GTX 980 Ti or GTX 1070 - Help me decide!

[johnt]

7 hours ago, xAcid9 said:

Yeah sure. Use = Need right? lmao

I suspect it won't be too far in the future when more games will start exceeding 6 GB... particularly at higher resolutions. Need "today" might not be the same thing as "need" when a couple new games are announced. Frame rates start to go downhill pretty quickly when you exceed the memory buffer. I guess you can always turn down settings.

[xAcid9]

43 minutes ago, JohnT said:

I suspect it won't be too far in the future when more games will start exceeding 6 GB... particularly at higher resolutions. Need "today" might not be the same thing as "need" when a couple new games are announced. Frame rates start to go downhill pretty quickly when you exceed the memory buffer. I guess you can always turn down settings.

When is this "not too far in the future" actually? a year? 2? 3?

You mentioned ROTTR already make 6GB on 980 Ti irrelevant but that's not the case now/today?

[johnt]

9 hours ago, HKZeroFive said:

We're starting to see unlocked i5s struggle in several more modern titles

Wasn't this the Sandy Bridge chips? There are a lot of conflicting stories with some even calling this a bug. I see this "issue" caused by an unbalanced system. A lot of goons shoot for the hills for their GPU and leave their CPU lagging behind. A lot of people in this forum wholeheartedly have been recommending i5's for a long time. Cards like the 1080 changes that. The 1080 can easily saturate an i5. And frankly, an i7 isn't that much more expensive. It's on sale today at Newegg for $300. A CPU for gaming can easily last for three years, and at $100/year. Yeeeeeeeeach the 7700k is a pretty freaking good value. If we want games to keep getting better, we can't expect to play games on max settings on older generation equipment. 

 

10 hours ago, HKZeroFive said:

Also, you're implying PCs are being purely used for gaming when they're not. There's an absolute buttload of multithreaded tasks that will benefit from an octacore CPU and I can't name them all

I bet you can't name a single one, bro. And forget video processing... it's not performed by a majority of users. And if they do, they aren't doing for production purposes like the Youtubers we watch daily. Most computing needs do not greatly benefit from more than 2 cores. Gaming is slowly starting to make use of more than 2 cores. Most applications used in the real world aren't. At this time, more cores allow you to do more things simultaneously. Under rare circumstances does more cores mean more performance.

 

10 hours ago, HKZeroFive said:

However, I'm going to repeat it again; the point isn't about being the absolute best. It's about the performance it can deliver at a lower price. There's no bad product, just a bad price.

I don't know. If you're never top dog, you're never really doing anything new. AMD always markets their innovation at a lower price point, but they aren't doing anything new. They are the budget kings.

 

10 hours ago, HKZeroFive said:

Fury X

Dude the Fury X was a joke from the start. 18 months later and I can obliterate its 4 GB memory buffer with Planet Coaster. You can buy this pop tart brand new for $300. It hasn't even retained 50% of its retail value even though it's the only card with HBM. Get real. The Fury X was never competition.

 

10 hours ago, HKZeroFive said:

And in a market that's already oversaturated, there's no other "saviour" company that will eventually make NVIDIA and Intel bow over. AMD is basically the only hope

This is unfortunately true  But at AMD's current pace and strategy, I don't see the blue and green flags coming down anytime soon. I also am confused if Nvidia's competition is coming directly from AMD GPUs. Nvidia is very much chasing the higher resolution train. Plus we can't neglect the shockingly high market share of consoles in general. And yeah there's no denying Intel is just sitting in luxury right now. But how can you argue that it isn't because AMD hasn't really had a king in the CPU market for over a decade now? If AMD could provide a super high performing chip, even if its super expensive, Intel will have to compete and eventually the R&D will trickle down. As it stands, if AMD continues to develop products that the competition already provided 2.5 years ago... man... I don't see why Intel would even bother. A ten core chip is outrageous. But Intel also has to price it right so the companies buying server chips won't get too frustrated.

 

10 hours ago, HKZeroFive said:

you want AMD to basically outperform NVIDIA and Intel for them to be classified as "good"?

 

Put it this way. If the RX 490 performs about the same as the GTX 1080 at the price point of the GTX 1070, that's already a win. If the next-gen Fury gets close to but doesn't outperform the GTX 1080Ti/Titan XP, yet priced much lower, that's a win. Sure, Vega has been massively delayed to the point where it's starting to get infuriating, but if it means getting more bang for your buck, I'm sure many (me included) wouldn't complain.

Yes! This is called competition. This will make Nvidia try harder for the next generation. Without a top dog, there is no competition to take down. Nvidia has to chase its own tail. I respect what you're saying, but yeeeeah you're kind of getting at the same point. I would love for the RX 490 to destroy the 1080. But if it only "performs about the same as the GTX 1080," or in other words, a new card that performs just as good as a GPU that's been on the market for 6 to 12 months (depending on the release dates) WTF has AMD been doing since the Fury X? Rebranding drivers? Marketing Zen? A price war is not true competition. It's just a tactic for a slice of market share. Nvidia has a stronger reputation with gamers and a shiny 490 won't change that. Only a top dog product will. The RX 490 may get Nvidia to reduce's the 1080's price by $100. But then Nvidia is going to pound AMD with the 1080ti at an even higher price point, higher specs, higher performance, and the 490 will make a few great benchmarking videos where it will trade blows with the 6 to 12 month old 1080, and get crushed by the 1080ti. At the end of the AMD will have accomplished nothing in terms of advancing performance.

[johnt]

8 minutes ago, xAcid9 said:

You mentioned ROTTR already make 6GB on 980 Ti irrelevant but that's not the case now/today?

Interesting come back given that most of the recommendations on this post (1070 vs 980ti) have been for the 1070.

 

Irrelevant? No the 980 ti isn't irrelevant. It's a great card for people who own it. If I had it, I wouldn't even consider the 1000 series. But sadly I had a **** AMD card that couldn't run the games I wanted to play anymore at reasonable settings. So I did what any prudent person would do with their money when considering the 1070 or the 980 ti....... they would buy the 1070!

 

Based on the available products and current prices, yes the 980 ti is irrelevant for new purchasers.

[DnFx91]

i dunno im wondering myself at the moment what to switch my R9 390 out for, polaris does look appealing what with the lowest end card being better than last year's mid range, but im really excited for Vega, shall i wait ? If there's a possiblity that sometime this year i can get a red team card that pars a 1080, for half the price, its clearly going in my rig

[Qwweb]

19 hours ago, WispTheHusky said:

I know that the pro of the 980 ti is that it (seems to) outperform the 1070 when it comes to Gaming Graphics, but the 1070 has the fact that it's newer and the extra 2GB of VRAM. I can't see much more between them really.

The 980ti has almost 1000 more CUDA cores than the 1070 and 300 more than even the 1080. This is one of the reasons that it performs so well despite having less VRAM. If you are going to be using any software that benefits from CUDA utilization, I would recommend the 980ti as it will perform much better than the 1070 in a work environment.

[i_build_nanosuits]

10 minutes ago, DnFx91 said:

i dunno im wondering myself at the moment what to switch my R9 390 out for:

- polaris does look appealing what with the lowest end card being better than last year's mid range, but im really excited for Vega, shall i wait ?

- If there's a possiblity that sometime this year i can get a red team card that pars a 1080, for half the price, its clearly going in my rig

- ?! what?! the top end polaris card (RX 480) is about on par with your R9 390...and the lower end ones (RX 460) are weaker than R7-370...

- That ain't happening...IF amd can pull a card that perform at 1080 level, it will have 1080 type pricing...when was the last time AMD (or nvidia) delivered a similar performance GPU at half the cost?! (hint: it NEVER happened)

[DnFx91]

1 minute ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

- ?! what?! the top end polaris card (RX 480) is about on par with your R9 390...and the lower end ones (RX 460) are weaker than R7-370...

- That ain't happening...IF amd can pull a card that perform at 1080 level, it will have 1080 type pricing...when was the last time AMD (or nvidia) delivered a similar performance GPU at half the cost?! (hint: it NEVER happened)

sorry man, pascal, i need to sleep.

[i_build_nanosuits]

1 minute ago, DnFx91 said:

sorry man, pascal, i need to sleep.

ahhhhh i see

haha makes more sense...cause polaris is a complete bust.

[johnt]

2 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

cause polaris is a complete bust

Story of AMD

[DnFx91]

1 minute ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

ahhhhh i see

haha makes more sense...cause polaris is a complete bust.

yeah man i don't even understand what the RX cards are for. But yeah pascal does look badass, but i've had great experience with AMD cards before and really hope Vega will be awesome. I know it won't be half price obviously but a 1080-grade AMD card would definitely be cheaper than it's green counterpart.

