are just out there so was looking more at the 1060 range and just wondering if there really is the benefit of getting a 6gb card vs a 3gb card.
Click to expand...

What resolution?

At 1080p, I'd go for a 6GB 1060. It would even play at 1440p with a bit of tweaking.

Beyond that, I'd just stump up for a 1080. The 1070 doesn't offer great bang-per-buck to my eyes.
 
I can't say that the 1060 3GB won't do what you're after, I've never used one, but I've been happy with the 6GB 1060 I have hooked up to the TV, doing 1080p gaming. Very capable card.
The 1070's are a little better in terms of being able to switch on just a few more epic effects levels in games without choking, but the prices on those have gone through the roof again in the last week or so.

--edit-- The 1060 6GB has got a small number of extra processing cores compared to the 3GB version IIRC, so it's not *just* a memory capacity thing, you are getting a slightly better processor too.
 
Last edited:
davetherave2 said:
So I have been plodding along with my system for many a year (just over 2 years for the main core of the system) and over that time have upgraded most of it to a fair standard. It's not bleeding edge by any stretch of the imagination.

My current rig is:

CPU: i7 5820K
MOBO: Gigabyte X99 SLI
RAM: 16 Gig (Quad DDR Team Elite 2400Mhz)
GPU: Radeon HD 7700 Series (I think it's a 7770 off the top of my head)
PSU: Coolermaster Real Power M1000 (Has been my work horse of a psu over the years)
O/S: Windows 10

So it has been some time since I really needed/required a gpu upgrade as I used the XBOX more than I do the PC for gaming these days and what gaming I did (StarCraft 2, Hearthstone, Civ 5) this worked fine for my needs. But occasionally I will get a non-responsive GPU event occur and then anything using video/gaming just dies and I have to force quit. Its random and I just think it maybe something funky happening in Windows 10 and this aging GPU (I have the same issue with an old 8800GTX)

So after playing the D2 Beta and my machine crying at the lack of lovely visuals and having to use the lowest possible settings just to get a an average 30fps for the most part I need to upgrade.

With the prices of GPU's at the moment the likes of the 1080+ range are just out there so was looking more at the 1060 range and just wondering if there really is the benefit of getting a 6gb card vs a 3gb card.

I also would like this card to perform well for streaming (as much as I like the ease of doing it from the XBOX the pc just gives me more options) so I need it to be fairly quite.

So what would be considered a decent investment at this moment in time or is the performance gain from the 1060 to 1070 really worth the extra cost (In some cases double the cost - so based on simple 5 year old logic I would expect double the performance) .

As much as I would love to be able to say "Which 1080 ti should I get?" I just can't justify that sort of price tag.


On a side note I'm not looking to Overclock this or anything I just want a straight replacement that will just work and make at least some of my games look a touch prettier.


Thanks for taking the time to help me out you beautiful people.
Click to expand...

What's the budget? Because that would depend if 980ti used is better option
 
davetherave2 said:
Ideally no more than £300. At the minute I am wondering if the OcUK reference 1060 https://www.overclockers.co.uk/ocuk...ddr5-pci-express-graphics-card-gx-21b-ok.html is probably the best value for money.
Click to expand...

I'd be curious to hear what you think of the card when you get it. I toyed with getting one of those but couldn't find anything good about them. I ended up going for what was the £299.99 Aorus card (it dropped £10 the same day I ordered) for the better cooling and potential oc room.
 
davetherave2 said:
1080p. I potentially will be looking for a 4K monitor at some point in the future but my 4K gaming experience will more than likely be with the Xbox One X rather than PC.
Click to expand...

4k on PC seems to be hit-n-miss to me at the moment. Amazed at how many people around here have actually "downgraded" back to 1440p, after having tried 4k. There was a great series of videos posted by Digital Foundry yesterday on their YT channel, running across 1080, 1440 and 4k. Even the mighty - and mightily expensive - 1080ti struggles to maintain 60 fps in certain games at certain times. 1440p seems to be the sweet spot until Volta next year.

Anyway, for the 1080p you quoted, I'd say get the 1060 6GB card. I run an MSI 970 at 1200p and it's great, so the 1060 at 1080p should be just fine.
 
davetherave2 said:
On a side note I'm not looking to Overclock this or anything I just want a straight replacement that will just work and make at least some of my games look a touch prettier.
Click to expand...
Panos said:
Non reference 980ti then and overclock it
Click to expand...

As I said I'm really not bothered about overclocking. I am happy with the stock options as I just don't have the time to do the kind of overclocking I used to do in days past.

Plus I would rather buy new rather than second hand. But at least I know the 980ti is an option.
 
davetherave2 said:
So I have been plodding along with my system for many a year (just over 2 years for the main core of the system) and over that time have upgraded most of it to a fair standard. It's not bleeding edge by any stretch of the imagination.
Click to expand...

It's not exactly old either, The only two upgrades I'd do if it was mine would be the gpu and faster ram.

I wouldn't go for a 3gb 1060 though,

I'd get at least 4 gb's but preferably 6 or 8, The 8gb Powercolor 580 Red Devil is priced well for today's market so I'd set my sights on that or a 6gb 1060, On the other foot you may be happy using the MM so have a look there, Unfortunately my 6gb 1060 has now gone (I put it on the MM yesterday) but you may be lucky if you wait a few days and make regular visits to check what's available on the Members Market. You might find a 980ti, 580, 480 or 1060 turns up, Just pop in frequently as they go quick.
 
Well I picked up the graphics card today for OCUK HQ and have got it fitted and everything just feels nicer.

Ran the Fire Strike Benchmark with the HD7770 and got just over 3K as a score. Put in the 1060 and the score is now 10853. So I can actually see what is happening in real time rather than it looking more like a flick book with pages progressively being dropped.

The noise from it isn't too noticeable but then again I think the PSU is probably the noisiest thing in my machine now.

All in all I have to say I am pleased with the initial results. So far everything seems to be running ok. So I guess I really need to test this out (Why isn't it the 24th October already ;p)

If there is anything specific you would like me to try and test it out with to see what it is like I will try it assuming I have it.


Now lets give a couple of games a run through and see how this performs under streaming as well.
 
Congratz, I think it would help if you can post your temperatures as we dont have much info on these cards or i havent seen much info about them. Might help convince few people to consider purchasing it.
 
Just to give you my 2p, I got my Aorus 1060/6gb yesterday and boy, what an upgrade over my previous card it is. I'd got it hoping to have FH3 at 60FPS and it stomps all over it, card is still cool and the fans on it are quiet under load as well. At least to my ears.

Cracking card for 1080p gaming and I'd definitely go for the 6gb over the 3gb as I have noticed things using over 4/5Gb in places. I'd get one as I read somewhere prices are supposed to rise again soon.
 
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