My personal experience with Nvidia and AMD

[xFluing]

Alright, so for the longest time I've been using AMD cards.

 

For about 3 years I've been using an R7 250 I had bought in desperate need for an upgrade (PC couldn't even run half life 2 on high without throttling), recently I bought two HD 7850s second hand, but I had to take them back because for some reason they've been cooked, and about at this time I've become more enthusiast than ever: I'd mess with contrast, brightness etc. in the driver settings, even was running overclocked off two monitors

 

However, it was only after I got this Nvidia card that I realized how limited Radeon Settings was in terms of image calibration (brightness / contrast sliders would only affect anything in increments of 5 which is so coarse it makes me sick) and video settings (90% of games couldn't have their settings forced), but with Nvidia, holy shit NVCP is my wet dream: the monitor calibration is so fine, and forcing video settings actually works.

 

So my conclusion, in the endless Nvidia vs AMD war is this:

If you're just a casual gamer, looking to just play games and not dabble into the nitty gritty of image calibration, just get whatever is in your budget.

If you're a tweaker / enthusiast, definitely go for Nvidia, this seems to be their target audience, at least until AMD fix their messy Radeon Settings.

[MedievalMatt]

5 minutes ago, xFluing said:

Alright, so for the longest time I've been using AMD cards.

 

For about 3 years I've been using an R7 250 I had bought in desperate need for an upgrade (PC couldn't even run half life 2 on high without throttling), recently I bought two HD 7850s second hand, but I had to take them back because for some reason they've been cooked, and about at this time I've become more enthusiast than ever: I'd mess with contrast, brightness etc. in the driver settings, even was running overclocked off two monitors

 

However, it was only after I got this Nvidia card that I realized how limited Radeon Settings was in terms of image calibration (brightness / contrast sliders would only affect anything in increments of 5 which is so coarse it makes me sick) and video settings (90% of games couldn't have their settings forced), but with Nvidia, holy shit NVCP is my wet dream: the monitor calibration is so fine, and forcing video settings actually works.

 

So my conclusion, in the endless Nvidia vs AMD war is this:

If you're just a casual gamer, looking to just play games and not dabble into the nitty gritty of image calibration, just get whatever is in your budget.

If you're a tweaker / enthusiast, definitely go for Nvidia, this seems to be their target audience, at least until AMD fix their messy Radeon Settings.

Except that overclocking nVidia cards is ultra terrible once you start going beyond their software limits.  Seriously nVidia, GPU current limits on the current limits.... Y THO.....

 

That said... i agree with all your other points.  Good day sir.

[Yoola]

No one should decide on anything just based on brand. If they objectively look at each product they're interested in, let them go for it. 

[App4that]

4 minutes ago, MedievalMatt said:

Except that overclocking nVidia cards is ultra terrible once you start going beyond their software limits.  Seriously nVidia, GPU current limits on the current limits.... Y THO.....

 

That said... i agree with all your other points.  Good day sir.

I completely disagree, Nvidia cards overclock much better than AMD. That's a blanket statement I can make.

 

Look at the 780 verses 290, 980ti verses Fury X, 1080 versus Vega 64.

[TheGlenlivet]

Owning both, the Nvidia software seems easier to deal with.  At least on a 10 series vs Vega.  Vega feels like it is still in development and they gave me the card to test the cooling solution they chose...

You can tell something isn't right when the first thing you do is under-volt it and you are stuck using wattman to do it...

[App4that]

4 minutes ago, valdyrgramr said:

As someone who has used both since the 90s, their drivers are both equal garbage that I have to pray to Thor that they don't bug out on me.  Or, I have to roll back to avoid a blue screen or keep a feat.

Ahhh, the "is it the new driver or Windows updating" game.

 

I hate that game...

[M300843499]

Drivers have been no issues with my R9, but finding a good driver to OC with it have been a bit of a pain, but it's a first world issue, stock it runs flawless.

[M300843499]

41 minutes ago, xFluing said:

Alright, so for the longest time I've been using AMD cards.

