So im helping my friend configure a build and his budget is 1500$ with a monitor and computer.
his purpose for the pc is putting vids for youtube and gaming.
so the main question is can some one fit a 780 in the budget? and the other question is will the i7 3770k have a big improvement over the 8350 for rendering. He dosnt want an ssd he'd rather spend the extra money in other things.
this is just my opinion but considering two 7970's are the same price as a gtx780 and have way more horses. thats the route i would go especially considering its about the same price for the reference 780 not even the aftermarket ones yet. i would also go with the 8350 it has slightly more performance for a tad less.
i have a AMD set up HERE.
It runns the AMD FX8350.
you can take apart this build and see what you like. this is the build I'm currently in the middle of. ordering parts every two weeks, though im saving the GPU's for last considering NVidia and AMD are just now coming out with their new next gen GPU's. should be interesting what they come out with before the summer is over.
for gpu I'd go with an MSI GTX680, reason being that it out performs the 7970. though you must consider that the 7970 and the GTX 680 are now considered the high end of "last gen" GPU's. the GTX780 and Titan are now the start of this coming gen. think ahead.
the 780 also costs as much as two 7970's..... sooooo think ahead, as we go forward there will be gpus that perform as well for alot cheaper, no sense wasting money
here are two solutions, both just a tad over $1400 but almost identical no monitor, but you can pick which ever monitor/peripherals you want. one is a 780 the other is a 7970 crossfire, the 7970 crossfire has more performance by alot. and only 20 bucks more. due to the power supply costing 20 dollars more. it has a 1TB WD black drive for programs and games you use alot and a seagate barracuda 2TB drive for recorded videos and such.16gb of corsair vengeance 1866 cl9 memory for editing.
GTX 780 build ----http://pcpartpicker.com/p/10BFN
AMD 7970 build ----http://pcpartpicker.com/p/10BCa
Actually, the GTX 680 does NOT outperform the HD 7970 (at least not at 1440p, and I highly doubt it does at 1080p). Here's a link to some fairly recent benchmarks...
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/geforce-gtx-780-performance-review,3516-6.html
The GTX 680 gets its ass whooped in BF3. This is suprising considering this game favors Nvidia. What's even more surprising is the HD 7970 surpasses the GTX 780, Titan, and GTX 680 in Hitman Absolution.
I'm actually considering selling my GTX 670 at some point in favor of something like the HD 7970. Or perhaps, in favor of AMD's next gen GPUs.
[Edit]
I will say this much about Nvidia cards...they tend to scale better in multi GPU scenarios. And they usually win in the power consumption and heat categories.
First, try to convince him to take an SSD!
I would probably wait.
wait for haswell, maybe AMD has a new CPU ready to get out as a responds for haswell, or at least a prince drop (AMD is great at dropping the price down)
And more important, wait for the rest of Nvidia 700 series (and prepare to an epic price fight between AMD and Nvidia)...
True, but CrossfireX has A LOT of problems. You're better off getting one nice, expensive card. The 680 is still a great card too.
haswell is not worth it. not for gaming, intel processors are over priced for gaming. they are good at memory intensive applications because of the higher ipc. but hes buying this as a gaming pc. the amd processors are perfect for that. but i do agree that it could be beneficial to wait for the next gen amd processors, they are rumored q4 2013. also radeon 8000 series are speculated q4 2013 or q1 2014. so i anticipate they will destroy nvidia 700 series. the 700 series is just an arch refresh while the 8000 series is a new architechure so it should be alot better. this is all theoretical of course. we dont know for sure what will happen ;)
Quick question, when is the 780 the same price as two 7970's?! Last time I checked, the 7970 is $400, and 400 * 2 = 800, not 650. Now, if you're talking about the 7950, then yes, the 780 is the price of two of those.
Also, I do not believe the 8000 series will be on a new architecture, they'll likely still be using the same architecture as the 7000 series, just with some minor improvements in FPS. Graphics cards tend to be released in a tik-tok method: a new architecture is made with big improvements, then the next series is an improvement of the current architecture, and then a brand new architecture is released again.
Crossfire has veryfew problems, actually. The recent driver updates have been drastically improving performance and frame times.
There are some lower-end 7970s, like the PowerColor ones, that are only $330ish.
wait for haswell... lower temps is just as important as performance... so just get it for that..
and get a 7970 ghz edition
YES, a single 7970 is so awesome! and they have an epic game bundle
yea there are a few 7970's selling in the $350 range right now, the 780 is about 650 but two 7970's is only 700 so thats basically the same price. and two 7970's offer alot more performance, as to the 8000 series, i see, they had originally planned to do a new architecture but i guess instead they are doing a refresh, must be because of the problems with there fab plants. also cool deathnote picture.