Upgrading from a 670 2GB

KarolW92 · 13 Jul 2016 at 07:32

Morning chaps,

Looking to be upgrading my trusty old steed rather soon.
The card handles BF1 alpha rather well for an old card but seeing as I want everything to be as glorious as possible for official release I'd like to upgrade without breaking the bank.
Should I wait for the 1060 or skip that and go straight into the 1070?
Do you think a 970 would be decent enough to handle it?

Thanks for your opinions.

Griffildur · 13 Jul 2016 at 07:44

depends what glorious means to you, what quality, what resolution. 970 especially new is still worth a pretty penny - 200-ish. You can get a second hand but it comes with all the risks associated and may die after a few weeks. Best idea is to get a new card and take advantage of the warranty.

980 TI has come down in price but it's a still a jump. Pretty soon 1060 will launch with 6 gb of memory, that could be an option. If you want one of the really good cards around then 1070 with 8 gb is quite powerful.

It all comes down to what else you have in terms of spec, 1070 is a big card so it needs to fit into your case first. It also depends what your budget is.

It may not be a bad idea to wait a little till 1060 is released.

KarolW92 · 13 Jul 2016 at 08:36

I'm gaming on 1920x1080. I don't see the need for a dual display.
Only recently got myself a G-Sync monitor and that itself felt like I've just upgraded my GPU. I would probably never opt to venture into the 2nd hand market.
Like you say I'd rather have the warranty. I've got a Cooler Master Haf X case so plenty of room, i7 2700k with 16GB RAM and 850w PSU.

Tommy_Here · 13 Jul 2016 at 09:09

I know people are suggesting 1070 over 980 Ti but honestly if you can't afford the extra £60-£80 then the Ti is a cracking deal at £349 heck I got mine for £359 and thought that was a steal still do

but yea 1080p a 980 Ti for the price will serve you very well!!!

KarolW92 · 13 Jul 2016 at 10:27

Even with ageing hardware? Surely the new tech long term would be more worth it?
I've noticed that the 1060 has a lower CUDA core count but Higher clock rates.
Obviously how it performs won't be known until it is released.

Tommy_Here · 13 Jul 2016 at 10:41

Pascal is Maxwell so drivers won't be effected as much as going from Kepler to Maxwell. Also the 1060 would be a good upgrade from the 670 though it's never going to match a 980 Ti

KarolW92 · 13 Jul 2016 at 10:50

Do you honestly think so? But the 1060 has like 500mhz clock speed on the 980Ti.
Am I missing something?

Tommy_Here · 13 Jul 2016 at 10:56

KarolW92 said:
Do you honestly think so? But the 1060 has like 500mhz clock speed on the 980Ti.
Am I missing something?

The 980 To has around 1600 more cuda cores if you buy a pre overclocked Ti it'll match a stock 1070 seeing as Pascal doesn't overclock as well as Pascal overclock both the Ti and 1070 to the max and youd be surprised with the 980 Ti winning in some cases both very evenly matched. Trust me no 1060 is going to match a 980 Ti I garuntee it

KarolW92 · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:07

Tommy_Here said:
The 980 To has around 1600 more cuda cores if you buy a pre overclocked Ti it'll match a stock 1070 seeing as Pascal doesn't overclock as well as Pascal overclock both the Ti and 1070 to the max and youd be surprised with the 980 Ti winning in some cases both very evenly matched. Trust me no 1060 is going to match a 980 Ti I garuntee it

Okay thanks for the input mate fella. Out of the 980Ti's which one would you recommend? I'm a slight Gigabyte fanboy but don't mind change, look of the card doesn't matter for me as I don't spend time staring at that.

Tommy_Here · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:16

you want the most bang for your buck really, the EVGA SC one for £349 is a fantastic deal or pay an extra £10 and get a backplate version again if this doesn't bother you save a tenner and buy a few pints with it instead

trust me you wont be disappointed, but I'd recommend overclocking yourself as well you should be able to get it to sit at 1400mhz and at least around +300mhz on the memory, that'll provide great performance that will beat a stock 1070 and will match it give or take once the 1070 is overclocked

if you're to ignore the cheap tacky 1070s you'd be spending at least £420 for a quality card so you're saving £70 and getting like for like performance

Tommy_Here · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:19

p.s I know it's only a synthetic benchmark but look at the unigine heaven benchmark those 980 Tis are beating out the 1070 if you want any quick videos in 1080p I can do one for you? list some games you'd like to see and I'd do a quick video for you

Tropicocity · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:20

Tommy_Here said:
Pascal is Maxwell so drivers won't be effected as much as going from Kepler to Maxwell. Also the 1060 would be a good upgrade from the 670 though it's never going to match a 980 Ti

I wouldn't say 'Pascal is Maxwell' really.. they've split the SM into two, doubled the amount of registers, shared memory, moved from a 28nm to a 16nm node and halved the transister count basically, and moved to GDDR5X.

Time will tell how well the drivers scale the 10xx series, but I won't deny that the 980ti when overclocked can match a 1070, and depending on the silicon lottery and what game you look at, can actually outperform it slightly, albeit at the expense of higher power draw and a soon to be EOL architecture.

Personally, at 1080p, a 980ti will play pretty much ANYTHING you can throw at it, with maxed settings (or at least the ones you notice most), and at current prices represent great value. However, I still think they need to bring the prices on them down closer to the £300 mark, but with the £/$ so destroyed and the demand on the 10xx series being wayyyyy higher than supply, prices will probably stay where they are for a little while, potentially as far as Black Friday :/

Tommy_Here · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:22

Tropicocity said:
I wouldn't say 'Pascal is Maxwell' really.. they've split the SM into two, doubled the amount of registers, shared memory, moved from a 28nm to a 16nm node and halved the transister count basically, and moved to GDDR5X.

Time will tell how well the drivers scale the 10xx series, but I won't deny that the 980ti when overclocked can match a 1070, and depending on the silicon lottery and what game you look at, can actually outperform it slightly, albeit at the expense of higher power draw and a soon to be EOL architecture.

Personally, at 1080p, a 980ti will play pretty much ANYTHING you can throw at it, with maxed settings (or at least the ones you notice most), and at current prices represent great value. However, I still think they need to bring the prices on them down closer to the £300 mark, but with the £/$ so destroyed and the demand on the 10xx series being wayyyyy higher than supply, prices will probably stay where they are for a little while, potentially as far as Black Friday :/

they're much more similar than maxwell and kepler however but like you say at current pricing it still is great value compared to the 10x series if I'm honest

Lokken86 · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:31

What is your maximum budget?

KarolW92 · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:37

Well I'm mainly a Battlefield gamer on the PC. I do stints on the console and PC depending how I feel (I know blasphemy).
Currently it seems like I will be doing the PC stint for some time now.
Just did a bit of digging around and I found the MSI 1070 for £429.99 *somewhere else*

Tommy_Here · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:42

KarolW92 said:
Well I'm mainly a Battlefield gamer on the PC. I do stints on the console and PC depending how I feel (I know blasphemy).
Currently it seems like I will be doing the PC stint for some time now.
Just did a bit of digging around and I found the MSI 1070 for £429.99 *somewhere else*

no doubt the 1070 is a fantastic card yes and it's lower power usage and 8gb Vram will be nice definitely, if you can strect your budget without thinking about it go for it, or if you would rather save that £80 get a card that yes uses more power to achieve the same performance, will run slightly hotter and 6gb Vram still plenty for 1080p then the sensible buy imo is the 980 Ti, I've just done a quick GTA V video for you at 1080p maxed out as high as it'll go including 8x MSAA uploading the vid now. Didn't realise how taxing the game was even at 1080p with aa cranked up since I play at 4k with it disabled

Tropicocity · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:43

Without naming where, there's a palit gamerock 1070 at £388 if you look about, that's worth the £30 over a 980ti in my opinion

Lokken86 · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:46

I would definitely get the 1070 over a 980ti if it was 30 quid in it.

KarolW92 · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:48

Tommy_Here said:
no doubt the 1070 is a fantastic card yes and it's lower power usage and 8gb Vram will be nice definitely, if you can strect your budget without thinking about it go for it, or if you would rather save that £80 get a card that yes uses more power to achieve the same performance, will run slightly hotter and 6gb Vram still plenty for 1080p then the sensible buy imo is the 980 Ti, I've just done a quick GTA V video for you at 1080p maxed out as high as it'll go including 8x MSAA uploading the vid now. Didn't realise how taxing the game was even at 1080p with aa cranked up since I play at 4k with it disabled

Wow Many thanks for the effort you didn't have to!
Do you think I could get away with a 850w PSU for the 980ti

Lokken86 · 13 Jul 2016 at 11:49

KarolW92 said:
Wow Many thanks for the effort you didn't have to!
Do you think I could get away with a 850w PSU for the 980ti

850w will be grand