 

For about 3 years I've been using an R7 250 I had bought in desperate need for an upgrade (PC couldn't even run half life 2 on high without throttling), recently I bought two HD 7850s second hand, but I had to take them back because for some reason they've been cooked, and about at this time I've become more enthusiast than ever: I'd mess with contrast, brightness etc. in the driver settings, even was running overclocked off two monitors

 

However, it was only after I got this Nvidia card that I realized how limited Radeon Settings was in terms of image calibration (brightness / contrast sliders would only affect anything in increments of 5 which is so coarse it makes me sick) and video settings (90% of games couldn't have their settings forced), but with Nvidia, holy shit NVCP is my wet dream: the monitor calibration is so fine, and forcing video settings actually works.

 

So my conclusion, in the endless Nvidia vs AMD war is this:

If you're just a casual gamer, looking to just play games and not dabble into the nitty gritty of image calibration, just get whatever is in your budget.

If you're a tweaker / enthusiast, definitely go for Nvidia, this seems to be their target audience, at least until AMD fix their messy Radeon Settings.

??

 

[Princess Luna]

TL;DR

[xFluing]

8 hours ago, M300843499 said:

??

 

Move the birghtness / contrast sliders around, see how you only see any change once every 5 steps

 

Granted, kinda the same happens with nvidia, with it going 2-3 steps at once, but it's much finer than with radeon settings.

[DeLorian]

11 hours ago, App4that said:

Ahhh, the "is it the new driver or Windows updating" game.

 

I hate that game...

It's a classic game for sure.

[Peskanova]

I've purchased a rx 480 8gb at msrp (260 euros/dollars) and paired with a 2500k and now i'm using a 4790k with a 1070 , (and my gf has a 1060) I can tell that AMD has best bang for buck and raw performance on that price but you cant let a amd card without a few tweaks.
 

AMD > NVIDIA on price / performance ratio but with green team you can purchase a card and use almost full potential without a tweak.

[Sakkura]

16 hours ago, xFluing said:

However, it was only after I got this Nvidia card that I realized how limited Radeon Settings was in terms of image calibration (brightness / contrast sliders would only affect anything in increments of 5 which is so coarse it makes me sick) and video settings (90% of games couldn't have their settings forced), but with Nvidia, holy shit NVCP is my wet dream: the monitor calibration is so fine, and forcing video settings actually works.

 

Radeon Settings lets you adjust brightness, contrast, saturation etc. in increments of 1. So I don't know WTF you're talking about.

[xFluing]

25 minutes ago, Sakkura said:

 

Radeon Settings lets you adjust brightness, contrast, saturation etc. in increments of 1. So I don't know WTF you're talking about.

Those "increments" of 1 do jack shit, the only steps they do anything in is "5"

[Sakkura]

1 minute ago, xFluing said:

Those "increments" of 1 do jack shit, the only steps they do anything in is "5"

Works on my end.

 

Remember this depends on your monitor settings. There's only so much granularity to go around.

[xFluing]

5 minutes ago, Sakkura said:

Works on my end.

 

Remember this depends on your monitor settings. There's only so much granularity to go around.

OK so, moving around the sliders would do nothing, not in +/-1 neither in +/-2 +/-3 OR +/-4, it's only at +/-5 that I see any change happening, and it's very big, however with nvidia it's much more granular, a +/-5 on nvidia does not look as drastic as a +/-5 on AMD. I would record a video for an example, but I don't have the AMD card on me currently, besides nvcp also comes with gamma, something completely missing from radeon settings, setting which I've used more than once on both my monitors.

 

Edit: and yeah this AMD issue happens with both of the monitors, so the monitor being the issue is out of the question.

[Sakkura]

2 minutes ago, xFluing said:

OK so, moving around the sliders would do nothing, not in +/-1 neither in +/-2 +/-3 OR +/-4, it's only at +/-5 that I see any change happening, and it's very big, however with nvidia it's much more granular, a +/-5 on nvidia does not look as drastic as a +/-5 on AMD. I would record a video for an example, but I don't have the AMD card on me currently, besides nvcp also comes with gamma, something completely missing from radeon settings, setting which I've used more than once on both my monitors.

 

Edit: and yeah this AMD issue happens with both of the monitors, so the monitor being the issue is out of the question.

Works on both of my monitors. The problem is on your end.

 

Gamma is built into Windows already.

 

Really seems like you just haven't calibrated your monitors properly.

