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Hey forum! I'll bulid a PC in about 1-2 months and i wanted to ask you which of these builds are better. The highest resolution i'll be playing will be 1920x1080. But i'm also looking for the most upgradable platform. This system will be used for light video editing and gaming. Build 1: CPU: Intel Core i5-4670 MOBO:Asus B85M-G RAM: Kingston HyperX Fury 2x4GB GPU: MSI GTX 760 2GB Case: Cooler Master Force 500 PSU: XFX ProSeries 450W Bronze HDD: WD Blue 1TB Build 2: CPU: AMD FX-8320 MOBO: Asus M5A97 LE R2.0 RAM: Kingston HyperX Fury 2x4GB GPU: XFX DD R9 280X Case: Force 500 PSU: XFX ProSeries 650W HDD: WD Blue 1TB

I brought a new r9 280x recently as an upgrade to 2x HD7870's in Crossfire (if you can call that an upgrade) and long story short the sodding thing is proving a bitch to overlclock past stock voltages. I have a reasonable amount of overclocking experience now, going through at least 3 generations of Amd cards my self and overclocking multipul different cards for friends. Here is the list of things I am using:- Asus Radeon R9 280X DirectCU II TOP VBIOS 015.041.000.000.000000 Catalyst 14.4 RC1 (Driver Packaging Version 14.10.1006-140417a-171099C) My goals or ideal overclock for this card would be something like the following: Core Clock 1175-1200 Mhz Memory Clock 1675-1700 Mhz Core Voltage 1.3v For comparison stock is: Core Clock 1070 Mhz Memory Clock 1600 Mhz Core Voltage 1.2v The first problem I am having with this card is getting the Core Voltage to actually get to and stay at 1.3V. Asus's GPU tweak manages to get it to about 1.25V, which I am reading in Asus Tweak's monitor thing and in GPU-z. I managed to get about 1.285 when using MSI Afterburner and setting voltage to be forced constant. I also tried 1.550V on the Memory as well, however none of these seem to be very stable and jump anywhere from their stock setting, halfway to the Voltages I set. The second problem, which is related to the first one is that the auto fan curve is the most stupid thing in the world, not even budging past 40% fan speed at 85 Degrees Celsius. My guess is this problem is being caused by the VBIOS or Driver, but I'm not 100% sure. There is LOADS of space around the card and it is inside a HAF X case with 1000000 Fans, so .... yeah. The way these problems are related is with throttling, if I set and relative high OC and leave the fan at auto, the Voltages will start relatively close to what I set them to be, as the card gets hotter (Testing in Furmark, to ensure no BSOD when gaming), artefacts start to appear then eventually a the black lines of death, everything else on the PC is running the the graphics are fucked, so I have to turn the PC off at the case. The magic temperature that is appears to crash at every time is about 70-75 degrees, with heavy voltage drop down to bellow stock sometimes at about 72 degrees. I have tried manual fan settings of 80 degrees flat, but eventually it reaches the magic 70-75 degrees area and *poof*. I realise that Furmark exaggerates temperatures immensely, so I am not really that bothered if the card reaches 95 degrees in Furmark because it will never reach about 65-75 in games. The way I see what is happening is that the card is throttling itself at 70-75 degrees and reducing voltage to reduce the temperature, therefore making the clock speeds unsustainable. (IT IS DEFINITELY NOT A POWER PROBLEM AS THE CARD HAS A 1000W POWER SUPPLY ALL TO ITS SELF.) The only solutions I see are to set the Core Voltage at a constant 1.3V in the VBIOS somehow (don't really know what I am doing with that yet, but I can work it out) or to try different VBIOS versions and versions of Catalyst. I don't really know where to start and would greatly appreciate some advice

Hey guys. I am planning on buying an R9 280, however a challenge I am am encountering is whether to choose the XFX, edition which boasts the same stream processors, and memory clock speed as the MSI edition, or the MSI edition which has a higher core clock speed (1000MHz vs 850MHz) but for an extra £35. Is it worth spending that extra bit for 20% higher core clock speed? (If there are any other matters that I should seriously consider like cooling please inform me, I haven't done lots of research but this is the main difference) Any help would be much appreciated, Many thanks Gannicius XFX: http://xfxforce.com/en-us/products/amd-radeon-r9-series/amd-radeon-r9-280x-double-dissipation-edition-r9-280x-tdfd MSI: http://uk.msi.com/product/vga/R9_280X_GAMING_3G.html#hero-overview

