GTX TITAN Black vs 2x GTX 690s ? Quicker replies are much appriciated! :)

Krelian

 

A little background information:

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Very, very depressed.

Not only am I now wearing an Eye patch AGAIN,... (about 5 months after lasik-gone-bad)

But im also horrible at keeping my balance with one Eye closed, ESPECIALLY when im dancing around Cables (lots of em) behind my computer&tv desks.

Result: Lost my balance, tripped over  and knocked my precious computer screen down; ASUS VG278H

Resolution: Get a new gaming screen: ASUS ROG Swift PG278Q (this is what I set my heart at, love at first sight lol)

Bad news: Computer specs rather good, BUT IMO, I MIGHT STILL need a more powerful Graphics card to pump out the Graphics at the new-higher resolution of 2560 x 1440 / 144 Hz.

(Been unable to work last 4 months because of mild-to-severe Eye pain, rather broke, so this gonna hurt, but gaming, gf & friends is all that is keeping me from commiting suicide lol )

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So, anyways, back to topic;

For the resolution of 2560 x 1440,

Would you recommend: 2x GTX 690s (meaning a total of 4 GPU's - a.k.a Quad SLI) (OBS! THIS IS WHAT I ALREADY HAVE!)

OR

Would you rather recommend a: GTX TITAN Black (or one of its sc/oc variants)

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Im thinking like, upgrading to a GTX Titan Black from 2x 690s DONT seem like its worth it at a glance, but than again, even though IM NO EXPERT, I recall reading several times (and observing sheets) that the 690s start scaling very badly (in comparasion to other/newer top-tier cards) once you go beyond the good old 1920x1080 resolution.

So, thats why im asking here.
 

I need to buy the new screen as soon as possible, so any answers given is reall appriciated

Kabaal

Your 690's will likely still be fine for 1440p, even a single 290/780 is fine at that res.

Quizzical

Don't waste money on a Titan black, or any other sort of Titan.  If you want Nvidia's top end GPU, you should be looking at a GeForce GTX 780 Ti.

I'd say try your existing cards first and see how they fare.  If you're happy with the performance, then there's no need to replace them.

syntax42

Your CPU is important, too.  I would imagine with your budget, you probably have something decent.  Just to be sure, though, can you post your CPU and how much RAM you have?

Krelian

Thank you guys for the prompt reply

Here are my system specs:

Intel Core i7-3930K

2x ASUS GeForce GTX 690 4GB

Watercooled - No Issues with overheating etcatera

Asus ROG Xonar Phoebus (with Control Box etc)

Corsair Vengeance Low Profile 32GB DDR3

500gig SSD

3TB Hard Disk

Mobo?? Forgot about it, something MSI I guess.

Full/Maxi Tower Case

Windows 8 x64 OS 

+

ASUS VG278H (The screen that was recently broken )

Logitech Z-906 Sound System

 

This thing was the king about 2 years ago, not so anymore... ofcourse.

BUT I digress, the machine, at 1920x1080 has been perfectly capable of running any game (including newer ones) at ultra/max graphics settings.

So, would this system be any good at running contemporary games at high/max settings USING THE NEW SCREEN that im thinking of buying (ASUS ROG Swift PG278Q) in its NATIVE RESOLUTION (2560x1440px) ?  

PS!

Yeah, I know (and thus admit) that the term ''contemporary games''; can be a little vague, some games released this year could demand a crazy system, while others could be a lot more modest in their system requirements, But I hope you get what I mean

Quizzical

I would expect that the only way that you would have trouble with games not running well on the new monitor is if SLI doesn't work.  And even then, one GPU would handle the monitor just fine in most--but not all--games.

Well, I suppose that I'm excluding the case of stupidly demanding graphical settings.  Given any hardware, it's pretty trivial to turn up settings far enough that the hardware chokes.  Most games will either disable such settings entirely or else try to hide them were unsophisticated users won't find them, as some people try to max everything they can find as though the goal is low frame rates and then complain if they "succeed" in doing this.

Ridelynn

I'd be surprised if that rig couldn't hang with the screen.

2x 690's, when SLI Is working right and you have adequate cooling, should beat a single Titan, provided your able to get any amount of SLI scaling at all. Games that have trouble scaling the Titan will win.

They are only 1 generation removed and both are Keplar architectures. Either one should be able to drive 2560x1440 without too much trouble, provided you don't do stupid things with graphics settings.

Mavolence

I just can't stand a lot of the games i've been playing lately dont support SLI and i have would gladly trade my two cards now for a single solid card. I dont think i'll every buy two cards again until every single game supports SLI without crashes,bugs, and good performance.

