I don't guess my post was clear enough, I was at work and didn't have a lot of time.
AMD has very compelling options right now. R9 290X cards are less expensive than 970's and offer roughly equivalent performance. The 290, while being slightly slower than the 970, is much less expensive. The 290/290X also have 4.0GB of full speed VRAM while the 970 rarely uses more than 3.5GB due to its segmented memory configuration.
Many people here and on other forums have returned their 970's and purchased a 290 or 290X instead. Some due to stuttering in SLI at high resolution, some because they are afraid that the 3.5GB + 0.5GB configuration will prove to struggle with future games, some because they feel resale value of their 970 will be lower due to its revised specs and some because they simply don't like Nvidia's corporate decisions throughout this whole fiasco.
Is this a joke?
The R9 290 when it goes on sale for $250 is as good of a value as the 8800 GT was when it came out. 15-20% slower than the top end card available for half the money. It's 2014's 8800 GT. Unless you didn't think the 8800 GT was compelling too... It's certainly not the performance champ if that's what you mean.
I didn't mean that AMD has nothing compelling at all. That's not want I meant. I agree with every last bit of what I just quoted. You are absolutely right.
My post was from the perspective of a person who already owns a gtx970.
When your gaming at that level of performance, there is really nothing that compelling. The 290 is a downgrade and the 290x is a sidegrade. I think its a shame that there isn't many great options for a person feeling upset over the 970 misinformation.
Don't get me wrong. Its not just AMD cards, I also don't think the 980 is very compelling to a person who already owns a 970. Most of the time in most real world scenarios, the 980 is only 10-20% faster than the gtx970. About 115%.
That's a very small bump up in performance. I actually know first hand because when I took my gtx970 back to bestbuy, my only options were an exchange with something on the shelf. which was another 970, a gtx980, or signifcantly weaker cards. They did not stock AMD r9 290s on the shelf.
I was upset enough to return my card and I felt its a shame how limited the options are. there really isnt anything all that compelling if you already have a 970. Once I got the 980, it only reinforced that. The performance improvement is not all that much.
I guess I am the kind of person that wants to see improvement when they go thru the trouble of a refund and/or swapping out gpus. If there isn't much of an improvement, its kind of a waste.
Look, you could secretly swap out someone's 970 with a 980 without them knowing it, and unless they look at it with gpuz or run with a fps overlay (before and after the swap), they wouldn't even be able to tell.
The performance difference is quite small.
People don't want to simply give NVidia a pass on these types of shenanigans, and I don't blame them. Some are willing to side grade for that very reason alone, and again, I can't blame them. Most of us have invested many thousands of dollars into NVidia products over the course of our lifetime and deserve better than to be deceived. People are doing what they should be doing. Expressing their dislike of the situation with their $$$ which is the only thing that even has a remote chance of ensuring something like this doesn't happen again. There needs to be accountability, there needs to be consequences.
Saying you can't get a better card for the same amount of money doesn't change the fact that you got a lesser card than you paid for.
I don't blame anyone for being upset. That's not what I am saying. If you want a refund and just want to sock it to nvidia and get a 290x out of spite, I am all for it. Anyone who is angry and already knows what they want to do, do it. I support them all the way.
But then there are those who just want to take the card back because they are told it is bad. They are those that feel screwed over but don't really want a sidegrade. I am more talking about that bunch. I think they should be upset. But they don't need to be pressured to refund their cards just to end up with something they really didn't want. If they want to show nvidia, if they want to get them back, they can still vote with their wallets next time. Nvidia isn't going anywhere and it will probably hurt them a lot more if people just decided to go AMD for awhile. Especially when AMD has a options that truly are a real upgrade over a gtx970.
I just think people are pressured to act when there aren't many options. But you don't have to to get nvidia back. If you truly are upset, just boycott nvidia your next card purchase. You can still get them later, probably even hit them harder.
I am talking to those who don't really want a sidegrade but aren't happy with being mislead.