• 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.

What should I do with my R9 280X, Upgrade or Crossfire?

toon_mad

toon_mad

toon_mad

Soldato
Joined
8 Jan 2009
Posts
4,819
Location
North East
Hi all :)

I bought my Sapphire R9 280X Toxic last year for £350 and with my i7-4770k it runs pretty good, most games can be set to almost ultra. By this I mean generally no to little AA, shadows and textures usually need dropping down so most games are not been run at ultra, but very high, and as I am finding more so lately games like GTA V, Project Cars and The Witcher 3 for example do struggle unless settings are turned down, all this on a 27" 1080p monitor.

So long story short I have been looking at the MSI GTX 970. From what I have read it is a much faster card then the one I currently have, but its spending another £300 which is not really a problem, however the annoying thing is how little apparently I could sell my Toxic for (around £120 :o)

What would you advise, pick a used Sapphire R9 280X Toxic and crossfire it with the one I have, or just bite the bullet and sell it at a loss and buy the MSI GTX 970?

With crossfire I have never done it and I keep reading issues regarding it such as micro-stutter, having to wait months for driver updates including the crossfire profiles and even then all games are not compatible? Then you have the added issue of more heat and power draw on top of which I have Corsair RM850 Gold PSU and I am unsure if that would be enough, Sapphire reccomend at least a 1000W PSU.

To be honest I have been using ATI since my last MSI GTX 460 and I want to go back to Nvidia, unless of course I am persuaded it is the wrong decision.

So what do you guys think, is it worth crossfiring another R9 280X Toxic, or sell it for what I can and go for the MSI GTX 970? As I have already bought The Witcher 3 I can sell the voucher code of the free one that comes with GTX 970 so that will bring the price down a little.

Cheers :)
 
If it were me, I'd hold off a few weeks and see what AMD's new lineup looks like before making a decision. Neither of those current options seem too appealing. I don't feel the 970 is a big enough upgrade to warrant selling what's still a decent card and shelling out another £150+, but the power/heat/driver issues Crossfire introduces are even more offputting.
 
I would sell it and grab either one of new AMD cards next month or a 980ti

I went from a Giga 280X>msi 970 (at 970/980 launch)the jump is decent,buts its not particularity massive either(at least till you OC the 970),its a minor upgrade IMO.I was lucky as i was able to flog my card for a good price to a friend and the upgrade ended up being extremely cheap(I wouldnt have bothered otherwise).For you selling now,the extra cash for the 970 is quite a lot.


It all comes down to longevity IMO,the 970 is good but your gonna run into the same dilemmas you face now in around a year or so with a 970.Spend a little more and get more life out your purchase.
 
Wilko_Dog said:
New amd cards due out next month or so I'd just wait a little longer if it was me
Click to expand...

In what respect? Wait and buy the new ATI cards (which I didnt even know about until I just looked down the forum and saw R9 380X/R9 390X series) or do you mean wait so the other Graphics card prices should generally become cheaper? :confused:
 
toon_mad said:
In what respect? Wait and buy the new ATI cards (which I didnt even know about until I just looked down the forum and saw R9 380X/R9 390X series) or do you mean wait so the other Graphics card prices should generally become cheaper? :confused:
Click to expand...
Either. If the new AMD cards turn out to be stunners, great, buy one of those. People also seem to be expecting the price of the 970/980 to come down a bit too with the release of the AMD cards and the 980 Ti in the near future, so you might be able to get one of those cheaper. It's just a bit of a bad time to be buying a new card right now, with new products from both companies set to shake things up in the next few weeks.
 
Ok, good advice thanks fellas :)

To be honest without starting any kind of negative discussions between ATI and Nvidia (I have used both) I keep reading and hearing about how Nvidia are able to offer better optimized drivers and that ATI are unable to compete on a equal par with them. So I am convinced my next card should be back with Nvidia after a few years with ATI. Maybe thats all conspiracy theory I don't know, but now that you all brought it to my attention how close around the corner the new ATI cards are I think it is probably best to wait.
 
FWIW when it comes to single GPU configs,the driver issue is pretty much nonexistent.

I have had far more trouble with Nvidia drivers than i ever had with AMD ones,but as always YMMV.
 
toon_mad said:
Ok, good advice thanks fellas :)

To be honest without starting any kind of negative discussions between ATI and Nvidia (I have used both) I keep reading and hearing about how Nvidia are able to offer better optimized drivers and that ATI are unable to compete on a equal par with them. So I am convinced my next card should be back with Nvidia after a few years with ATI. Maybe thats all conspiracy theory I don't know, but now that you all brought it to my attention how close around the corner the new ATI cards are I think it is probably best to wait.
Click to expand...

Only drivers you'll struggle with is xfire , and even then there's ways and means round it, I've used both amd and nvidia and never had a problem really that's been worth me going with one or the other ..

I also meant as people have said either or with waiting for new cards to arrive :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom