{Help me out!} graphics card debate...

[Vespar]

Recently, I've been having some major issues with my Radeon 7870 graphics card and have decided its time to invest in a new card. I am very out of the loop with Nvidia's technology but I don't want that to stop me from buying a good card should an Nvidia one prove better. I had been looking at the difference's between a GTX 770 and the AMD R9 280X but I am by no means settled on any one card in particular just yet.

I really only play FFXIV right now but I want this game to run on MAX, and look great! I would like to stay in the $300 price range if possible, if you could share your experiences with some higher end cards in that range I'd appreciate it!

My current specs are:
Windows 7 64-bit
i5-3570K CPU
8GB DDR3 RAM
Radeon 7870 GPU (on the fritz)

[Rosy]

I just bought (a couple of months ago) a computer with a GTX 770...it's awesome, runs much better than my GTX 690 EVER did, max on everything, even in raids, smooth as silk, cool as a cucumber, in fact my computer is like an air conditioner now and this one doesn't even have water cooling like the last one which used to keep the whole house heated. So yeah, I'm very impressed with the GTX 770.

[Raist]

Don't use XIV as a determining factor for your purchase... until it moves away from DX9 and into DX11, it won't matter too much once you reach a certain level of hardware. You may have already plateaued somewhat. With it's current engine, people can get acceptable results out of 5 year old hardware... just saying, you may be going into overkill if you use the current XIV as a deciding factor for a new GPU.

Google for benchmark comparisons on the other games you are interested in, or at least compare scores for something like Crysis 3 and such. Something like this article perhaps:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...ming,3451.html

Passmark posts scores from their benchmarks as well that can help you narrow down the field a bit too:
http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/

[Vespar]

snip

FFXIV isnt the only game I will be playing, its just the one I'm playing the most right now so I want it to look good. Thanks for posting this chart I had seen it before the last time I was in the market for a card but couldn't remember where I'd seen it.
After reading through the charts and weighing price options, I'm starting to look a little more closely at the GTX 770. Is a 2GB card enough @ 1080p or should I spend the extra money and get a 4GB version?

[skaterger]

I personally use a Gigabyte Windforce R9 280X. It comes OC out of the box so you don't have to do it if you're not into that kind of thing. So far it works great but can get a little noisy at times if working at full load. That was 6 months ago so many new cards might have come out during that time. I also heard the R9 290 that came out shortly after 280X is a better value for its buck. You might want to look into that.

Also, consider that the general consensus seems to be that Nvidia seems to give better performance than AMD while AMD is priced more competitively. You might want to take that into account. Good luck!

[Ooshima]

I personally use a Gigabyte Windforce R9 280X. It comes OC out of the box so you don't have to do it if you're not into that kind of thing. So far it works great but can get a little noisy at times if working at full load. That was 6 months ago so many new cards might have come out during that time. I also heard the R9 290 that came out shortly after 280X is a better value for its buck. You might want to look into that.

Also, consider that the general consensus seems to be that Nvidia seems to give better performance than AMD while AMD is priced more competitively. You might want to take that into account. Good luck!

For FFXIV wise there is quite a few complaints on Nvidia drivers not working properly with FFXIV thou.

The R9 290 received a lot of attention it is on the same league as the GTX 780 but costing much lesser. I owned the Gigabyte Windforce R9 290 OC. Runs smoothly on 1440p resolution at max settings.

[skaterger]

For FFXIV wise there is quite a few complaints on Nvidia drivers not working properly with FFXIV thou.

The R9 290 received a lot of attention it is on the same league as the GTX 780 but costing much lesser. I owned the Gigabyte Windforce R9 290 OC. Runs smoothly on 1440p resolution at max settings.

Yeah I remember the r9 290 coming out a few days after I bought the 280x. It seemed to hit a sweet spot between price point versus performance on benchmark tests. Was pretty bummed about it. But I guess that's how it goes with technology, always something new to replace the old, kinda like chasing the carrot in mmos really

[Ooshima]

Yeah I remember the r9 290 coming out a few days after I bought the 280x. It seemed to hit a sweet spot between price point versus performance on benchmark tests. Was pretty bummed about it. But I guess that's how it goes with technology, always something new to replace the old, kinda like chasing the carrot in mmos really

Well indeed there are a lot of new releases these days and how things get replaces are getting faster and faster, but price point versus performance is something more and more people are going to look at. Just like Titan Black and Titan Z. High benchmark scores, but when you look at the price and do the math about performance/bucks... you know the answer

Things like R9 290 are gems that happened once in a while imo

[skaterger]

Well indeed there are a lot of new releases these days and how things get replaces are getting faster and faster, but price point versus performance is something more and more people are going to look at. Just like Titan Black and Titan Z. High benchmark scores, but when you look at the price and do the math about performance/bucks... you know the answer

Things like R9 290 are gems that happened once in a while imo

Okay I swear now you're purposely tempting me to upgrade or crossfire. Need....to.... control....

[Naraku_Diabolos]

I can run the game on max on my GeForce 760 GTX Ti card. Of course it came with the Alienware when I bought it, so it's an OEM card. I would probably upgrade it in several years but there isn't any need right now since I only play this game. Either the 760 card would be good for you or even the 770. My card runs the game flawlessly and I have no issues. I only had an issue in Gridania today, but that was because there were so many people in the city lol