Thoughts about my GPU choice

Since I have a fairly large budget, but not an insane amount to work with: I'm thinking about getting a GTX 770 next year, followed by another 770 the year after, resulting in a duel 770 setup. I would love to hear your thoughts and tips about/for this, and if you think it's a good idea.

If you can, please don't start a flame war. It is not necessary.

 

meh.
amd is better.
sparks ignited etc

 

I am rocking AMD right now, but it just seems like a cock blocker. I run games at mediocre settings at mediocre FPS. Everytime I see a map/mod I really, REALLY want, AMD's like "Oh, you want it? Too bad, invisible walls filled with No textures". I want that to change.

 

If you already plan on getting 2 770's, my advice would be to save your money and get a 780, 780ti, or wait for the 800 series cards. A single card is always better than 2 cards.

 

Yeah, either go 780ti/290x or wait for next gen. While I loved my 770 anything that needed two of them would've ran better on a 780ti or 290x because VRAM.

 

Don't worry about dalek, just a hater of the master race for some reason

 

(imported from here)

 

Let's see, AMD driver issues across Linux galore, check. Nvidia driver issues on Linux, nope, OK they aren't open source but who gives a shit when they work. Also since that gif was made NVidia did donate test hardware, previously private/unavailable data sheets and extra schematics to one of the groups making an open source set of nvidis drivers resulting in nvidia being better documented than AMD, yep, totally worst to work with. And yet AMD still has a ton of issues on all platforms (for a start as shockwaffle mentioned, missing textures, pretty big fail there, much higher RMA rate too).

 

Well now, don't go nvidia fanboy. Sometimes I feel like the least biased person here.

 

What AMD card are you using? I've had no problems at all with my 270 and it runs most new games in max settings at 50-60 FPS, except for GTA IV and its horrible optimisation. And I still get 30+ FPS unless I use ICEnhancer.

If you have the money, then Nvidia is probably better though. Don't buy two 770s though, unless you're planning to play games in dual/triple display setup one is just fine. Dual 770s are overkill for a single 1920x1080 display. (Unless you want 60 FPS in all games all the time, which is stupid as you won't notice unless you open the FPS counter)

Basically, AMD is better for mid-end/budget builds as you can get a better card for the same price, but Nvidia is better for a high-end build because the only AMD card which can get up to the 780 Ti is the 295x2, which is more expensive and needs 500W just to work.

 

First step - don't consider brands.

Get the card that suits your lifestyle. Are you a casual gamer on a crappy monitor aiming for a quite case? Get a low end Nvidia, like the 750ti. Cheap, efficient and powerful enough to max out any game at 720p 60fps, lower settings and you can get 1080p 60fps. Do you want a multi use card and do you have a case that has adequate cooling and sound dampening? Get a Radeon R7 265. It will do a little more than the 750ti at a little more money and heat. Do you want the ultimate monster card? Get the 780 or 780ti. It will do high settings in games at 1440p at 60fps, and 4k at lower settings at 30fps.

Learn the differences between the two. AMDs run hotter and a little slower core, but Mantle is great and CrossFire is supported in more motherboards than SLI. Nvidias are pricier, but perform marginally better and CUDA and PhysX are useful.

 

A 265 is a bad idea. It's not any better than the 750 Ti, and for a bit more you get a 270, which is out of the budget PC range into the actual mid-end range.
And don't set 60 FPS as your goal, there's no visual difference between 30 and 60, and it's the same for recording too as YouTube only supports 30 FPS video.
So unless you're planning to capture videos and then add 2x slowmo, getting 60 FPS is only useful to rub it in people's faces.

And remember, always keep your card balanced with your CPU. Don't buy a 780 Ti unless you have a 4670/4770 to go with it.

 

*sigh* See, you can't generalize cards. Just 3 years ago most people would've said the opposite. I'm not saying it isn't true but you need to look more at the card/card basis. Looking for used? Go AMD for sure. Playing a lower resolution and around $250, go 770. Need higher resolutions for ~$400, go 290. You're right in saying that it depends on the usage scenario, but there are so many cards, budgets, and monitors that you really need to look at exactly what the person needs.

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And I was so happy for you and the rest of the rather reasonable post.
I can see the difference between 60 and 75. Where did you get 30 as a number?

 

Do you watch a YouTube video and say "wow, this looks awful"? No? Well, it's 30 FPS.
There's more difference to the eye between 25 and 30 FPS than 30 and 60. You might notice it's slightly smoother, but nothing really that great. 30 is a perfectly playable framerate.
I don't really notice the difference when I'm playing unless I open up a FPS counter. IDK, maybe it's because I'm enjoying the game rather than trying for the smoothest framerate ever.

 

There's a rather large difference between passively watching a pre-rendered video playing at 30fps vs playing a game in real time at 30fps.

 

There is, but 30 FPS is still a good framerate.
Like I said, I personally don't see the difference, probably because I'm too busy playing.

 

30 FPS is a vomit inducing framerate.

 

Yes, that is odd. I prefer watching stuff I don't control in sub 30 fps actually. With motion blur I can handle even down to the low twenties. I get nauseated if I watch something prerecorded much over 30 fps actually. I enjoy 45 fps as a good solid framerate and 60 and 75 just make it better. I actually noticed my monitor was stuck in 60hz mode because that. All in all it doesn't really matter that much, right?

 

I'm not considering brands or anything like that, I just want Nvidia after all my problems on the software and the hardware side.

I might wait for the 800 series, due to the effectiveness. Still not sure.

 

I find 20fps can still be smooth gameplay. I am entirely happy at 30. 60 vs 30, I honestly can't tell the difference except when I am vsynced to 60 and then it lag spikes to 30 momentarily.