Seriously considering going from GTX 580 to Radeon 7970

[OILFIELDTRASH]

I've never messed with graphics card coolers before, how difficult was it to put that on and take the stock cooling off?

About the same difficulty as installing an aftermarket CPU cooler. In other words easy. The difference in temps are staggering. I had a gtx 580 asus DCII that would not run as cool as my gtx 480 with a accelero xtreme. In fact the 480 runs about 10c cooler than the DCII.

 

[blackened23]

Too late.

Also, skyrim is a bad example because you're CPU bound. If you're playing a game like Metro 2033 with max detail, you will definitely notice the difference. Skyrim is a weak and tepid game that doesn't require much GPU horsepower, crysis 2, metro 2033 are quite the opposite. With 7970 crossfire i'm getting a 50-70 fps advantage over 580 SLI, with maximum detail settings. It is VERY noticeable.

And I can't believe someone would buy a 580/7970 and play on a cheap Walmart 23" TN panel. Get real, why THE HECK would you spend 500$ on a GPU and play on a junker 23" TN panel at 1080p? Christ. That doesn't make sense to me. Do you understand how ridiculous that is? If anyone still owns a terrible monitor that cost 150$ they should just stick to a 5770 or a 560ti. Getting anything past that is a complete waste for 1080p.....with a 580 or 7970 you should also invest in a monitor setup that is single 27" 2560 res or higher, or triple monitor.

Please someone tell me why you would spend more than 400$ on a GPU with a cheap 23" 1080p Monitor? I just don't get it. It is beyond ridiculous.

 

[taltamir]

1. Not all 1080p monitors are that cheap.
2. A 400$ can't max out on a 1080p monitor for some games...
That being said, dual GPU+ of 400$+ per card, that would require some suitably awesome display to go with.

 

[Grooveriding]

I can see the case for dual 7970s on a 120hz 1080P monitor. For regular 1080p @ 60hz, it's likely overkill unless you enjoy benchmarking.

 

[Quantos]

1. Not all 1080p monitors are that cheap.
2. A 400$ can't max out on a 1080p monitor for some games...
That being said, dual GPU+ of 400$+ per card, that would require some suitably awesome display to go with.

Which games, 2033? The $500 cards won't run it either.

I can see the case for dual 7970s on a 120hz 1080P monitor. For regular 1080p @ 60hz, it's likely overkill unless you enjoy benchmarking.

How much of a difference is there between 60 and 120Hz?

 

[taltamir]

Which games, 2033? The $500 cards won't run it either.

That was exactly my argument.

 

[Grooveriding]

How much of a difference is there between 60 and 120Hz?

If you're into FPS games quite a big difference in the fluidity of motion. I would own one if they came in 30" sizes with an IPS panel. For me a good panel and size outweighs the refresh rate though.

 

[jackstar7]

How much of a difference is there between 60 and 120Hz?

Basically night and day.

Or it's more subjective. But you should head to a shop and see if they have some on display and just drag windows around the desktop. You should see the difference... and in games, it can be dramatic.

 

[gerardfraser]

Too late.

Also, skyrim is a bad example because you're CPU bound. If you're playing a game like Metro 2033 with max detail, you will definitely notice the difference. Skyrim is a weak and tepid game that doesn't require much GPU horsepower, crysis 2, metro 2033 are quite the opposite. With 7970 crossfire i'm getting a 50-70 fps advantage over 580 SLI, with maximum detail settings. It is VERY noticeable.

And I can't believe someone would buy a 580/7970 and play on a cheap Walmart 23" TN panel. Get real, why THE HECK would you spend 500$ on a GPU and play on a junker 23" TN panel at 1080p? Christ. That doesn't make sense to me. Do you understand how ridiculous that is? If anyone still owns a terrible monitor that cost 150$ they should just stick to a 5770 or a 560ti. Getting anything past that is a complete waste for 1080p.....with a 580 or 7970 you should also invest in a monitor setup that is single 27" 2560 res or higher, or triple monitor.

Please someone tell me why you would spend more than 400$ on a GPU with a cheap 23" 1080p Monitor? I just don't get it. It is beyond ridiculous.

I run 580 SLI 3GB cards on a cheap 1920x1080 screen and I am going to get 7970 crossfire for the same cheap screen.

Matter of fact I am probably going to upgrade my 2600K and goto x79 3930k and buy 3 7970 and keep a 580GTX 3GB for Physx.

Reason because I can.
I do not know where your getting that 1920x1080 sucks.
580 SLI just not powerful enough at 1920x1080 with max AA and 60FPS min,to run all the games I play.


It is beyond ridiculous to keep seeing people saying that a 580/6970 is enough for 1920x1080 to max out any game.

When for me I know this is not true.

7970 seems to be an awesome card and the OP already made his choice to go with 3x7970.Sounds like a good choice to me and can not wait for his benches.

 

[blackened23]

I run 580 SLI 3GB cards on a cheap 1920x1080 screen and I am going to get 7970 crossfire for the same cheap screen.

Matter of fact I am probably going to upgrade my 2600K and goto x79 3930k and buy 3 7970 and keep a 580GTX 3GB for Physx.

Reason because I can.
I do not know where your getting that 1920x1080 sucks.
580 SLI just not powerful enough at 1920x1080 with max AA and 60FPS min,to run all the games I play.


It is beyond ridiculous to keep seeing people saying that a 580/6970 is enough for 1920x1080 to max out any game.

When for me I know this is not true.

7970 seems to be an awesome card and the OP already made his choice to go with 3x7970.Sounds like a good choice to me and can not wait for his benches.

With a single card you have to disable stuff like ubersampling in witcher 2 and ADOF in metro 2033. Big deal. Game looks no different. You don't need to max settings, and honestly the games barely look different with quality settings one notch down. I've seen metro 2033 run on a single 580 at medium detail and it looks fine - and you can't really spot a difference between that and ultra really. You don't need more than a 560ti to play metro 2033 at 1080p.

Point remains that spending 1000$ of GPU and pairing it with a cheap 150$ 23" 1080p TN panel. That my friend is lunacy. If you're spending 1000$ on GPU you should also spend the additional money on triple monitor or a 27" 2560 resolution panel.

The gaming experience on a cheap junker 23" TN panel is terrible once you've tried a 27 or 30", or triple monitor. If someone doesn't see a problem with a crap 1080p monitor paired with 1000$ GPUs, well....:whiste: Bottom line is that anyone playing at 1080p shouldn't waste their money.. I wouldn't use more than a 560ti for 1080p gaming. These are premium cards made for extreme enthusiasts....its like pairing a GTX 580 with a Core 2 Duo. Doesn't make sense. If you're getting a 550$ GPU you should make sure everything else in your system complements it (including your monitor(s)

 

[gerardfraser]

Sticking with my 1920x1080 screen for now.Thanks for the tips man.

 

[blackened23]

Sticking with my 1920x1080 screen for now.Thanks for the tips man.

That wasn't directed at you specifically, and if it sounded that way I didn't intend it. I'm just confused when someone mentions that they're on a 23 incher with dual GPU. I wouldn't get a 7970 or 580 for 1080p... Hey thats just me though...different strokes for different folks I guess

 

[imaheadcase]

Enthusiasts have different mindsets. Plus part of the fun is just getting shiny new stuff. I would think a place like this would be the last place to criticize people for going top of the line.

Embrace the overkill.

'

Well this is the same place that compares power saving features and power draw for gaming cards when making a decision to buy one. So its not like its the first time mindsets was messed up here.

 

[Vesku]

I'd say more that everyone is in their own messed up situation. I play with bitcoin mining so the things I would be concerned with in regards to graphics cards will take into account having 3 running at full bore 24/7. If someone wants to cram a halo card into a pizza box case and obsess over making it as quiet as possible, well, I think your weird but more power to you.

 

[AdamK47]

Installed everything yesterday. Had a few problems related to the installation. I don't know if it's the cards or if it's PCI-E 3.0, but it doesn't like bus clock changes in the slightest. I was running a 105MHz base clock and was getting no video signal after powering on. Resetting the BIOS and setting it to an even 100MHz fixed it. Another problem related to installation is the HDMI audio from the cards. There are what seems like 50 million audio devices when using three of these cards. It causes huge delays when trying to open the Sound options from the control panel. It seems to poll every device which can cause it to take up to a minute to open the sound options. It can even take over a minute just to shut down the PC because of this. It normally takes between 2 to 3 seconds. Disabling all of them from the device manager fixed it.

I'll post more on my thoughts later... and boy do I have some thoughts about their drivers.

 

[bryanW1995]

I plan to make a similar move once there are custom 7970 cards available. Need those custom cards as I want a minimum of 1200core, preferably 1300 since I am aiming to go down from 3 cards to 2.

If you make the switch, please share some benchmark comparisons!

Per MLAA it works in any game AFAIK. Also FXAA works on AMD cards as well As well, you can use custom FXAA injectors to force it in games if you want.

