[JaysTwoCents] 970 SLI vs. 980Ti vs. Titan X (all overclocked) 1080P/1440P/4K

[RussianSensation]

For most of the gamers on this forum the results shouldn't be surprising if you have followed benchmarks of these cards closely in reviews.

Recommendations*:

1080P = single 970
1440P = single 980Ti
4K = none of these (get at least a 980 SLI as most of the above setups can only provide fps in the high 30s-40s range at 4K)

Enjoy the video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4RyNNlKbJw

* Of course there are exceptions such as if you have a 120-144Hz monitor or want to use DSR super-sampling, etc.

 

[TzzV]

What do you think about the SLI 970s for 1440p?

I have a single 970 at the moment, and I'm going to buy a PG279Q monitor as soon as it becomes available...
As you know, it's a 1440p / 144hz, G-Sync panel, so I'm wondering what you think about it with two 970s (I'll be looking into adding a second one).

I know the VRAM might be an issue, but I'm not a biiig expert on that, so what do you guys think? Would DX12 help with that anyways? I heard rumors, but again I'm no expert so I'm not sure what I should believe.

As seen in this video, the performance with current games are *very* encouraging with SLI 970s, outperforming almost every single card setup in almost every single instance, and I wouldn't consider moving to 4K, so...
Would 3.5GB of VRAM be ok for 1080p and not enough for 1440p, moving forward? I heard it was going to be a big issue only with 4K, so now I don't know anymore.

Thanks!

P.S. You should probably change the link in your post to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4RyNNlKbJw because this is the video you're talking about

 

[flopper]

sell 970 buy a 980ti or a Fury pro.

 

[guskline]

Good video RS. I'm beginning to think the battle is shifting to the 1440p resolution even though 4k seems to be the "buzz" word.

My 2 R9 290s have served me well in that regard, especially from a price perspective.

 

[TzzV]

sell 970 buy a 980ti or a Fury pro.

Honestly, in my country getting 2* 970s is cheaper than a single 980ti, and also selling mine would make it an even worse loss of value...

 

[guskline]

TzzV, since you already own a 970 you might want to sell it and recoup most of your price since it's still not discounted and hop on the GTX980TI train.

In my case I stayed with my 2 r9 290s because resale is too low.

In your case, if you cane get @$275-285 for resale, add that to to the cost of a new 970 (275+340) and you are within $50 of a new 980TI.

Selling both of my cards for $200 per card (higher end of resale) yields $400 so I'm $250 from a single 980TI.

 

[flopper]

Honestly, in my country getting 2* 970s is cheaper than a single 980ti, and also selling mine would make it an even worse loss of value...

It might be but its a better option as sli has issues.
If you can buy a card that allows the same fps as a sli/crossfire its the best thing to do.
if one decide on price alone as the playing experience is more crucial as you are going to have the cards for some time I always opt for the better playing experience.

 

[TzzV]

TzzV, since you already own a 970 you might want to sell it and recoup most of your price since it's still not discounted and hop on the GTX980TI train.

In my case I stayed with my 2 r9 290s because resale is too low.

In your case, if you cane get @$275-285 for resale, add that to to the cost of a new 970 (275+340) and you are within $50 of a new 980TI.

Selling both of my cards for $200 per card (higher end of resale) yields $400 so I'm $250 from a single 980TI.

Selling my 970 wouldn't get me more than 280€ (and I would have to go through shipment etc), while buying a new one should be around 360€.
980ti right now (with the stock coolers, not even the aftermarket ones) is 800€ here, so the difference would be around 160€ + going through selling a card...
Also, as I said, I wasn't going to upgrade immediately but I was going to do it in the (near but not immediate) future...

 

[TzzV]

It might be but its a better option as sli has issues.
If you can buy a card that allows the same fps as a sli/crossfire its the best thing to do.
if one decide on price alone as the playing experience is more crucial as you are going to have the cards for some time I always opt for the better playing experience.

Well yeah, I know about the whole "single card being better than multi-card setup", of course...
That's the kind of answer I was looking for, though.

But it seems to me like these issues are becoming less frequent lately, as the developers are starting to enhance SLI support and it's no longer an issue on newer games, so it makes me think it is only going to get better in the future. Am I making sense?
I'm more concerned about the VRAM issue at 1440p, honestly, as that's more "uncharted" territory :/

 

[kasakka]

What do you think about the SLI 970s for 1440p?

I know the VRAM might be an issue, but I'm not a biiig expert on that, so what do you guys think? Would DX12 help with that anyways? I heard rumors, but again I'm no expert so I'm not sure what I should believe.

I've been running 970 SLI for some time and the only game where I've had issues at 1440p has been Shadow of Mordor and even that became quite irrelevant after driver updates and upgrading from 8 to 16 GB RAM.

At the moment the VRAM has not been an issue at all but I can't say if it will be in the future so in that sense the 980 Ti might be a better bet. However, 970 SLI is fine for 1440p otherwise.

SLI is not perfect and there are a few game engines that don't support it (like idTech5 and Unreal Engine 4) but generally most major releases have worked well. I've been happily playing GTA V and Witcher 3 at near max settings.