[i_build_nanosuits]

1 minute ago, JohnT said:

Story of AMD

nahh...tahiti cards (HD7950/7970) where THA SHIT and also the HD5870 was a complete monster and a steal for the price...sadly though it all went downhill from there with GPU's that consume as much as an entire PC and can heat up two rooms without breaking a sweat...

[xAcid9]

1 minute ago, DnFx91 said:

sorry man, pascal, i need to sleep.

First DirectX in Doom, now Pascal=Polaris, you really need to go to sleep son.  

18 minutes ago, JohnT said:

Interesting come back given that most of the recommendations on this post (1070 vs 980ti) have been for the 1070.

 

Irrelevant? No the 980 ti isn't irrelevant. It's a great card for people who own it. If I had it, I wouldn't even consider the 1000 series. But sadly I had a **** AMD card that couldn't run the games I wanted to play anymore at reasonable settings. So I did what any prudent person would do with their money when considering the 1070 or the 980 ti....... they would buy the 1070!

 

Based on the available products and current prices, yes the 980 ti is irrelevant for new purchasers.

Indeed, but in some cases where 980 Ti is >$50 cheaper than 1070, i'll recommend 980 Ti instead if it's a good aftermarket card.

Similar performance, negligible power consumption increase.

[DnFx91]

1 minute ago, xAcid9 said:

First DirectX in Doom, now Pascal=Polaris, you really need to go to sleep son.  

Indeed, but in some cases where 980 Ti is >$50 cheaper than 1070, i'll recommend 980 Ti instead if it's a good aftermarket card.

Similar performance, negligible power consumption increase.

haha worst thing is, i'm at work, where i deal with computers all day !! It's a quiet day gme a break

[johnt]

3 minutes ago, xAcid9 said:

Indeed, but in some cases where 980 Ti is >$50 cheaper than 1070, i'll recommend 980 Ti instead if it's a good aftermarket card.

Similar performance, negligible power consumption increase.

>$50 difference then yeah that's something to consider. But at times the 1070 can be found for around $325.........

 

You can't really go wrong with either of these cards

[johnt]

7 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

nahh...tahiti cards (HD7950/7970) where THA SHIT and also the HD5870 was a complete monster and a steal for the price...sadly though it all went downhill from there with GPU's that consume as much as an entire PC and can heat up two rooms without breaking a sweat...

I recall that's when AMD started rebranding their cards, which probably explains why my R9 280 started taking major dumps.

 

Speaking of heat... I had crossfire 280's and they would overload my PSU pretty often during gaming. It's a Corsair HX850. Not freaking cheap or crappy. Neither GPU was OCed. And my 5820k has a modest OC to 4.0 GHz at 1.15v. I don't know why it would happen but randomly, and frequently during games, poof the PC shuts down. Disable crossfire and it would work fine for hours on end.

 

And yes, my wife would cuddle with my case when I first got the dual 280's for heat during the winter.

[i_build_nanosuits]

7 minutes ago, JohnT said:

I recall that's when AMD started rebranding their cards, which probably explains why my R9 280 started taking major dumps.

 

Speaking of heat... I had crossfire 280's and they would overload my PSU pretty often during gaming. It's a Corsair HX850. Not freaking cheap or crappy. Neither GPU was OCed. And my 5820k has a modest OC to 4.0 GHz at 1.15v. I don't know why it would happen but randomly, and frequently during games, poof the PC shuts down. Disable crossfire and it would work fine for hours on end.

 

And yes, my wife would cuddle with my case when I first got the dual 280's for heat during the winter.

Check this out though...the HD7950 is the same chip as one of your 280...i had one back in the day and i considered an upgrade to a GTX 770 but ended up getting the 780 instead...today, in newer games, they are on par...GTX 770 use to be at least 15 to 20% faster

 

 

[Qwweb]

6 minutes ago, xAcid9 said:

but in some cases where 980 Ti is >$50 cheaper than 1070, i'll recommend 980 Ti instead if it's a good aftermarket card.

