[Meta] Can we stop the GTX 960 circlejerk?

[Suika]

I think I sniff a brainwashed fanboy!

You know, you really don't come off as having any less bias towards a company when you call others fanboys, especially since OP mentioned how the 285 and 280 are still very good options if within the right price point.

[AlexWJD]

You know, you really don't come off as having any less bias towards a company when you call others fanboys, especially since OP mentioned how the 285 and 280 are still very good options if within the right price point.

 

Its like people don't read my post....wait....

[Majestic]

I think I sniff a brainwashed fanboy!

 

So much projection you can start your own cinema.

[MageTank]

Please read the whole post before commenting

 

I just want to stop the hate for the 960, its not a bad card! It costs the same as the 280/285 counterparts, it mainly beats the 280, and is very competitive with the 285. And I mean very. 

 

First, our favorite article on the 960 benchmarks:

http://www.eurogamer...-gtx-960-review

 

Here is also a video from our favorite tech reviewer:

 

First off, let me say that the 285 and 960 are both better in average to the 280. 3GB VRAM means nothing if the raw GPU power isn't there. I don't really like to recommend the 280 anymore, as the 285/960 will yield better performance at the same price. The VRAM on the 280 won't last if the raw power can't last. Moving on, let me address some common circlejerk digs towards the 960.

 

Q: 128bit bus is not enough!

A: Of course it is. The bus even utilizes all of the VRAM in the 4GB cards. You guys seem to like to state the year we live in, so I'll try it here. It's 2015 people, we don't need a 256bit bus to manage 2 or even 4GB's of memory.

 

Q: 2GB is not enough! Games require more!

A: Well then how does the 285 beat the 280 9/10 times? Games will use how much VRAM your GPU has. If it has 2GB, it will yearn to use the 2GB. If its 3GB, it will use 3GB. I do agree 100% that in the future the memory size standard will increase, but not now. 2GB is still excellent for a budget card. 

 

Q: The price to performance is shit!

A: The 285/280/960 all cost within $10 of each other without rebates. And looking at my video and article above, this question is already answered.

 

Q: 2GB will not last! It will be obsolete by next year! 

A: Nope. Remember our good friend, the GTX 660? Well its still kicking strong after 3 years with 2GB of VRAM and a lot less GPU power. It still can do BF4 at generous settings.

 

Have more questions on the 960? Leave them below, I will always have an answer!

 

Conclusion:  960 is a great card, along with the 280 and 285. If you're recommending the latter two, which sometimes fall to the 960 (In GTA:V especially) then isn't it logical to recommend the 960 as well? Don't talk about subjects in which you have no knowledge in. 

 

Edit: the overclocking the potential of the 960 is worth a note as well. A decent OC'd 960 will flat out beat an OC'd 285/280. 

 

Also the R9 280X, yeah thats another post for another evening. 

 

http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/334258-why-the-gtx-960-isnt-bad/

 

Stop with these repeat posts Alex, we have been over this before. Stop trying to force your opinion on the masses, and stop trying to justify your purchase. 

 

The people that insult the 960 do so with a valid point, in that the card was supposed to be a valid upgrade over the previous kepler cards of its class, but it was not. It is barely faster than a GTX 670, and its hardly faster than a GTX 760 (in some cases, the 760 has been shown to out perform the 960). This is where the "hate" comes from. It is a card that has very little value in most people's machines. It's TDP is only slightly lower than a 970, so SFF enthusiasts will not find comfort in choosing it over a 970. It's price:performance is still awful when you actually pay attention to the other options. It is also a card that is stuck in a dying resolution standard. 1080p is being left behind by many gamers, and the 960 is pretty much at its knee's trying to drive the latest titles at 1080p on ultra. Do not even mention trying to use SLI as a solution, because 2gb x 2gb = 2gb, and you wont be running 4k with 2 960's.

 

You are almost as bad as @zappian when he did those repeated "the i3 is an amazing CPU" threads. You are talking on a tech forum where plenty of people know what they are talking about. Nobody is insulting the 960 for the things it can do. We insult it for the things that it should have been able to do, but cannot.

[Whorax]

You should try it sometimes, it makes you seems like less of an imbecile later.

 

Also my title isn't hostile? Did I rustle your jimmies?

Ah, insults. I'll leave now since it would appear you can't be civil.

[Kinda Bottlenecked]

 

Errrr.... just no. 

That's the price in my country anyway. Its hard to like a 960 with its price like that in my country. Poor 960, getting all the flack for its pricing. 

[zappian]

Post purchase rationalization and justifying purchases lol.

 

Cheapest 960:

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

 

Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 960 2GB Video Card  ($181.79 @ Amazon) 

Total: $181.79

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-04-21 11:51 EDT-0400

 

Cheapest 280x:

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

 

Video Card: Gigabyte Radeon R9 280X 3GB Video Card  ($221.98 @ Newegg) 

Total: $221.98

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-04-21 11:52 EDT-0400

 

40 dollars more expensive.

What do you get with 40 dollars:

 

-3 GB of VRAM.

-Triple the bus size.

-12% more performance.

 

[Trik'Stari]

The 960 a good value?

[Whorax]

You know, you really don't come off as having any less bias towards a company when you call others fanboys, especially since OP mentioned how the 285 and 280 are still very good options if within the right price point.

I only assume others are fanboys when they come up with titles sided towards a certain brand card that they know people will click because they're so asinine.  

So much projection you can start your own cinema.

Thanks! I'll give you some credit if I ever put that idea into motion since you thought of it.

[Briggsy]

People hate on the 960 because they/we were expecting a 192 bit, 3GB card that would trample the 280x. Instead you have a 760 with less power consumption and lower manufacturing cost (higher profit margin for Nvidia). Is it a good card and well priced (at least here in canada)? yes. Is it as good as we hoped for? no.

[stconquest]

Now you're again projecting because you only judge the arguments based on your preference and do not consider someone might share a different opinion about said arguments. Meanwhile sounding like a total douchebag by attacking me personally and calling my posts useless. Way to go.

 

I don't know what you are saying... but pointless again.

[Suika]

-3 GB of VRAM.

-Triple the bus size.

-12% more performance.

1) The only benchmarks I've seen that making a real difference on is 4K. The 960 is a 1080p card. Please, don't tell me you can see and understand the future, either, because we really don't know for a fact that 1080p will require 3GB.

 

2) Bus size is irrelevant, please come back with a real "feature." The 128-bit bus the 960 holds can run 4GB without an issue, thanks to NVIDIA's memory compression methods.

 

3) 12% performance increase for a 22% cost increase. Were you saying that the 280X is a better price to performance? 

 

Finally, PNY has a 960 for $179. It's a couple dollars, but it's a decent GPU regardless.

 

I only assume others are fanboys when they come up with titles sided towards a certain brand card that they know people will click because they're so asinine. 

Don't assume, read the content before making a conclusion. Otherwise, you don't look like you're free of bias, either.

[Octavialicious]

The GTX 960 starts at $179 without rebates. Tell me more about how much cheaper the 280X is. The 4GB card also starts at $210 and while it's not more powerful than the 280X, it can still trade blows in specific titles.

 

I wonder, the other day I was test benching a GTX 560 Ti with 1.28GB of VRAM. It ran the majority of my games completely fine, it even ran Far Cry 3 on 1080 with the same settings my 780 could (30FPS was consistent and playable, but not as good...), but... that's impossible, 2GB 3GB is the 1080p standard!

The cheapest is $190, unless you want a crappy PNY XLR8. $20 more is a pretty damn good price for the performance increase.

[MageTank]

People hate on the 960 because they/we were expecting a 192 bit, 3GB card that would trample the 280x. Instead you have a 760 with less power consumption and lower manufacturing cost (higher profit margin for Nvidia). Is it a good card and well priced (at least here in canada)? yes. Is it as good as we hoped for? no.

 

^This. This is where the animosity towards the 960 comes from. In our eyes, it was supposed to be better. It was rumored to be better. It had no reason not to be better after seeing what Nvidia could do with the 970, and where its Price:Performance stood. It just fell short, and it was not a viable upgrade for many people. If you owned a 670 or higher, or a 760 or higher, there was no point in buying the 960. Hell, if you had a 660 or 750 Ti, you were still doing decent at 1080p, might as well save up another $100 and get a 1440p card like the GTX 970, or an AMD equivalent and be even happier as time progressed. The 960 let a lot of people down.

 

It is still a good card for someone needing a GPU on a budget, and are not upgrading from something that is already capable of handling 1080p games on medium-high. If you need a new GPU on the cheap, then the 960 can deliver that to you. It just was supposed to be more than this.

[Whorax]

1) The only benchmarks I've seen that making a real difference on is 4K. The 960 is a 1080p card. Please, don't tell me you can see and understand the future, either, because we really don't know for a fact that 1080p will require 3GB.

 

2) Bus size is irrelevant, please come back with a real "feature." The 128-bit bus the 960 holds can run 4GB without an issue, thanks to NVIDIA's memory compression methods.

 

3) 12% performance increase for a 22% cost increase. Were you saying that the 280X is a better price to performance? 

 

Finally, PNY has a 960 for $179. It's a couple dollars, but it's a decent GPU regardless.

 

Don't assume, read the content before making a conclusion. Otherwise, you don't look like you're free of bias, either.

Had OP not made the presentation of the topic so silly I probably would have taken the time to read it. "Can we stop the GTX 960 circlejerk?" isn't the most flame war resistant title.

[zappian]

1) The only benchmarks I've seen that making a real difference on is 4K. The 960 is a 1080p card. Please, don't tell me you can see and understand the future, either, because we really don't know for a fact that 1080p will require 3GB.

 

2) Bus size is irrelevant, please come back with a real "feature." The 128-bit bus the 960 holds can run 4GB without an issue, thanks to NVIDIA's memory compression methods(kek).

 

3) 12% performance increase for a 22% cost increase. Were you saying that the 280X is a better price to performance? 

 

Finally, PNY has a 960 for $179. It's a couple dollars, but it's a decent GPU regardless.

 

Don't assume, read the content before making a conclusion. Otherwise, you don't look like you're free of bias, either.

 

12% of performance and 1 GB of VRAM .

Sounds like a good deal to me for 40 dollars.

Try to play GTA V at 1080p on a gtx 960.

The gtx 970 is a great card I have no issues with it but the 960 is just MEH.

[Majestic]

Zappian just hates maxwell. I still remember his 970 3.5GB nervous breakdown really well /adhominem.

 

Anyone arguing either card is better, is biased. Neither is better, and it's up to personal preference to determine which one is better for who.

Because if you're bringing up GTA 5, which had some of the worst day-one drivers on the AMD side of things, you're clearly not being objective.

[Hodor]

1) The only benchmarks I've seen that making a real difference on is 4K. The 960 is a 1080p card. Please, don't tell me you can see and understand the future, either, because we really don't know for a fact that 1080p will require 3GB.

 

2) Bus size is irrelevant, please come back with a real "feature." The 128-bit bus the 960 holds can run 4GB without an issue, thanks to NVIDIA's memory compression methods.

 

3) 12% performance increase for a 22% cost increase. Were you saying that the 280X is a better price to performance? 

 

Finally, PNY has a 960 for $179. It's a couple dollars, but it's a decent GPU regardless.

 

Don't assume, read the content before making a conclusion. Otherwise, you don't look like you're free of bias, either.

If you look at the graph you will see that r9 280x performs 15% better not 12%. Fanboy much?

[MageTank]

Zappian just hates maxwell. I remember his 970 nervous breakdown really well /adhominem.

 

Anyone arguing either card is better, is biased. Neither is better, and it's up to personal preference to determine which one is better for who.

 

I disagree slightly. Personal preference might play some part in peoples choices, but the most logical choice at all time should be price:performance. It should come before anything for consumers on a budget, and these two choices are aimed towards people on a budget anyways. That being said, time plays a very important factor in these choices. What is a cheaper option today, could cost more tomorrow. The more expensive card could go on sale tomorrow, making it the better choice at the time. I know some people have other means for buying things, such as aesthetics and performance per watt, etc, but i still advise people to get the best for their dollar. 

[stconquest]

Zappian just projects her hate for maxwell. I remember his 970 nervous breakdown really well /adhominem. 

 

*fixed

 

 

Now, from my original post:

 

...

 

R9280, R9 285 or GTX 960, simply put:  buy what you want from these mid-range options and enjoy a very decent gaming experience.

 

 

...

 

Anyone arguing either card is better, is biased. Neither is better, and it's up to personal preference to determine which one is better for who.

 

Sounds like we are saying the same thing... weird

[Suika]

 

The cheapest is $190, unless you want a crappy PNY XLR8. $20 more is a pretty damn good price for the performance increase.

The MSI GTX 960 is $181, and the PNY XLR8 will run the card fine at stock, but would probably have a lot less headroom for overclocking. Linus himself has stated that he's had a good experience with PNY, though his experience may be skewed from review samples. I've otherwise not heard anything wrong with PNY.

 

Again, you're getting a 12% performance increase (on average) for a 16% higher cost. Price to performance isn't much different but favors the 960 ever so slightly. Both are good cards in the right price brackets.

 

12% of performance and 1 GB of VRAM .

Sounds like a good deal to me for 40 dollars.

Try to play GTA V at 1080p on a gtx 960.

The gtx 970 is a great card I have no issues with it but the 960 is just MEH.

1) So you're paying a premium for the 280X. If you have the $40, spend it, if you have an extra $140 get a GTX 970. Not everybody will have or want to spend the money.

2) While I couldn't find direct 960 benchmarks, the GTX 770 seems to match the R9 280X and HD 7970 GHz in GTA V with both normal and very high textures. That 1GB of VRAM doesn't seem to mean anything to GTAV on 1080p.

3) The 960 is just as good as the other cards in the price range. You get what you pay for.

[Jaybird]

OP is comparing the 960 to the 280/285, you saw that? 

nope. i saw 960. but i bought a 970 so im comparing the 970 to a 960   970 is good deal. 

[Suika]

If you look at the graph you will see that r9 280x performs 15% better not 12%. Fanboy much?

You know, you really don't come off as having any less bias towards a company when you call others fanboys.

 

I only mentioned 12% because Zappian made the mistake, and I followed without verifying on the graph. Please bring something productive to the conversation rather than name calling.

[Majestic]

I disagree slightly. Personal preference might play some part in peoples choices, but the most logical choice at all time should be price:performance. It should come before anything for consumers on a budget, and these two choices are aimed towards people on a budget anyways. That being said, time plays a very important factor in these choices. What is a cheaper option today, could cost more tomorrow. The more expensive card could go on sale tomorrow, making it the better choice at the time. I know some people have other means for buying things, such as aesthetics and performance per watt, etc, but i still advise people to get the best for their dollar. 

 

Price/performance or price/value? I'd say the latter is the most interesting. Raw performance can come at a cost and can blind you to other benefits. Nvidia's day-one drivers are generally better, the 10-15% performance gap the 280(X) has is mostly elievated by overclocking (which is piss easy on the 960). The memorybus isn't a bottleneck for the 970, so it's not a bottleneck for the 960 either. 

 

So it boils down to preference. You can either choose for;

 

960;

-High Overclocking (1.5+ ghz pretty much guaranteed)

-Shadowplay

-Gsync

-2GB memory

-fanless idle

-low heat output (so less airflow req.)

-lower power supply required

 

280

-Freesync

-3GB memory

-Mantle (though in most mantle titles nvidia's DX11 driver is just as good).

-.... i got nothing.

 

That is not meant as a stab, I just don't really know what else AMD has going for it. So help me fill in.

[Thorium19]

The 960 isn't inherently a bad card, it's just priced wrongly considering the 280X is the same price here in the UK and the 280 is £20 less. The overclocking potential of the 960 is outstanding, as is the efficiency, enough so that I'm tempted to get one and later on down the road go SLI, as my PSU will be able to support it and an overclock. The memory is a bit of a bugger, it's more likely that the 960 will run into issues with textures etc. earlier on than the 280X, but for now it's good enough, although for how long, taking into account games like GTA V, we've yet to see.