Hi guys, So a while back I overclocked my Sapphire r9 280x Dual-X graphics card. The other day, I reinstalled windows onto a new SSD and it seems my clock was sent back to stock (At least that's what GPU Tweak told me). No biggie, I reinstalled GPU Tweak and the GPU Drivers (Did this right after windows install), and re-overclocked the card (Pic below). I then noticed that my GPU Voltage was at 1300mV, but that I could technically increase it to 1400mV. Is this a really bad idea? Or would it be ok? Thanks guys EDIT: I know GPU Tweak says my card is a Matrix 7970, I think it's just a bug, GPU-Z recognises the card correctly

I plan to build a configuration with: Hadron Air - small case limits airflow and only comes with a 500w gold rated power supply i5 4690k Noctua NH-U9B SE2 ASUS Z97i-PLUS 8gb Patriot Memory 128 gb Samsung 840 EVO 2 x Noctua NF-S12B FLX Case Fans Here are my current pros and cons for each card: PNY Enthusiast Edition GTX 760: Pros: Blower-style fan configuration is excellent for the hadron air, therefore lower temps and quieter More features and support compared to AMD, especially better optimization for Early Access Steam Games Cons: Not as good value for money as the R9 280x (they are the same price when bought used) MSI R9 280x: Pros: Significant boost in performance compared to GTX 760 Cons: Lots of reliability issues as described by Newegg reviews of the card having artifacting issues and having terrible RMA process Traditional fan configuration - not optimal for Hadron Air's compact space If you have any other suggestions (although these cards to my knowledge best fit my tight budget and configuration) or want to refute any information I've given above, then list them below. Otherwise, I would very much appreciate the help of this community in deciding the video card for my build.

Hi Guys & Gals The question i wanna ask is at the moment ive got an Intel Core i5 4670k and a Radeon 7850 Saphire 2GB i'm planning to upgrade the graphics card to a GTX 770 or an R9 280x got about £350 to spend on a new graphics card, new cpu cooler and more ram should i leave my graphics card and just upgrade my cpu or should i upgrade the graphics card and leave the cpu do you think this graphics card will still be good a few years to come with an upgraded cpu or just change graphics card

Hello, my question is: How much power does the Windforce R9 280X consumes on Max Load?

I just bought my graphics card for my computer build, and the sag on this card is pretty heavy. I have some wooden dowels to use as a support on the plastic fan frame. The area around the fans are pretty solid, and I think they will support the card well. It would have a layer of foam between the card and the wood. The model is a MSI twin frozr 280x 6gb edition. The sag worries me, and would this also be an adequate response to it.

Hello everyone, I'm Planning to build a new pc in July and maybe having it last for at least 3 years Anyways I have been planning this rig for the past few weeks, after countless hours debating with myself if I should just wait for next gen, but since maxwell and broadwell are well out of the way, i have decided to stick with these. Would love to receive some tips of what i think is a well rounded/balanced rig. I'm ordering these parts from Amazon UK and shipping them to Malta and my budget is around 2000$ max including monitor (peripherals are taken care off) I will be buying an NZXT Sentry mix 2, NZXT rgb lights and replacing fans with better ones later on as well, but aesthetics and a slight performance bump comes later. Parts: Case: Corsair 450D Motherboard: Asus Maximus VII Hero CPU: i5-4690k Devil's Canyon Ram: 1x8GB corsair Dominator 1866 ram (upgrading to 16GB later if needed/for looks) Cooler: Corsair H100i PSU: Corsair RM750 SSD/HDD: Samsung 840 Evo 250GB Monitor: Asus VX 239 H (adding another one in the near future) The dilemma i have is the GPU, With the recent game releases demanding more and more VRAM, such as Watch Dogs, whom uses about 3.5GB of VRAM (which is a shit ton) the Asus GTX 760 Striker Platinum seems like a really compelling choice, But for 230GBP, You can either buy an Asus R9-280X which i heard a lot of bad stuff about after a few months of use or even immediately and finally The MSI GTX 770 (the Asus looks bad) which offers a better core but less ram at a mere 10GBP more. so it's: Asus GTX 760 Striker Platinum or Asus R9-280X or MSI GTX 770 Again, really appreciate if you can give me a second opinion on this! BTW I'm installing Windows 7 on this but i already have a new copy.

