Is it a sensible move ?! I mean I'm not looking to spend money for a 25% increase in performance and I'm not computer savy either. Or perhaps I should be looking at another GPU ?! Not something expensive.
Is it a sensible move ?! I mean I'm not looking to spend money for a 25% increase in performance and I'm not computer savy either. Or perhaps I should be looking at another GPU ?! Not something expensive.
From what I can tell, the gtx 680 is going to destroy the gtx 295 in performance. You might bottleneck it if you have a weak cpu tho so might be best if you post your whole setup.
Specs: I5 3570K - GTX 670 - 8 gb ram
My youtube page: https://www.youtube.com/user/aldrashan
As far as the 680 is concerned, it totally destroys the 295. Performance wise it's roughly 5 times more powerful than a 295.
However, it depends which games you're playing. WoW is very CPU bound, if you have a weak CPU you may find there's no improvement after upgrading the GPU.
If you play other GPU heavy games you may see a huge performance boost. It all depends on your other components.
Edit: Having seen your post above - yes you should see good improvements with that CPU and system.
I probably wouldn't recommend the 680, you can get the 670 for $100 less and it performs nearly as well as the 680.
It would be a significant upgrade, but however, I don't think a 680 would be the best choice right now.
7970 is within the same price range as a 670 and largely, it performs as good as a 680.
Thanks for replies, all.
If you primarely play World of warcraft then a suggest the gtx, wow engine favors it.
8700K (5GHz) - Z370 M5 - Mugen 5 - 16GB Tridentz 3200MHz - GTX 1070Ti Strix - NZXT S340E - Dell 24' 1440p (165Hz)
I can recommend the GTX680 for performance, not price. It is true, the 7970 performs on par with it and is cheaper but if money is no concern and you play in 1920*1080 go for the 680. In all games I have tested these two against eachother, apart from Metro, the 680 wins every time. I know cause I have a 7970 in my media center.
Media center setup:
Silverstone Grandia GD06
Asus Maximus V Gene
intel core i7 3770K @4,6GHZ
Corsair dominator platinum 2x8GB @2133MHZ
ASUS Radeon HD 7970 3GB GDDR5 Matrix Platinum 1100Mhz
Corsair AX750
Corsair H80
Edit: listed the Sugo SG08 as case then realised that one serves as a travel PC these days...
Last edited by Lemmiwink; 2012-12-06 at 12:08 AM.
I'd recommend just going with an overclocked GTX 670. More bang for buck and only a fraction behind the 680 in performance. It's also a gigantic leap ahead of a 295.
The performance difference (looking from 3dmark vantage) is like 3.5 times. OC'ing a gtx680 would be like 4 times. Bear in mind due that a gtx 670 has a smaller pcb will just be a few dba's louder & run warmer.
An overclocked gtx 680 would only perform 10%? faster than a gtx 670 but gtx 680's are better to overclock though.
Just to be honest, get a 670. They tend to have less coilwhine than 680's..
That is a massive upgrade though I would go with the 7970 ghz edition or wait for the next ones coming out in a few months!
i7 3770k @ 4.3 GHz | Cool Master Evo Push/Pull | Asrock z77 Extreme 4 | GTX 680 4GB SLI | Samsung 840 Pro 128GB | WD Blue 1TB | CORSAIR Vengeance 16GB| Seasonic X850W | Thermaltake Element V Black Edition| CrossOver 27Q 2560x1440 S-IPS 27" Monitor | Razer DeathStalker |Naga MMO Champion |Windows 7 Ultimate 64 Bit
I was just deciding between an asus-overclocked 670 and a 7970. The 7970 is quicker, but I'm putting the 670 in a quiet case in a public part of my apartment--I picked the 670 because the quiet cooler on the card at heavy load was more important to me than the marginal performance gains.
At the price point I'd either recommend the GTX 670 or the 7970 GHz edition. As NWN posted above, the $100 is not worth the (on average) ~7% extra performance the GTX 680 offers.
The performance difference just depends on the amount of overclock though. Check this, a decent gtx 680 OC'ed will outperform a 670 with 20fps -> http://images.hardwarecanucks.com/im...680-TOP-91.jpg
Because the gtx 670 is a gtx 680 with 1 SMX unit disabled doesn't mean the 670 will overclock better. Basically a gtx 670 IS a gtx 680 with one SMX unit lasercutted (disabled) and nvidia ofcourse lowered their clock.
The gtx 670 has a smaller pcb which just simply means less space for more vrm phases & smaller pcb versions are not better, and especially the cooling on a gtx 670 is kinda poor compared to a gtx 680. The boost throttledown kicks in at 70° and you have to mod your bios to disable the throttledownstuff. I can be wrong, the boost could be for 670's around 80° instead of 70° for the 680 but doesn't matter :>
As far as I know from benchmarks, the gtx 680 top is running at full load 54° while the gtx 670 top is running at 70-71° full load.
I've seen hawks 660ti (zotac brand?) doing 1400MHz on stock volt >.<