I would have to say that i was in the same predicament as you are.. i just purchased a MSI z87-g45 gaming motherboard and was wondering which graphic card would best compliment it.. I've had 4 radeon cards in the past and to be honest i really liked them. My friends had nvidia cards and on occasion i would go green seeing Physx running on a few games. Now as far as performance is concerned in my opinion anything that is able to give you 60+ frames is great (unless your doing 3d gaming), and beyond that it would be the additional perks of the card that will make it a selling point. If you are an astute gamer then i believe you might be able to spot the difference between 60fps and 90 fps, and if you are just looking at fps numbers, i would suggest you take a look at guru3d's review on the 770 first. I personally will be going for the msi 770 gaming.. it compliments my motherboard (although you might not really care about that one!!), and more importantly i think the price to performance value is quite good. In the long run if i do find gaming quite difficult, i could pair it with another 770, which i think.. should be as good as a 690 in performance.. although i could be wrong.