ZGR
Platinum Member
- Oct 26, 2012
- 2,054
- 661
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Performance between 290/390 and 970 is a wash for the most part. Power consumption is lower on the 970, but it isn't a big deal unless you are seriously power limited.
Buy the card that performs best on the games you like to play and make sure it has a well reviewed cooler. All variants of the 970/390 have different fan/cooling characteristics that may affect your purchasing decision; so go with whatever brand that you think will fit best in your rig.
Either GPU will run cool and quiet so it really comes down to feature set, supported/sponsored games, and cost. Some would argue the GTX 970's efficiency is well worth the premium; some not. It really comes down to your build.
The new R9 380X review has good examples of performance, power consumption, noise, and heat:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/9784/the-amd-radeon-r9-380x-review/13
http://www.anandtech.com/show/9784/the-amd-radeon-r9-380x-review/5
The extra 4.5 GB of VRAM on the R9 390 is kinda gimmicky right now @ 1080p.
I would buy the cheapest GPU with a good cooler.
Buy the card that performs best on the games you like to play and make sure it has a well reviewed cooler. All variants of the 970/390 have different fan/cooling characteristics that may affect your purchasing decision; so go with whatever brand that you think will fit best in your rig.
Either GPU will run cool and quiet so it really comes down to feature set, supported/sponsored games, and cost. Some would argue the GTX 970's efficiency is well worth the premium; some not. It really comes down to your build.
The new R9 380X review has good examples of performance, power consumption, noise, and heat:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/9784/the-amd-radeon-r9-380x-review/13
http://www.anandtech.com/show/9784/the-amd-radeon-r9-380x-review/5
The extra 4.5 GB of VRAM on the R9 390 is kinda gimmicky right now @ 1080p.
I would buy the cheapest GPU with a good cooler.