[xFluing]

3 minutes ago, Sakkura said:

Works on both of my monitors. The problem is on your end.

 

Gamma is built into Windows already.

 

Really seems like you just haven't calibrated your monitors properly.

Windows's gamma setting is a fucking joke, I mean it does the job right, but it has no steps on it, no marks on it, just whatever, and getting those dots to disappear every single time is a pain

 

I would have calibrated properly if AMD allowed me to  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Seriously now, all jokes aside, the AMD calibration did do its job well enough, however Nvidia just does it better.

[AngryBeaver]

17 hours ago, MedievalMatt said:

Except that overclocking nVidia cards is ultra terrible once you start going beyond their software limits.  Seriously nVidia, GPU current limits on the current limits.... Y THO.....

 

That said... i agree with all your other points.  Good day sir.

Good thing we have non-reference cards then with modded bios's for much higher power limits... some of them even do it automatically by just selecting the secondary bios on the card.

 

So yes, Nvidia did put some blocks in place, but this was more to make it harder to fry a card for your average person just wanting higher performance. For the true enthusiasts there are ways around these "blocks" so that you can crank the power even higher.

[Humbug]

Meh, modern day Radeon settings + drivers surpasses Nvidia in my experience. But both are ok though. I wouldn't base my buying decision on that.

 

I would base it on individual products in your price range.

e.g.

RX 580 vs GTX 1060

Vega56 vs GTX 1070

Vega64 vs GTX 1080

Above are just examples assuming MSRP (which is not reality today).

My point is never go into a buying decision thinking AMD is better or vice versa. Rather compare the individual product and consider your use case.

 

So in practice this would be something like

RX580 performs similar to GTX 1060. Maybe since I dual boot Linux I will pick the RX580 since it works better out of the box with great open source drivers.

Vega56 performs similar to GTX 1070.  I will just take my pick based on which AIB model I prefer. Or based on whether I have a freesync or gsync monitor.

Vega64 performs similar to GTX 1080. But I can overclock the GTX 1080 more to surpass the Vega64 and it takes a lot less power. So I pick nvidia.

 

Above are just examples of the correct logic to use when choosing a graphics card. You compare products for your use case. Don't go in thinking Nvidia vs AMD.

[AngryBeaver]

27 minutes ago, Humbug said:

Meh, modern day Radeon settings + drivers surpasses Nvidia in my experience. But both are ok though. I wouldn't base my buying decision on that.

 

I would base it on individual products in your price range.

e.g.

RX 580 vs GTX 1060

Vega56 vs GTX 1070

Vega64 vs GTX 1080

Above are just examples assuming MSRP (which is not reality today).

My point is never go into a buying decision thinking AMD is better or vice versa. Rather compare the individual product and consider your use case.

 

So in practice this would be something like

RX580 performs similar to GTX 1060. Maybe since I dual boot Linux I will pick the RX580 since it works better out of the box with great open source drivers.

Vega56 performs similar to GTX 1070.  I will just take my pick based on which AIB model I prefer. Or based on whether I have a freesync or gsync monitor.

Vega64 performs similar to GTX 1080. But I can overclock the GTX 1080 more to surpass the Vega64 and it takes a lot less power. So I pick nvidia.

 

Above are just examples of the correct logic to use when choosing a graphics card. You compare products for your use case. Don't go in thinking Nvidia vs AMD.

I figure I can chime in on this one.

 

Nvidia has had some pretty solid drivers and outside of a couple bad drivers they quickly fixed... their drivers tend to be pretty solid.

 

Amd drivers have gotten much better over the years, they still aren't the best, but they are years better than they were.

 

So after that little break down, I personally prefer the Nvidia drivers and even the software that goes with it like Geforce experience.

 

Now your break down with card comparisons is pretty accurate. There is another thing I feel needs to be mentioned. 

 

Right now Nvidia hards have a great deal more raw horsepower in most circumstances, but when it comes to DX12 AMD has a much better async computing solution... so they have big gains in FPS and Performance in games that take advantage of that technology.

 

So this means that a 580 can beat a 1060 in a dx12 game and similar down the line. Now the Nvidia cards don't do poorly, just they do not see the gains currently between dx11 and dx12 like AMD cards do. I fully expect to see this change as nvidia finally adapts and pushed for better async performance.