GTX 970 or R9 390?

[EarthboundHero]

I know, I know, this topic is overdone, but the issue is really bothering me. (Ask @pspfreak) This wasn't so much n issue 'til I asked pspfreak about his 970 and he said GTAV gets close to using more the the 3.5GB of full speed RAM, and that he gets stutters frequently. I don't play GTAV very often, so that's not a huge deal, but it made me think that games will go over that amount very quickly. I will probably upgrade again within 2 years, so by then games probably won't use more than 6GB's at 1080P. But with the 390's 8GB's of RAM I can use VSR and not experience too much performance impact. The main reason I wanted to upgrade to the 970 is because my room ambient is currently insanely high, so I wanted a lower TDP card. But I can ignore this if there's good reason. The 970 and 390 seem to trade blows, but I'm currently into modding Fallout 3 and New Vegas, as well as Batman: Arkham Knight (Once it's fixed) and Fallout 4 (Once it's out) I just want some opinions on the subject. I'll have $380 to spend, and the exact models I was looking at were, the G1 Gaming for the 970 and the MSI Gaming 390. Thank you.

 

Edit: The G1 Gaming is current $350+$4 shipping with a $20 MIR and Batman: Arkham Knight, which I own but can sell on G2A. The MSI Gaming is $330+$5 shipping.

[Gix7Fifty]

See if either of are on sale @ midnight for amazon prime day.

[himo Mo]

i don't deny that R9 390's performance is slightly better than the GTX 970, it's not that huge difference, but i would still go with nVidia just cause i love nVidia
well i'm not sure if i am allowed to post a youtube video that is not Linus's , so i would say search on youtube R9 390 Vs GTX 970, there are a couple that could give u a closer look & a better answer showing u some test results

[RyGuy99]

Before someone links JayzTwoCents' video I'd like to point out you can get better performance out of a 970 than just 1442 mhz. Especially if you go for an MSI Gaming or G1 gaming.

[Kinda Bottlenecked]

Well at this point you'll be comparing features from what the cards offer. Whether you want Nvidia or amd features. For vram it'll depend on how far you want to take your modding. The 970 and 390 are pretty much neck and neck.

And before someone comes in and exclaim "OH the 970 can do 1500mhz, the 390 only 1200mhz" stop. What people seem to forget is the amd cards get more fps per clock than Nvidia cards. Even with the 970 at 1500+Mhz and the 390 at 1200+Mhz range you'll still get the same amount of performance increase.

[robinspi]

Well at this point you'll be comparing features from what the cards offer. Whether you want Nvidia or amd features. For vram it'll depend on how far you want to take your modding. The 970 and 390 are pretty much neck and neck.

And before someone comes in and exclaim "OH the 970 can do 1500mhz, the 390 only 1200mhz" stop. What people seem to forget is the amd cards get more fps per clock than Nvidia cards. Even with the 970 at 1500+Mhz and the 390 at 1200+Mhz range you'll still get the same amount of performance increase.

 

I love that post of yours. AMD vs NVDA Overclocks are not directly comparable. You just can't do it.

 

Also, as I reccommended to a guy on another forum, get the r9 390 if you want your system to last longer. 8GB probably will come in handy eventually...

[RyGuy99]

Well at this point you'll be comparing features from what the cards offer. Whether you want Nvidia or amd features. For vram it'll depend on how far you want to take your modding. The 970 and 390 are pretty much neck and neck.

And before someone comes in and exclaim "OH the 970 can do 1500mhz, the 390 only 1200mhz" stop. What people seem to forget is the amd cards get more fps per clock than Nvidia cards. Even with the 970 at 1500+Mhz and the 390 at 1200+Mhz range you'll still get the same amount of performance increase.

What people seem to forget that there is more factors than mhz as well. Completely different architectures add lots of variables.

[austinhamilton1234]

I wish there was a clear-cut winner, because I was gonna ask the same question about the 970 and 390x.

There is a website called gpuboss that compares graphics cards based off of their stats, and I think benchmarks as well.

Hopefully there will be better comparisons when the 390x gets more use by enthusiasts and benchmarkers.

[EarthboundHero]

I wish there was a clear-cut winner, because I was gonna ask the same question about the 970 and 390x.

There is a website called gpuboss that compares graphics cards based off of their stats, and I think benchmarks as well.

Hopefully there will be better comparisons when the 390x gets more use by enthusiasts and benchmarkers.

Pretty sure 390X wins in raw performance.

[robinspi]

I wish there was a clear-cut winner, because I was gonna ask the same question about the 970 and 390x.

There is a website called gpuboss that compares graphics cards based off of their stats, and I think benchmarks as well.

Hopefully there will be better comparisons when the 390x gets more use by enthusiasts and benchmarkers.

 

GPUBoss is biased toward NVDA (at least a little bit. Last time I checked, CPU boss is biased toward Intel as well, though it isn't quite as apparent, because AMD currently sucks.)

 

I try other sites for benchmarks, and decide for myself.

[Doughnutnator]

Well at this point you'll be comparing features from what the cards offer. Whether you want Nvidia or amd features. For vram it'll depend on how far you want to take your modding. The 970 and 390 are pretty much neck and neck.

And before someone comes in and exclaim "OH the 970 can do 1500mhz, the 390 only 1200mhz" stop. What people seem to forget is the amd cards get more fps per clock than Nvidia cards. Even with the 970 at 1500+Mhz and the 390 at 1200+Mhz range you'll still get the same amount of performance increase.

Really? I never saw any benchmark confirming that but it's pretty interesting, maybe Hawaii works in a differet way or something like that?

[Doughnutnator]

OP get whatever is cheaper.

If you have a not so good 550-600w PSU or less get the 970, since you need a good quality PSU for the 390, it's hungry.

With the 970 you will probably get a little bit more performance if you overclock it to 1500-1550Mz.

Remember that with the VRAM you're paying for VRAM you're probably not going to use anyways, since both the 970 and 390 are not able to render decent framerates in games/resolutions that require high amounts of VRAM.

Crossfire-SLI sounds like a nasty idea, for 390's you need a beefy power supply, with 970's there's the 980Ti. For both 390's and 970's there's a similar performance, maybe better, less tricky, without lots of issues, single high end GPU solution

[atsf]

depends.. do you only play games? then the R9 390 is a better choice (8GB VRAM advantage and overall better performance)

do you do some productivity aswell? then the 970 with it's CUDA acceleration will be more beneficial..

 

but i assume most of you play games so i'd definitely opt for the 390

[Doughnutnator]

Also OP, I forgot something.

If you want to game only maybe you will want to go with Nvidia, since things lime Gameworks exist.

AMD usually gets the short end of the stick, with unoptimized games and devs using stuff like Gameworks that work better on their hardware.

Also Nvidia, somehow, has better DirectX11 optimization in their drivers. So for gaming, Nvidia could be the best option, just to avoid issues and sub-performing stuff just because "The devs used the competition stuff". AMD usually use open source stuff, they even made TressFX open source.

AMD are really cool, nice guys, but Nvidia are the ones with money...

[Kinda Bottlenecked]

Really? I never saw any benchmark confirming that but it's pretty interesting, maybe Hawaii works in a differet way or something like that?

Go look over at the benchmark charts in the 3d mark thread. You'll find all the benchmarks there.

And it's not just hawaii. GCN cards work this way. Remember, just last generation. Kepler cards also don't overclock till 1400mhz easily. It's only this generation, Maxwell cards were able to run at a higher speed but alas the fps per clock is also lower than Kepler.

[Eugene Yap]

390x

[EarthboundHero]

390x

Can't afford 390X. It's between 390 and 970. I think I'm going 390 though.

[Eugene Yap]

Can't afford 390X. It's between 390 and 970. I think I'm going 390 though.

Good choice. 

[tuffjuff]

I know, I know, this topic is overdone, but the issue is really bothering me. (Ask @pspfreak) This wasn't so much n issue 'til I asked pspfreak about his 970 and he said GTAV gets close to using more the the 3.5GB of full speed RAM, and that he gets stutters frequently. I don't play GTAV very often, so that's not a huge deal, but it made me think that games will go over that amount very quickly. I will probably upgrade again within 2 years, so by then games probably won't use more than 6GB's at 1080P. But with the 390's 8GB's of RAM I can use VSR and not experience too much performance impact. The main reason I wanted to upgrade to the 970 is because my room ambient is currently insanely high, so I wanted a lower TDP card. But I can ignore this if there's good reason. The 970 and 390 seem to trade blows, but I'm currently into modding Fallout 3 and New Vegas, as well as Batman: Arkham Knight (Once it's fixed) and Fallout 4 (Once it's out) I just want some opinions on the subject. I'll have $380 to spend, and the exact models I was looking at were, the G1 Gaming for the 970 and the MSI Gaming 390. Thank you.

 

Edit: The G1 Gaming is current $350+$4 shipping with a $20 MIR and Batman: Arkham Knight, which I own but can sell on G2A. The MSI Gaming is $330+$5 shipping.

 

Before making the jump to my 980 Ti, the 970 I was using handled GTA V at 1080p maxed out at around 3,900MB with no performance issues. I know that the 970 has a theoretical performance plateau after using 3.5GB of VRAM, but in GTA V, Witcher 3 and Shadows of Mordor (all games which I can easily get to use 3.5-4GB+ of VRAM at 1080p, let alone 1440p) I never experienced anything out of the ordinary. I believe you'd have to run a game like WItcher 3 and have the card physically not able to handle the game smoothly (like maxed out at 1080p, for example) in order to have a "problem" with performance.

 

TL;DR - the 970 has no real-world memory problems, and you'll likely run into overall performance limitations (or need more than even 4GB) before there's a problem.

 

 

 

Can't afford 390X. It's between 390 and 970. I think I'm going 390 though.

 

Honestly, both are great cards and if you're at 1080p, you'll be happy for a number of years.