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Which GTX 560 to get?
Well, it's black friday time on newegg & I can't decide which GTX 560 to get.
EVGA 01G-P3-1561-AR GeForce GTX 560 Ti : AR version which was a lifetime warrenty.
EVGA 012-P3-2078-KR GeForce GTX 560 Ti: Looks better but is the KR version which only has a 3 year warrenty.
I intend to use this video card for as long as possible. Been using a 8800GTS for 4 years & finally think it's time for an upgrade.
Comments
How about neither? Why not get something more modern rather than an aging Fermi card that is long since discontinued and languishes on the shelves for good reason?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125451
That's significantly faster than a GeForce GTX 560 Ti, while using dramatically less power. It's also the cheaper before rebate, or the same price after rebate. And it comes with a free game, too.
For what it's worth, the two cards you link aren't similar at all. One is the top bin of the GK114 GPU chip, while the other is the bottom GeForce bin of GK110. The latter perhaps could have been more sensibly called a GeForce GTX 565, but Nvidia marketing probably wanted to avoid comparisons to the awful GeForce GTX 465 card.
Thanks Quizzical for your input.
I use to be a Radeon fan but have switched to Nvidia for their better driver support. That card looks nice but I think I'm going to stick w/ Nvidia for now. A GTX 670 would be really nice to have but I don't feel like spending that much $
AMD have the better driver support these days tbh, every week or two there's a new update be it via the driver or the caps (caps should be used even on single cards). Both Nvidia and AMD tend to have similar amounts of problems with them though despite AMD being quicker to release updates and new game support. The new 12.11 drivers are fantastic for the 7*** series, they brought a signifcant performance increase right across the board.
I wouldn't let them dictate which brand you buy though, the choice should really come down to do you want more grunt for the same or less money from AMD or physx/cuda from Nvidia.
"I intend to use this video card for as long as possible" - a 560 doesn't fit that criteria at all. At the amount you're spending only the 7850 or 660 (non ti) make sense as they continue to improve through drivers, while already being faster, and the 560 is mostly stagnant at this point.
If you want to go the Nvidia fanboy route, then the modern options nearest to your budget are a GeForce GTX 650 Ti (cheaper) or else a GeForce GTX 660 (more expensive).
at that sort of price point
660GTX or HD7870 are better buys
former if physx is more important later if clocking is more important.
Really appreciate the replies guys!
I have narrowed it down to three cards.
GTX 660
7850
7870
I don't care about the free game(s) that come w/ it. I'm leaning towards the 7870. It's $30 more than the 7850 but I think it's worth it after reading many reviews.
Best Graphics Cards For The Money: November 2012 - I found some very useful information here along w/ this Graphics Card Hierarchy Chart
Too Bad the 7870 I want is sold out on newegg
I guess I can wait a little longer. The Black Friday hype brought me here in the first place.
Sounds like a 3 year warranty is perfect then.
Unless you really need the extra display ports on the XFX cards then i wouldnt bother with them tbh, even if you do you can use a splitter that will work just the same and cost a few bucks. Other brands that are just as reliable with better coolers can be had cheaper ie gigabyte 7850 (looks like the windforce 3 cooler on it if the photo on newegg is correct) for $30 cheaper than the XFX or the HIS IceQ (i have one of those in the house and the cooler is fantastic, never broaches 60C no matter how high i overclock it) for $20 cheaper. Same goes for the 7870, other just as good ones can be had for cheaper than the ridiculous premium on the XFX.
There's not a huge difference between a 7850 and a 7870 they both also have great overclocking potential and generally will go 20-30%+ above their stock clocks without any hassle. Personally on cost for performance i would forgo the 7870 and get the 7850, or if you wanted more grunt then grab a 7950 as the gap between them is huge despite not really being much more expensive than the 7870. In addition, if the 7850 was the only AMD card you were looking at then the 660 is a good alternative from the green team albeit more expensive, but it's not comparable to the 7870. Nvidia don't really have a card that should be weighed against the 7870 other than the 660ti which is still overpriced for what it is considering it's only cheaper than a 7950 by $20 or so, the 670 is the 7950 equivilient.
Why that particular 7850 and 7870? Why not a cheaper one like this?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102983
I haven't had any bad experiences w/ XFX in the past. I don't trust MSI & don't really know much about Sapphire. Alot of reviews on the Sapphire 7870 were people claiming the card overheats or there was a 50/50 chance of Dead on Arrival.