Cleffy

Your CPU may be lacking to fully support 2x GTX690. Also 1 GTX690 should be more than sufficient in supporting 4 times that resolution with the highest specs. You should have no problems supporting a 1440p resolution.

Even if you are running skyrim with 200 mods and an ENB on maximum settings, you would probably be software bottlenecked instead of hardware bottlenecked.

Krelian

Thanks alot for all the replies I received in such a short notice.

Not thanking as a formality, but actually thank-you

Now, im thinking like I will be mostly fine with the graphics cards that are already inside my computer, and if anything, I ''MIGHT'' need a better CPU, perhaps..

BUT, here is the thing (just a little update);

My 690s are equipped with a MINI-displayport 1.2 (among other connection alternatives)

But the new screen is only capable of (REGULAR-SIZE) Displayport output.

Meaning that; they are incompatible, at least incompatible without any intervention from my side.

So, I thought about getting a Displayport to Mini Displayport cable (found one already in a local store),

but would that mean any reduced graphics quality and/or lag etcatera?

 

Thx again and sorry for peppering you with questions!

Grunty

Unless you're running up against the supported maximum length of 2 meters* and either/or both cables are cheap cables that barely meet standard then you should have no problems.  Price/feature wise ignore any cable that advertises gold plating. They are overpriced and more than likely the only part that is gold plated carries no electricity and can't be seen when connected.

*1080p cable length standard is up to 50 meters.

 

Displayport FAQ: http://www.displayport.org/faq/

Q: Is a DisplayPort to Mini DisplayPort cable going to be fully compatible in both directions? Most people use this adaptor to run a DisplayPort screen or projector from a Mac with Mini DisplayPort but I need to go the other way to run a Mac display with Mini DisplayPort from a DisplayPort on an AT Radeon 5770 on a PC. Am I likely to have full function or is the Apple implementation going to cause issues?

A: Standard DisplayPort-to-Mini DisplayPort adaptors and cables work both ways between sources and sinks:

• Mini DisplayortP graphics card to standard DisplayPort monitor
• Standard DisplayPort graphics card to Mini DisplayPort monitor

Q: What is the maximum length of DisplayPort cable that supports a resolution of 2560×1600?

A: 2560 x 1600 (WQXGA resolution) is supported over all 2-meter “DP Certified” cables. Some cables, due to their design, may be capable of supporting 2560 x 1600 resolution over lengths longer than 2 meters.

 

 

rojoArcueid

i will leave the specifics to the more posters with more knowledge, but i will say that Titans arent worth the price.

Ridelynn

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Originally posted by Krelian
Thanks alot for all the replies I received in such a short notice.Not thanking as a formality, but actually thank-you :)Now, im thinking like I will be mostly fine with the graphics cards that are already inside my computer, and if anything, I ''MIGHT'' need a better CPU, perhaps..BUT, here is the thing (just a little update);My 690s are equipped with a MINI-displayport 1.2 (among other connection alternatives)But the new screen is only capable of (REGULAR-SIZE) Displayport output.Meaning that; they are incompatible, at least incompatible without any intervention from my side.So, I thought about getting a Displayport to Mini Displayport cable (found one already in a local store),but would that mean any reduced graphics quality and/or lag etcatera? Thx again and sorry for peppering you with questions!

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Mini-DP to DP cables work just fine - every single Macintosh laptop uses them, and I use one with both my PC (AMD 6970) and my Mac. No issues with that really. It's like USB->mini-USB, it's the same thing, just a smaller port. No loss of signal or quality, provided you have a good cable.

As far as to needing a better CPU: Yeah, if your pumping quad-GPU's and the software is actually scaling, you'd expect to hit a CPU bottleneck (or at least a bandwidth bottleneck on the PCI bus). The bad news is, you've got a Sandy Bridge already - overclock that puppy and really there isn't anything faster CPU-wise. Your GPU's are only using 2 PCI buses, so even going up to an X99 with the new Haswell-E's isn't going to net you anything.

Sandys were usually pretty good overclockers - so good that they are still very viable CPUs today, and that most will overclock to beat out Ivy's and Haswells. You've pretty much got the fastest thing your going to find for gaming if you overclock it just a bit, at least CPU-wise.

Quizzical

I don't think there's any real risk that your CPU will be too slow, outside of badly coded games that run poorly no matter what hardware you have.  Higher monitor resolutions put massive extra load on the GPU, but not much on the CPU.  About the only way the CPU load is affected by your monitor resolution is when culling objects for being completely off the screen:  some things that could be discarded as off the screen at a lower resolution have to be passed along to the video card at a higher resolution.  But the work it takes to check is the same regardless of the monitor resolution, as is any work keeping track of the state of the game world or loading assets.