Currently my only annoyance with SLI is that DSR does not work with G-Sync. Single card + DSR + G-Sync is fine. SLI + DSR also works but if you simply connect a G-sync display the DSR option disappears no matter if G-Sync is on or not. With this kind of horsepower it would be fun to use DSR on some games.

If you're not in a rush you could wait a bit to see if AMD's offerings do anything to 970 or 980 Ti prices, especially in Europe.

 

[tviceman]

Good video RS. I'm beginning to think the battle is shifting to the 1440p resolution even though 4k seems to be the "buzz" word.

1440p is simply where it's at for comparison purposes between single GPU setups right now. Single Titan X and 980 TI setups simply don't have enough grunt to run at 4k consistently with high quality / no AA on most recent games. 4k is a bragging right that no one should care about right now unless you're going with two top-end GPU's. It's like buying a gtx 750 TI / R9 270 and saying you have amazing 1080p performance.

 

[james1701]

Why has 1600P all but disappeared?

 

[tential]

Well yeah, I know about the whole "single card being better than multi-card setup", of course...
That's the kind of answer I was looking for, though.

But it seems to me like these issues are becoming less frequent lately, as the developers are starting to enhance SLI support and it's no longer an issue on newer games, so it makes me think it is only going to get better in the future. Am I making sense?
I'm more concerned about the VRAM issue at 1440p, honestly, as that's more "uncharted" territory :/

IMO, if I was you, I'd buy a used GTX 970 instead. It's such a cheap upgrade option.

I know others are suggesting selling your GTX 970 and getting a single card but as you've stated, it's going to cost you a LOT of money as pricing in your country is different than where I'm at and where others are at.

Also, that HUGE cost you sink into the GTX 980Ti, I think that'll be BLOWN away by 14nm. If again, everyone thinks that a node shrink after multiple years of not having one won't matter much then seriously, you have low expectations of Nvidia who is doing a node shrink + HBM. I can't imagine how people would think Nvidia's next gen GPU is not going to blow away the current Titan X/GTX 980Ti given the 14nm+HBM, but think Nvidia is a great company to buy graphics cards from right now. Just doesn't make sense to me.

Also, at worst case scenario, you sell the GTX 970 you just bought now back for 10-20 less, and you're right back where you started anyway.

I just don't think it's worth it for you to sell a GTX 970 to get a GTX 980Ti at those prices.

Considering the Titan X and the Gtx 980Ti are the same performance basically:
http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/graphics/82060-evga-gtx-970-ssc-sli-vs-titan-x-r9-295x2/?page=3

I think you'll find that review helpful.

I'm curious as to why you need SLI with a Gsync monitor?

 

[Makaveli]

Why has 1600P all but disappeared?

Because its cheaper for them to make all panels 16:9 so 16:10 was basically killed off.

As someone that also prefers 16:10 I feel your pain

Dell and HP still carry 16:10 if you can afford to drop the coin.

HP Z Display Promo Z30i

Dell UltraSharp U3014

 

[tential]

Because its cheaper for them to make all panels 16:9 so 16:10 was basically killed off.

As someone that also prefers 16:10 I feel your pain

Dell and HP still carry 16:10 if you can afford to drop the coin.

HP Z Display Promo Z30i

Dell UltraSharp U3014

When I got my 16:10 laptop I was VERY happy. I thought the extra space and added resolution was cool. But now that I use 16:9 laptops, it's not as useful for doing productivity or really anything at all. I'd rather have blackbars on movies and have my laptop be easy to use than have a perfect movie display. The only thing I like about it is I like the aesthetics of a 16:9 laptop over a 16:10 laptop when small. Probably wouldn't notice though ever

 

[james1701]

Because its cheaper for them to make all panels 16:9 so 16:10 was basically killed off.

As someone that also prefers 16:10 I feel your pain

Dell and HP still carry 16:10 if you can afford to drop the coin.

HP Z Display Promo Z30i

Dell UltraSharp U3014

I have a U3011 with flanked monitors on each side. I am stuck right now, because my 7970's can't do PLP eyefinity, and for the last 3 drivers, the resolution has been broken for PLP.

I would like to see what the cards can do with my single large monitor.

 

[happy medium]

one thing I learned from the video is even a 8 core 5960 @ 4.4 cant fully push 3 gtx980ti's or 12gb Titans.

 

[tdslam720]

The whole 4k being unreachable thing is so overestimated. 4K gaming is fine on just about everything except the latest and greatest games, and that's only with most settings maxed out. GTA 5 is playable with 970 SLIs with everything on except MSAA. Older games except for things like Crysis 3, you'll be pushing well over 60fps.

 

[tential]

The whole 4k being unreachable thing is so overestimated. 4K gaming is fine on just about everything except the latest and greatest games, and that's only with most settings maxed out. GTA 5 is playable with 970 SLIs with everything on except MSAA. Older games except for things like Crysis 3, you'll be pushing well over 60fps.

It's all about how much money you want to spend and the capability. If Crossfire Fiji WCE can play 4K then great. Except, generally launch performance of AMD isn't so great, so you'd have to wait for CF support.

If you're willing to turn down settings though you can definitely get to 4K.