Hi. I was wondering if there are any Heatsink out there, who will fit the XFX R9 280X DD. It don't have to be made specialy for the card, just one who fit and doesn't cost like $1 million. I would also like to know, if the NZXT G10 or the upcomming Corsair mounting bracket will fit and work. Hope you guys can help me :-)

I've been shopping around for an R9 280X, the average price appears to be to MSI card for approximately £215, however this XFX card is £35 cheaper, and I can't help doubt that this may have been listed incorrectly? http://www.amazon.co.uk/XFX-Express-Graphics-2xDVI-2xm-DP/dp/B00FSC5N66/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1403729008&sr=8-1&keywords=r9+280x Any help would be much appreciated Many thanks Gannicius

can some one tell me what water block i can use for Radeon™ R9 280X Gaming BF4 3GB GDDR5

Hi everyone! I am new to customizing computers and had a quick question regarding a build I am working on. I am gathering parts for a mid-level $1300 build right now and have decided to go with the 6GB Twin Frozyr OC R9 280x graphics card from MSI. The card was on sale for about the same price as the 3GB card so I decided to pick it up. It, according to the benchmarks and reviews I have seen, will suit my current gaming needs however, I may decide to pick up another card and crossfire it should the need arise in the future. My question for you guys is, are the 3GB and 6GB cards compatible for crossfire? Or would I need to get a second 6GB card for them to be crossfired? (Note: I am not as familiar with crossfire functionality as I am with SLI so don't judge!). Many Thanks, -a new guy

Hi all, This is my first post on here; I only just started getting into the "pc building scene." I just built my first PC. Needless to say it was a lot of fun. I plugged my 24" TEAC 1080p TV as my (temporary) display via HDMI and it looked great to start with. However, while I was setting up storage and customising my computer, when the display suddenly cut out for a second. When it came back, I instantly noticed that it now had a large black border about 15mm thick, and that the display on the screen was very blurry and fuzzy. I thought the issue may have been the drivers of my GPU (because I hadn't installed them yet), but when I installed them, nothing changed. I have fiddled around with over/underscan and that has removed the border, and I enabled ClearType which has made it tolerable. Basically, it looks like it is being horribly upscaled to fit the 1920x1080 res that it listed both on Windows display settings and the AMD Control Catalyst software. My graphics card is an XFX r9 280x. My motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-970A-D3P. The mobo only has PCIe 2.0 slots, but I found on various forums that that wouldn't make much of a difference. Please correct me if I'm wrong about this. My little brother is out at the moment, so I might "borrow" his monitor so I can see if it just an issue with the TV, which I hope it is. I'd appreciate any help or knowledge you may have about this. Thanks, lvskii

Hello! It's time for an upgrade and I want to buy a new GPU and i wanted something good and well priced...so i came down to these 3 options: 250Euro: ASUS R9 280X DIRECT CU 2 235Euro: ASUS GTX 760 2GB DIRECT CU 2 OC 230Euro: ASUS R9 280 DIRECT CU 2 TOP I know that the 280x is the fastest for gaming generally but does it worth the extra money? I'll appreciate any opinion. Thank you.

simple question but couldn't find it on the amd site.

planning on building a nice mini itx console killer. i selected a i5 4440 right now but the X4 760K is way cheaper! will the X4 760K reduce the performance of the R9 280X? what gpu can it handle max? and what about the kaveri apu's are they any better when combined with a high end gpu?

Should i buy the RM 850 or the RM 1000 from Corsair so i can make in future more upgrades without buying a new PSU in 3-5 years? AMD FX-6350 2x AMD Radeon R9 280x in crossfire and all the other parts

So guys, I am thinking about buying Sapphire Radeon R9 280x Vapor-X Tri-X from pccasegear.com. Can anyone here who has bought something from the tell me that whether or not they can be trusted in buying hardware. Because it is an Australian site and I will use the card in Turkey, so I won't have a chance, or I will need to pay a lot, to send it back if they send me defective card. Have you stumbled apon an occasion where they sent a defective card? Also, are the prices on their site in Australian Dollars, or American Dollars, because 299 AUD seems very very cheap for this card. That is the reason why I am considering to buy a card from halfway across the world. Any comment is appreciated. http://www.pccasegear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=193_1642&products_id=30668