Trade in R9 270x or...nah?

[Dive5885]

Ah, alright, well, I'd try to hold off a little bit -- a week or two -- and see if their stock gets any better. 

 

It's not even an issue. At sub 4k resolutions it makes no difference, and at 4k you shouldn't be buying a 970. 

I'm not familiar with the issue so I don't know much about it besides that people are complaining all over the place. 

[79wjd]

I'm not familiar with the issue so I don't know much about it besides that people are complaining all over the place. 

Basically the card was advertised with 4gb of VRAM, 2mb L2 Cache, and 64 ROPs. As it turns out there is 3.5gb main VRAM and then .5gb secondary VRAM, which has a much slower access time. Additionally the 970 only has 1.67mb L2 cache and 56 ROPs enabled (although the rest is still there). Whats been reported to have happened is the marketing team didn't realize the .3mb of cache and 8 ROPs were disabled on the 970. 

 

So now everyone's freaking out and a select few are fanboying hard.

Is it an issue? Performance-wise? Not really as you should buy a card based on the benchmarks -- which still haven't changed. The smaller amount of VRAM isn't even an issue at sub-4k resolutions, and seeing as the 970 doesn't handle 4k particularly well (even SLI 980s doesn't handle 4k well) you shouldn't be buying 970s and expecting 4k performance. 

 

Ethically? Yes, I can completely understand people being upset with Nvidia and giving them all kinds of shit -- thats fine. 

[TechnoNerd]

Ill wait a week. Im thinking either the MSI or EVGA 960...

[Dive5885]

Basically the card was advertised with 4gb of VRAM, 2mb L2 Cache, and 64 ROPs. As it turns out there is 3.5gb main VRAM and then .5gb secondary VRAM, which has a much slower access time. Additionally the 970 only has 1.67mb L2 cache and 56 ROPs enabled (although the rest is still there). Whats been reported to have happened is the marketing team didn't realize the .3mb of cache and 8 ROPs were disabled on the 970. 

 

So now everyone's freaking out and a select few are fanboying hard.

Is it an issue? Performance-wise? Not really as you should buy a card based on the benchmarks -- which still haven't changed. The smaller amount of VRAM isn't even an issue at sub-4k resolutions, and seeing as the 970 doesn't handle 4k particularly well (even SLI 980s doesn't handle 4k well) you shouldn't be buying 970s and expecting 4k performance. 

 

Ethically? Yes, I can completely understand people being upset with Nvidia and giving them all kinds of shit -- thats fine. 

I've heard nothing but good things about the 970, that's the only reason I said he should save up and get one.

[79wjd]

I've heard nothing but good things about the 970, that's the only reason I said he should save up and get one.

Like I said, this whole thing has been blown way out of proportion with people all uppity over how they're not getting the performance they paid for -- when in fact the performance is exactly the same as the it was launched. 

 

With that said, it's perfectly understandable for people to be upset with Nvidia and wanting a refund -- not because their card is crippled, but rather because they don't want to support Nvidia. However, thats not the case -- not with most people anyway. 

 

If you want an idea of the stupidity that I'm talking about, just skim through this thread...although, you'll probably be ready to shoot yourself after page 30 (the place I just couldn't take the bullshit anymore). http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/298855-official-nvidia-flat-out-lied-about-gtx-970-specs-has-56-rops-and-less-cache-than-adevrtised/