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upgrade advice

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Joined
8 Dec 2006
Posts
746
Location
Luton
Hey guys,


Ok i simply cannot wait to upgrade anymore. I just have the bug now.

From 2x 5850s which would be the best upgrade for me?


Could you please list gpus from nvidia and amd. I game at 1080p.

P.S. i do not mind going xfire or sli.

max budget: £380

Rest of specs in signature.

Thanks
 
Well, at stock, probably no more than around 20%, but when overclocked you could see more like double that (minimum). It's not uncommon for an overclocked 7850 to surpass a gtx580, even reaching stock 7950 speeds. A set-up like this would net you the best price for performance, though if you were wanting a single card, something like a 7950 /70 or gtx670 would be the ones to look at, with the 7950 winning the value stakes there.
 
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Ok so it is down to either a 7970 or 670. I can get the 4gb model of the 670 for around £370. Is it worth it? I know high VRAM is only really needed for high resolution which i don't play on.
 
You could go for a 7950 and overclock and still have plenty of change. Something worth bearing mind.

No, the 4gb of vram is not needed in your case.
 
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You can get a 7950 as mentioned - looking at £220 for a basic one or about £260 for something with a custom cooler. Probably the best bang for buck.

GTX 670 has gotta be the MSI Power Edition for me atm. £320.
 
Can he use that in Borderlands 2, does it just replace PhysX?

I don't think so. nvidia physx is not open source and that's the way nvidia want it, nvidia work with some game titles to code nvidia Physx into the game, to make an exclusive nvidia feature.

OpenCL, what AMD use is open to everyone, so anyone can use it to encode some fancy Direct Compute effects, however AMD do also work with game developers to get it working well, there is nothing to stop anyone using OpenCL with or without AMD's knowledge (it's Open Source)

Personally i would like all this to be Open Source so you can get this with any tittle, but nvidia seem to have shunned OpenCL for whatever reason as they haven't bothered with it on the GTX 6## cards, it has it but it's absolute junk compared with it on AMD's, and they are refusing to make Physx Open Source, possible for Physx marketing reasons.

It may well turn out to be a bad decision for nvidia in the long run, AMD pushing OpenCL now, some big names are taking it up, for example Adobe Photoshop CS6 now has OpenCL hardware acceleration, nvidia CUBA is gone in that now.
 
Can he use that in Borderlands 2, does it just replace PhysX?

You can run physx off your cpu in borderlands 2 if you don't have nvidia but to run it on high off the cpu you would need at least a highly clocked i5 2500k.

Edit: Actually just heard from my friend with his i5 2500k and borderlands 2 too much for it on high.

Once you get further in to the game the i5 2500k is not powerfull enough to run high physx.
 
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I am still considering the options i have. Btw, do ocUk have a Christmas sale? If so, does it start before Christmas or after?
 
I don't think so. nvidia physx is not open source and that's the way nvidia want it, nvidia work with some game titles to code nvidia Physx into the game, to make an exclusive nvidia feature.

OpenCL, what AMD use is open to everyone, so anyone can use it to encode some fancy Direct Compute effects, however AMD do also work with game developers to get it working well, there is nothing to stop anyone using OpenCL with or without AMD's knowledge (it's Open Source)

Personally i would like all this to be Open Source so you can get this with any tittle, but nvidia seem to have shunned OpenCL for whatever reason as they haven't bothered with it on the GTX 6## cards, it has it but it's absolute junk compared with it on AMD's, and they are refusing to make Physx Open Source, possible for Physx marketing reasons.

It may well turn out to be a bad decision for nvidia in the long run, AMD pushing OpenCL now, some big names are taking it up, for example Adobe Photoshop CS6 now has OpenCL hardware acceleration, nvidia CUBA is gone in that now.

That sucks, just how they locked out surround to SLI.

You can run physx off your cpu in borderlands 2 if you don't have nvidia but to run it on high off the cpu you would need at least a highly clocked i5 2500k.

Edit: Actually just heard from my friend with his i5 2500k and borderlands 2 too much for it on high.

Once you get further in to the game the i5 2500k is not powerfull enough to run high physx.

I have a 3570K it is sounding like a good move to Nvidia for PhysX but I don't really care about Borderlands 2 so..

Also I vote 7970 too and is what I will buy eventually.
 
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