Again, I will reiterate. 1070~980ti in gaming (1070 is 3% better); 980ti>1070 in workloads. 980ti has features that better benefit workloads such as; higher memory bandwidth, larger memory bus, more L2 cache for the VRAM, more shaders, more texture mapping units, higher texture rate, more render output units, and a higher pixel fill rate. All of this effects workloads much more than game performance, but it should be said that this results in smoother gameplay as the 980ti has more VRAM cache and a better output bus than the 1070.  

[smokefest]

Get the 1070... its obviously the best choice... eazy pick...

[Morgan Everett]

20 hours ago, WispTheHusky said:

Hi LTT community! I'm hoping you'll be able to help me decide on a GPU to get! I'm torn deciding, and think you guys should be the ones to advise from your personal experience! It's my first fully-fledged build, so could do with some guidance.

 

The rig this is going into contains the following already:

• MSI Z97 Gaming 5 MoBo
• Intel i7-4790K processor
• 16 GB DDR3 1600 MHz
• Corsair HX620W
• NVMe SSD and SATA 3 HDD

General uses of the machine will be:

• Gaming on High-FPS games (regularly)
• Very occasional Video Editing
• My day to day machine

So far, I know that the pro of the 980 ti is that it (seems to) outperform the 1070 when it comes to Gaming Graphics, but the 1070 has the fact that it's newer and the extra 2GB of VRAM. I can't see much more between them really.

 

In regards to cost, they're almost identical (at £370 for the 980 ti and £390 for the 1070), so there isn't really much difference there. Unless anyone can recommend anything else card-wise they think would be good around the same kind of price range! 

 

Thanks!

The 1070 performs slightly better in games, has more VRAM, is a more recent architecture and consumes less power. For £20 more, it's an obvious choice.

 

I've owned both GPUs, by the way.

[johnt]

6 minutes ago, Qwweb said:

Again, I will reiterate. 1070~980ti in gaming (1070 is 3% better); 980ti>1070 in workloads. 980ti has features that better benefit workloads such as; higher memory bandwidth, larger memory bus, more L2 cache for the VRAM, more shaders, more texture mapping units, higher texture rate, more render output units, and a higher pixel fill rate. All of this effects workloads much more than game performance, but it should be said that this results in smoother gameplay as the 980ti has more VRAM cache and a better output bus than the 1070.  

I hear you, but I think most of us have been discussing gaming performance over other productivity.

 

And I just did a quick search to confirm what you're saying, and while your argument sounds justified based on the specs of the cards....... the benchmarks tell a different story. All the guts and glory in the 980ti average out to a 1% performance gain over the 1070 according to this site:

 

https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/GTX-1070-and-GTX-1080-Premiere-Pro-Performance-810/

 

And a few other websites in my search results confirm the productivity differences between these cards are negligible

[johnt]

20 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

Check this out though...the HD7950 is the same chip as one of your 280...i had one back in the day and i considered an upgrade to a GTX 770 but ended up getting the 780 instead...today, in newer games, they are on par...GTX 770 use to be at least 15 to 20% faster

That's actually some impressive results for such old cards. Man I wonder if I just struck out or did something wrong

 

But I had other issues with my 280 when trying to use it in my HTPC. I don't know was it the brand? I got Sapphire versions. Is that a shit brand? I've never had so many issues with a video card before

[i_build_nanosuits]

2 hours ago, JohnT said:

That's actually some impressive results for such old cards. Man I wonder if I just struck out or did something wrong

 

But I had other issues with my 280 when trying to use it in my HTPC. I don't know was it the brand? I got Sapphire versions. Is that a shit brand? I've never had so many issues with a video card before

sapphire is usually pretty good actually...

[WispTheHusky]

Thank you, everyone, for your input! Suspicions confirmed. I'm now £390 lighter - but a GTX 1070 heavier! Appreciate it guys! 

[Cryptonite]

11 minutes ago, WispTheHusky said:

Thank you, everyone, for your input! Suspicions confirmed. I'm now £390 lighter - but a GTX 1070 heavier! Appreciate it guys! 

great choice, I hope someone locks this thread though, it got derailed damn badly and by people who love to argue about the dumbest crap I've ever heard.

Which 1070 did you decide on? I personally love my Asus Strix, it runs damn cool (65 Celsius), performs excellent and it's fairly quiet @ 45% fan speed max (this being in the Summer of a country like South Africa where we hit 40 Celsius easy)