How much faster is 2x7970 going to be for you? Your gtx 480s are already @ 580 speeds, right? And isnt the chief advantage of 3 cards that you don't get the super low mins and/MS?

 

[notty22]

I do all that with my SLI 460 setup. Disable the gpu/sound chips under system devices. Not just under sound. This way, when I uninstall or install the Nvidia driver, system never see's the gpu -on board sound chips. So driver installation never sees, asks or installs those drivers.
I also learned that, stability wise to lock the pci-e at 100mhz, was the best choice.

 

[Grooveriding]

How much faster is 2x7970 going to be for you? Your gtx 480s are already @ 580 speeds, right? And isnt the chief advantage of 3 cards that you don't get the super low mins and/MS?

It was never about avoiding microstutter for me having 3 cards, it was just a bonus, I don't notice MS as much as some people seem to. I see it in two games Crysis/Warhead and the STALKER series.

My cards are at stock 580 speeds. My plan is to get two 7970s that I can run at at least 1200 on the core.

You have to remember that after two cards scaling improvements drop off when you add a 3rd or 4th card. There is the odd exception where you get the sort of scaling you get out of the second card, but it's not the rule.

A 7970 at 1200core is 50% faster than one of my cards. So two at those speed in CF should be faster than my three cards so long as they are scaling well. Most of the reviews I've seen have shown the same good scaling shown in the 6XXX series so long as CF is working.

I also just want to run less cards. I'm not a benchmarker, I just play games. I just want to be able to take any game and put it on its highest settings and have it run well at my resolution. So two 7970s giving me 20-30% more performance than I have now is perfect with the games currently on the market.

 

[VtPC83]

I would get a 7970 and use a 1080p monitor because I care about MINIMUM frame rates.. Who cares about 70FPS MAX in games when they dip below 30 in certain circumstances...

 

[blackened23]

Installed everything yesterday. Had a few problems related to the installation. I don't know if it's the cards or if it's PCI-E 3.0, but it doesn't like bus clock changes in the slightest. I was running a 105MHz base clock and was getting no video signal after powering on. Resetting the BIOS and setting it to an even 100MHz fixed it. Another problem related to installation is the HDMI audio from the cards. There are what seems like 50 million audio devices when using three of these cards. It causes huge delays when trying to open the Sound options from the control panel. It seems to poll every device which can cause it to take up to a minute to open the sound options. It can even take over a minute just to shut down the PC because of this. It normally takes between 2 to 3 seconds. Disabling all of them from the device manager fixed it.

I'll post more on my thoughts later... and boy do I have some thoughts about their drivers.

Do a custom install of CCC and don't enable HDMI audio. Don't select it during installation. I had oddities as well with GTX 580 -- I always de-selected the HDMI audio driver during installation

 

[Grooveriding]

I always assumed the HDMI thing was just normal. I get 4 HDMI entries for each card I have. I don't disable them because I use the HDMI port as well. I guess I could disable the eight from the cards not outputting, but it causes me no issues.

 

[blackened23]

I always assumed the HDMI thing was just normal. I get 4 HDMI entries for each card I have. I don't disable them because I use the HDMI port as well. I guess I could disable the eight from the cards not outputting, but it causes me no issues.

What are you doing with NV cards in your PC? AMD not paying you enough to be the ringleader in charge of all of the shills here?

(i'm joking, all of those accusations were ridiculous)

 

[notty22]

Yes if you disable the correct ones, under system devices you won't see all the Nvidia high def audio controllers under sound.
I use the realtek m/b chip for sound and use the front audio jack for my headphones, and occasionally I would have to do some extra configuring after a driver update. System got confused what I was using basically.

 

[bryanW1995]

I don't want to 3 cards anymore, it's too much noise and heat. I'd prefer something a little more powerful and elegant in its footprint at the same time.



See above comment I want a reasonably quiet computer again. I am used to the noise from my rig at this point and mainly use headphones to game. But I'd like to stop hearing my wife tell me I turned on the blow dryer again when I fire up a game I wouldn't want to mess with an aftermarket cooler on my GPUs. I think I'd have to buy XFX anyways to have that covered by warranty and I am hoping an MSI Lightning type card will overclock better than what we've already seen.

It is so great going to a quiet rig when you've had a hair dryer for a year or two. I'm much more sensitive to noise now than I used to be, I think that I might be ready for WC one day soon...

 

[BallaTheFeared]

I love the look of blower cards, I haven't seen a custom one yet that looked better to me personally. However the noise they can create is just awful.

I don't think I'll go back to air cooling anything unless power draw/heat output gets so low I can OC to the limit with passive cooling.