I'm still considering the Sapphire 7870, it got some really good reviews too.
I never heard of HIS before but considering it as an option. HIS IceQ 7870
*Edit* Great, Now both cards are Sold Out,. haha. oh well, as of right now I will be getting the HIS IceQ7870 when it comes back in stock/has another good deal.
*2nd Edit* After randomly refreshing the page at 1 a.m. in hopes of the Sold Out message to go away, it did! The HIS IceQ 7870 are in stock again. $190 after rebate + Far Cry 3 pretty good deal
Wow..... 10 minutes later it now says they are sold out. I hope my order went through.
Strange that this is the second time I've brought this card up, but right now, the best midrange card is the GTX 480
http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.php?gpu=GeForce+GTX+480
It's performance is better than the cards you're looking at.
You make me like charity
You said the same thing on another thread, so I'll copy and paste my reply here:
-----
A GeForce GTX 480 can roughly hang with a Radeon HD 7850 in performance. The 7850 is cheaper, though. And the 7850 will use less than half as much power to deliver about the same performance.
Above, I said that a 550 W power supply is plenty. Well, maybe not if you get a GTX 480 that pulls 300 W all on its own. If you plug in two monitors, a GTX 480 will use about as much power at idle as a Radeon HD 7850 does under realistic gaming loads. It's a big enough gap that if comparing prices, you need to add the extra cost of buying a stronger power supply to handle the GTX 480, as well as the increased electricity bills of running it. When it's more expensive to begin with, and then you add a lot more cost for both of those, you're looking at considerably higher total cost of ownership than a Radeon HD 7870 or GeForce GTX 660 that outperforms it handily.
And then there is the problem of reliability. All of that extra power draw turns into extra heat output. The cooler on a reference GeForce GTX 480 simply cannot handle the card. It will get unreasonably noisy just trying to keep GPU temperatures in the mid-90s. Getting too hot every single time you play a game will take its toll over time. Oh, and that's assuming that you can manage to keep your case 100% dust free; if you can't, that makes it even worse.
That the GTX 480 is still around more than two years after being discontinued is because no one sensible wants one. It was a bad card the day it launched and hasn't gotten better with the passage of time.
Yeah, I didn't think he was even serious when he suggested it.
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No its not. Yet again.
Makes me wonder why you are pushing the 480 so hard. When everyone knows that card uses tons of power and puts off alot of heat.
Do not buy a 480. There is a reason those are still in stock, people dont want to buy them.
Maybe people like Nvidia because they have had a bad experience with AMD.
I have not had an AMD card yet that did not overheat, blackscreen for no reason, or just have issues in general. So yes...I am now an Nvidia "fanboy".
I am just the opposite.
I have had great luck with the AMD line and have used them for the past 4+ years. I think it all boils down to personal preference anyways. Both have nice performing GPUs out now.
I do have Nvidia card in my desktop and it works fine, I got an occasion on very good price so I bought it.
STILL nvidia is not fault less. Nvidia 8600m gt died on my laptop 2 months after my warranty expired and it was whole series that was faulty and there were thousands of people with same problem. It was even court case about it.
So no, both AMD and Nvidia have good and bad cards and moments. One is not better much from another.
As I see it, if you start by determining which brand you're going to buy, before you even look at price or performance, that makes you a fanboy. One could debate whether it is reasonable to be a fanboy of particular vendors, but that's a different topic entirely.
Right now, AMD has well-priced cards all up and down the lineup. Nvidia has several cards that are sometimes priced competitively, but has bigger holes in the lineup than AMD.
But sometimes, one vendor or the other is simply not competitive. If you wanted a high end video card around the end of 2009, you could either buy from AMD or buy something that was a terrible value for the money. Around the end of 2006 or in the middle of 2008, if you wanted a high end card, you could either buy from Nvidia or decide not to get a high end card after all. For most of the last few years, if you wanted a sub-$140 card, you could either buy AMD or seriously overpay for an inferior Nvidia alternative, though some GTX 650s falling to $100 has recently given Nvidia a credible alternative in that range.
There's a clearer distinction right now in processors. Today, if you want a high end processor for gaming, you have to get Intel, as AMD doesn't have any good alternative. If you want to put something together on a severe budget that is viable for gaming, then you have to buy AMD, as Intel's integrated graphics are both far more expensive and far worse.