RussianSensation
Elite Member
- Sep 5, 2003
- 19,458
- 765
- 126
I used Ati/AMD cards exclusively for over a decade. Not any more. You've burned me enough. Until they can demonstrate an ability to deliver what they promise and release stable drivers on a consistent/frequent basis, I am steering clear of AMD.
I've said rock solid drivers with GeForce 6, 8, HD4000, 6000 and 7000 series. You must be talking about CF situations then because AMD's drivers have mopped the floor with NV's when it comes to GCN vs. Fermi/Kepler generation. If anything, AMD's driver team has been way more rock solid than NV's in the last 3 years when it comes to single GPUs.
This ^100000x. AMD has, in the past, clocked their high end halo part beyond the sweet spot of perf/w to be more competitive at stock speeds. Aftermarket 980 TI's are getting 30% overclocks vs. reference 980 speeds with decent (but not ultra-quiet) noise levels and temps. It is a tough order to keep up with that, but at least AMD strapped Fury with the cooling capable of easily handling it.
Disclaimer: I'm not interested in Fury or 980 TI.
True, for brand agnostic/objective gamers, 980Ti OC vs. Fiji OC is a key comparison. For all those other gamers who for years ignored HD7950/7970/7970Ghz overclocking though and constantly linked us after-market 680 reviews vs. a reference HD7000 card, it's an interesting position how now a reference Fiji is a fail unless it outperforms a max overclocked after-market 980Ti card.
You are missing some factors - we would also need to see an after-market Fury X (will this exist?) vs. an after-market 980Ti. Secondly, you aren't at all compensating for Fury X exhausting 300W of power out of the case while running cool and quiet. An after-market 980Ti cannot claim that. This gets worse for SLI vs. CF comparisons.
Right now NV charges $750+ for EVGA 980Ti Hybrid for the same setup AMD is bringing for $650.
Another thing to keep in mind is TPU sometimes doesn't use AA in some of their game testing. Sites like Sweclockers do. The end result is 980Ti isn't even 40% faster than a 290X at 4K. That means if Fiji scales well, it's possible it might end up 7-8% faster than 980Ti at stock which means it doesn't need to overclock as much as the 980Ti.
They key advantage of a 980Ti is that it doesn't use that much more power when overclocked. If both of them are very similar in performance in overclocked states but Fiji OC uses 450W of power or something, then it could tilt things more in 980Ti's favour.
----
As far as the OP's question goes, I am currently thinking about upgrading. Most likely will wait to 14nm/16nm GPUs or if I do decide to upgrade, will wait much later than now. In the summer time I play sports and travel so the card would just be idling most of the time.
Last edited: