Upgrading My Graphics Card

[JoshK]

I currently have a GTX 770 which is about a year and a half old. I'm thinking about upgrading my monitor to 1440p in the very near future. I would probably get the monitor first and then upgrade my graphics card after. I was thinking the 980 but wanted some more input from other people. I do plan to watercool and overclock down the road which is something to keep in mind also. Graphics is something that are super important to me because I only play single player games (because of internet reasons) which I mod the hell out of. Like skyrim, and fallout 4. I would like to be able to have a steady 60 fps which high to ultra graphics on pretty much any game. Thanks guys!

[don_svetlio]

R9 390 - 8GB of VRAM for all your modding needs

[App4that]

For Fallout 4 and some other Gameworks titles you want a 970, for just about everything else you'd want a 390. So it's up to you to decide how much time you spend in each game.

[JoshK]

For Fallout 4 and some other Gameworks titles you want a 970, for just about everything else you'd want a 390. So it's up to you to decide how much time you spend in each game.

Thats a really hard decision. Im kinda a Nvidia fanboy, but that 8 gb of VRAM is tempting. Both of these cards will be able to run 1440p at 60 fps?

[AdamH96]

Thats a really hard decision. Im kinda a Nvidia fanboy, but that 8 gb of VRAM is tempting. Both of these cards will be able to run 1440p at 60 fps?

Depends on game and settings, they will do good at those resolutions but if you are talking about recent tipple A games (especially The Witcher 3) they won't do 1440p 60fps and high to ultra settings.

 

GTAV and TW3 barley keep a steady 60fps at 1080p at max settings. (my card is also OC)

 

you might want to look at a 980TI, (possibly a 390x), Fury (X) if you want to achieve that.

[App4that]

Thats a really hard decision. Im kinda a Nvidia fanboy, but that 8 gb of VRAM is tempting. Both of these cards will be able to run 1440p at 60 fps?

Yes, I run Fallout 4 in 1440 with everything set to ultra but shadow distance which I set in the ini files to half ultra and have 35 mods active. I have a 290 which also only has 4g of VRAM. I've gone over it a few times and only knew it because I run Monitor it, there was no performance indicators. Fallout 4 run substantially better on the 970, but you shouldn't buy a GPU for one game. Tough choice. If I didn't have my 290 and was buying a card I'd get the 970 because I play a lot of Gameworks games.

[JoshK]

Depends on game and settings, they will do good at those resolutions but if you are talking about recent tipple A games (especially The Witcher 3) they won't do 1440p 60fps and high to ultra settings.

What card would you recommend for that if there is a good card for that?

[AdamH96]

you might want to look at a 980 TI, (possibly a 390x haven't really looked at the performce), Fury (X) if you want to achieve that. Always go with the strongest card you can get before thinking about SLI.

 

just look at your budget and see what is reasonable, if you don't want to drop a shit load on these cards then a 390/970 would be ok, it just won't be able to achieve what you are going for.

[NuclearPeace]

For modding Skyrim, unless you are on Windows 7, then you can only use 4GB of total combined VRAM. Plus, even though the 390 is a great card I don't think its much of an upgrade. Try the 390x if you can afford it.

[JoshK]

you might want to look at a 980 TI, (possibly a 390x haven't really looked at the performce), Fury (X) if you want to achieve that. Always go with the strongest card you can get before thinking about SLI.

 

just look at your budget and see what is reasonable, if you don't want to drop a shit load on these cards then a 390/970 would be ok, it just won't be able to achieve what you are going for.

Well there is quite the price gap between 390x and 980ti. Im kinda leaning towards the 390x right now. But as long as theres only a 4gb limit on Windows 10 then I dont see much point in going anymore unless I were to do multiple monitors or something which I really dont plan on doing. But I guess if youre spending that much on a gpu and there is an option with twice the amount of vram then why not go with it?

[AdamH96]

Well there is quite the price gap between 390x and 980ti. Im kinda leaning towards the 390x right now. But as long as theres only a 4gb limit on Windows 10 then I dont see much point in going anymore unless I were to do multiple monitors or something which I really dont plan on doing. But I guess if youre spending that much on a gpu and there is an option with twice the amount of vram then why not go with it?

If you can fill it up ya, might be better in the future with dx12, I really have no idea lol. The 8gb is amazing if your doing and 3D rendering work, but in gaming the GPU is not strong enough to use all of it. Just think about slapping like 4gb on a GT 730 or some low end card like that, there is no way that GPU could use that 4gb in gaming.

 

I suggest looking around on YouTube with people using heavy mods and benchmarking their cards an see how much vram they can use.

 

The GPU is good, I just never saw the hype over the 8gb for gaming.

[App4that]

Well there is quite the price gap between 390x and 980ti. Im kinda leaning towards the 390x right now. But as long as theres only a 4gb limit on Windows 10 then I dont see much point in going anymore unless I were to do multiple monitors or something which I really dont plan on doing. But I guess if youre spending that much on a gpu and there is an option with twice the amount of vram then why not go with it?

Because the VRAM is there for marketing reasons, not functionality. The 390/X is a great card, but you'd be giving up Nvidia features and compatibility with Gameworks for VRAM that serves little purpose.

Just my 2c

[JoshK]

Because the VRAM is there for marketing reasons, not functionality. The 390/X is a great card, but you'd be giving up Nvidia features and compatibility with Gameworks for VRAM that serves little purpose.

Just my 2c

Soooo 980? 980ti? One 970 and maybe another one later down the road?

[App4that]

Soooo 980? 980ti? One 970 and maybe another one later down the road?

Obviously the 980ti offers the best performance and longevity. But it comes at a price that matches that. If it were me I'd but a 970 and run that until it no longer offered the performance you wanted and the replace it with the next generation of GPU we should have this time next year. But I have a feeling that the next generation of GPU will be very much like the Fury from AMD and offer poor 1080p performance as it is meant for higher resolutions. So I'd expect the 970 to be good for years. Once the high resolution monitors finally come down in price the newer GPUs will be more relevant.

[PCPartPickerPro9171787]

A R9 380 has 8 GB of vram, which can help significantly with high detial mods.

[App4that]

A R9 380 has 8 GB of vram, which can help significantly with high detial mods.

4gs of memory here, mod like no tomorrow at 1440 and have yet to have a problem. So.