If you're willing to put up with a frame dip every ONCE in awhile, then you can probably enjoy a sli/crossfire setup just fine at 4K. I remember when the HD7870s CF were beating the Titan in games. You can get a great amount of performance from a crossfire/sli setup and yes, some games may not get support and you may not get to use both of your cards. Boo hoo. Chances are you probably don't play those games and if you are a person that plays every single game, and you have money to buy every single game that comes out, you can probably also buy a faster GPU too.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

I'm not completely convinced by 4k gaming being impossible with only a single GTX980, I have my 4k monitor arriving today and I think that sacrificing both MSAA and very intensive graphics effects like HBAO should really help boost FPS into playable on the AAA modern titles.

Obviously you're not going to run Ultra settings on those kind of games, but there's only a handful of modern AAA games right now that really push hardware like the 980, GTAV is one of them but even then I have it running on my 2560x1600 panel (which is 1/2 the number of pixels as 4k) at about 60-70fps with mostly ultra settings and my experience with FC4 is the same.

The vast majority of my 500 games on steam I'm pretty sure will have enough horsepower to be run at 4k, I'm guessing way less than the top 1% wont run max and even then it won't require dropping too much.

 

[Makaveli]

When I got my 16:10 laptop I was VERY happy. I thought the extra space and added resolution was cool. But now that I use 16:9 laptops, it's not as useful for doing productivity or really anything at all. I'd rather have blackbars on movies and have my laptop be easy to use than have a perfect movie display. The only thing I like about it is I like the aesthetics of a 16:9 laptop over a 16:10 laptop when small. Probably wouldn't notice though ever

Totally agree.

The 16:9 ratio is for movies and if all you are gonna do is watch movies on a laptop then just get a tv

When I finally decided to move off my 16:10 1200p screen I will have to choose between 1440p or 1600p and I would like to next screen to support freesync aswell so will just be watching on the sidelines for now.

I have a U3011 with flanked monitors on each side. I am stuck right now, because my 7970's can't do PLP eyefinity, and for the last 3 drivers, the resolution has been broken for PLP.

I would like to see what the cards can do with my single large monitor.

This will be the perfect opportunity for you then to look at the new radeons coming out this month. I will be keeping my eye on them also as my 7970Ghz is starting to get long in the tooth. I am however going to hold out for windows 10 I want to see what DX12 will do for all the GCN 1.0 parts before I drop any major coin.

 

[PrincessFrosty]

Tried GTAV a lot tonight on my brand new 4k panel, I was jumping from a 2560x1600 resolution to 3840x2160 and I dropped the 2xMSAA I was using completely, I went from about a solid 65-70fps to about 45-55 depending on the areas, with only a few minor dips down to 35fps, it was extremely playable at a decent 50fps average.

Honestly I think it looks better at 4k with no AA on a 32" than at 2560x1600 with 2xMSAA at 30", I can imagine the 4k 27" panels really not needing AA at all. The only time I ever consciously saw aliasing was when it was dark and the bright yellow line on the mini map/GPS was contrasting with the dark background, here i could see aliasing but only clearly when it was only just off perfectly horizontal or vertical.

Smooth objects that curve such as most of the sports car silhouettes and the player models all looked absolutely excellent, in fact the large circles on the screen after you complete a mission that show JP and RP are very smooth indeed without AA.

I'm extremely pleased with the performance of the 980 and this is without any overclocking, I think it's a bit unfair to say that 4k gaming isnt possible with just a single 980, because this is one of the more demanding games recently and it looks really nice and runs well at 4k.

 

[FxSoap]

I'm extremely pleased with the performance of the 980 and this is without any overclocking, I think it's a bit unfair to say that 4k gaming isnt possible with just a single 980, because this is one of the more demanding games recently and it looks really nice and runs well at 4k.

how about games like Metro/Bf4, have you tested on those too?

 

[cmdrdredd]

It might be but its a better option as sli has issues.
If you can buy a card that allows the same fps as a sli/crossfire its the best thing to do.
if one decide on price alone as the playing experience is more crucial as you are going to have the cards for some time I always opt for the better playing experience.

SLI doesn't have issues in general. It has worked fine for years and I've had GTX 670SLI before my 970s and before that a GTX295. You get about the same performance with SLI 970s and sometimes a bit better performance than the 980ti. The difference is you don't have to sell your card and take a hit on what you paid for it and can simply get a 970 and drop it in. This will cost less money in the end because you aren't going to get $400 for a used 970 to make up the money you already spent and then pay out around $650 for a new card.When these questions come up the easiest solution for me to recommend is just drop another card in for SLI.

Since Tzzv is in europe where prices are different it's even harder to recommend selling the 970. He also didn't say he was doing it tomorrow, just that he was thinking about it in the near future, potentially for new games. What the best thing to do now is wait and see if prices drop a bit which they may soon. AMD has their new lineup coming and that may make the market wiggle a bit on pricing. See what happens in the weeks following the new AMD launch and evaluate what the options are then.

I don't play at 4k because I prefer to set all the graphics options on the highest settings. I do run some games at 1440p, and even a step above 1440p depending on the demands of the title.