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Upgrading to a 680

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16 Nov 2011
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696
So now that the price of the 680 has gone down since the new cards are out, i was considering getting the http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-213-MS that is on offer for the week.

I wanted it to compliment my new 120hz monitor, and to also run games at max, i run a amd 6870 at the moment and it's starting to show its age a bit lately.

I run 8GB ram and a i7 2600 @ 3.4ghz, will i get any bottlenecks and what kind of framerate do i expect on most games at max on 1920x1080?

Many thanks.

-edit- I dont remember my exact PSU, but i know it's somewhere between 750 - 850
 
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I got one of them yesterday great as mine was @ £259.99 deal :D

What games you play if I have them I see what FPS I get if you like?
 
I got one of them yesterday great as mine was @ £259.99 deal :D

What games you play if I have them I see what FPS I get if you like?

Nice pickup for the price!

I dont run a lot of games regularly that are hugely demanding, only because i havent really had the chance to upgrade. Once i do i wanna get into playing BF3 online as i can only play a game online if i can hit 60fps + consistently and bf3 i struggle with. but i play Dota 2, SSF4:AE ATM, so not demanding.

When i do get my new card i plan to play through some demanding games (Well not demanding, but ones i struggled with a bit) Skyrim, BF3, Crysis, Hitman (Some are i stuggle with, some i just wanna max out) and pick up some more games!
 
When you say MAX , do you mean with MSAAx8 and ultra details ? If so then a few games will be well under the 120 fps target your monitor sets.
 
Well my 670 is consistantly over 60fps on bf3 at 4xmsaa and skyrim is the same, crysis 3 is a bit more demanding so it might dip below 60fps a few times, and hitman might do also.

As i say mines a 670 at 1150mhz core and 6800mhz memory so your 680 should be faster.
 
Well my 670 is consistantly over 60fps on bf3 at 4xmsaa and skyrim is the same, crysis 3 is a bit more demanding so it might dip below 60fps a few times, and hitman might do also.

As i say mines a 670 at 1150mhz core and 6800mhz memory so your 680 should be faster.

The reason i got a 120hz monitor was to combat screen tearing as at times it made me just feel so ill, now that i have it it's fantastic ust need a card to match up :) Thanks for the help!
 
Gah, noticed the ASus preorder is significantly more cheaper, and i'm not much of an overclocker, but i might aswell considering i paid the extra for this edition >_< didnt realise the asus would be so cheap.
 
I run 8GB ram and a i7 2600 @ 3.4ghz, will i get any bottlenecks and what kind of framerate do i expect on most games at max on 1920x1080?
Yes there would be some bottleneck. I use a a 120Hz monitor as well, and I can tell you that you should really aim to overclock your CPU as high as possible. This is because even if your graphic card is capable of 120fps, if you CPU is only managing to is only manage to push 70-100fps, the actual frame rate would still be that.

Take BF3 multiplayer for example...a GTX680 would deliver around min 64fps and average 77fps with max setting at 1920x1080 4xAA. If you are willing to trade graphic detail for performance, dropping down to high setting and 2xAA would probably bring to the the frame rate of the GTX680 up to 100fps+, but now you have a problem- despite the GTX680 is may be capable of 100fps+ on high setting and 2xAA, your stock clock i7 2600K would not be capable of keep up with the frame rate of that the GTX680 is capable at this settings, and you would see GPU usage not at max because of this. So basically to reduce the gap between the two frame rate, you need to overclock your CPU.

With a 120Hz panel, I'd rather play with minimum 90fps at High setting than the minimum 64fps on max setting. That's how I feel, but I'm not sure if you feel the same.
 
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Yes there would be some bottleneck. I use a a 120Hz monitor as well, and I can tell you that you should really aim to overclock your CPU as high as possible. This is because even if your graphic card is capable of 120fps, if you CPU is only managing to is only manage to push 70-100fps, the actual frame rate would still be that.

Take BF3 multiplayer for example...a GTX680 would deliver around min 65fps and average 77fps with max setting at 1920x1080 4xAA. If you are willing to trade graphic detail for performance, dropping down to high setting and 2xAA would probably bring to the the frame rate of the GTX680 up to 100fps+, but now you have a problem- despite the GTX680 is may be capable of 100fps+ on high setting and 2xAA, your stock clock i7 2600K would not be capable of keep up with the frame rate of that the GTX680 is capable at this settings, and you would see GPU usage not at max because of this. So basically to reduce the gap between the two frame rate, you need to overclock your CPU.

With a 120Hz panel, I'd rather play with much higher frame rate at High setting than the lower 65-80fps range on max setting. That's how I feel, but I'm not sure if you feel the same.

I'm not sure mine is a K edition, i think mine is the one that cant be overclocked? I really dont have a great cpu fan aswell sometimes it gets loud during hot days, always has, runs really fast and doesnt get too hot though. My pc isnt amazingly well ventilated but its fairly good.
 
I'm not sure mine is a K edition, i think mine is the one that cant be overclocked? I really dont have a great cpu fan aswell sometimes it gets loud during hot days, always has, runs really fast and doesnt get too hot though. My pc isnt amazingly well ventilated but its fairly good.
Well, if it is a non-K edition 2600 and a non Z chipset board you got, then you are right you won't be able to overclock. The best you could do is make sure the turbo boost is enabled, so it would at least bring your CPU clock to 3.80GHz.

BF3 Multiplayer can be quite hard on the CPU. It's not much of a problem for most people because they only need to push 60fps for their 60Hz panels...but for 120Hz panels, the target would become aiming at pushing twice the frame rate, so the CPU speed plays a huge part as well.
 
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Well, if it is a non-K edition 2600 and a non Z chipset board you got, then you are right you won't be able to overclock. The best you could do is make sure the turbo boost is enabled, so it would at least bring your CPU clock to 3.80GHz.

Hold up i'll get you my rig.
Wondering if it's too late to cancel the power edition order in favour of the cheaper asus one for 259..
 
Dont worry, I set my bf3 to HIGH settings from Ultra and the fps shoot up to around 90 - 140 with my 3570k cpu at 3.8ghz which is around the same performance as your 2600 @ 3.8ghz.

High and ultra look the same to me except the shadows look a bit different.
 
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