• Competitor rules

    Please remember that any mention of competitors, hinting at competitors or offering to provide details of competitors will result in an account suspension. The full rules can be found under the 'Terms and Rules' link in the bottom right corner of your screen. Just don't mention competitors in any way, shape or form and you'll be OK.

Upgrading GPU - Opinions

danny86

danny86

danny86

Associate
Joined
10 Jan 2012
Posts
74
Hi guys

I currently have an old GTX 580 and even though it works fine for the games I play (Arma 3 etc) I now want to upgrade it.

I have mainly been looking at 2 cards

MSi 7990 - Can get hold of one fairly cheap. Still seems like a monster of a card for the price I can get one. I know about the power/heat etc but have just taken a liking to this card.

290X Lightning - Costs quite a bit more, newer tech so cooler/less power etc.

What are your opinions on this card. The 290x lightning seems to be still quite expensive.

I know the newer cards are almost out so might be worth waiting to see what cards come up for sale with people wanting to upgrade.

P.S I run 2 monitors at 1080p if that affects the decision.
 
I'm biased but for the money you can't beat a Sapphire Tri-X OC 290. I don't personally think the money is worth it for a 290X over a 290. Especially not a Lightning unless you're going to be benchmarking. Just for gaming there isn't much point getting one of them IMO. My 290 hasn't been without its issues but they're not issues specific to the card - they're more issues with the series of cards in general and some minor AMD niggles.

My 290 (which is a good clocking one) has beaten all but a handful of the 290Xs in the Heaven 4.0 thread so you can see the difference between a 290/290X is tiny. I think for the money get a 290 and then if the opportunity presents itself for another in future at a reasonable price then look to go CF.
 
I have heard good things about that Tri X 290.

For some reason I am just drawn to MSI and lightning cards haha

What is the rough price you can pick one of those up for now?
 
OCUK doing them for £260. :)

There's nothing wrong with getting a Lightning I just don't think the cost/benefit scenario weights up in favour of it over the Sapphire 290.
 
:D Just saw that thread appear after I asked.

I see there is a 290x version too. Ill keep them in mind and see what people think of the ones I posted too

thanks!
 
At 1080p gaming the 7990 is a bit of over kill IMO and I see a few people seem to have sound ( fan speed ) and heat issues with these cards and end up dropping voltages etc to cool them down a bit but the other thing you must consider is your PSU what do you have at the moment and just check that what you are looking to replace your current GPU with your PSU will power.

I your current card when idle uses around 150 watts and when under load 363 watts and if you moved to a Sapphire Tri-X OC 290 idle is 109 watts and under load 403 watts as an example.

However I do think a 290 will more than meet your gaming needs :)
 
My PSU is 1000W so should be fine whichever I decide to go for.

Yeah I know it is a bit overkill, but it is also cheaper haha so dont really need to worry about that.
 
It's two GPUs, each with 3GB. Same as buying two 3GB graphics cards and linking them together.

As normally each GPU draws a frame alternately, they each need to have all the info that one would need, so the most complicated picture you can draw in terms of memory use is limited to 3GB.

(OK, am oversimplifying a bit, but hopefully you get the idea)
 
Also it's worth remembering that crossfire don't always scale well with games (particularly Nvidia titles seem to have a tradition of poor support for both SLI and Crossfire).

I would think it's better to just get a 290. You always get TrueAudio feature, and possible better performance/compatibility with Mantle than 7000 series.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom