Hey guys. So I'm an Ex-Box gamer(see what I did there?) and I have been wanting to transition over to PC. I'm finally getting that opportunity this coming January. That being said, I have done a VERY fair amount of research and I believe I have come up with a very good PC for it's price range. YES I KNOW there is no SSD, but load times don't concern me that much. I'd prefer storage as opposed to load times. ANYWHO, here is what I've got planned out.
Opinions? I think it's very good for the price range and a fantastic PC to run most games. However, there is one issue I'm having. That would be determining the superior GPU. If I have the money, I plan on getting the R9 280X, but if I don't, then I have no idea what I'm getting. I have it narrowed down to 2 GPU's though. It's between the Sapphire Radeon HD 7950 3GB and the EVGA GeForce GTX 760 2GB Superclocked. Any idea which of the 2 is superior for every game on average? I know some GPU's work better on certain games as opposed to other GPU's, but I'm talking about for the majority of big title games. A little help and advice would be appreciated.
That was the original plan. However, here's the catch I was worried about. I've been reading up on AMD's Mantle API. the 7950 supports GCN Architecture so it will have Mantle support meaning that AMD supposedly will spike in performance on games that support Mantle. I'm aware the 760 is better simply by default hardware specifics(and software by a fair bit), but I'm worried that if I go nVidia, then AMD is going to kick everything's ass. This applies vice versa. I'm afraid that if I choose the 7950, then nVidia might come out with something new and epic or Mantle might not be all it's cracked up as.
thats why its the safer option to go with whats stronger now instead of potential strength in the future. Strength now is guaranteed. 280x is the best of both worlds though, 300$ for the performance of a 400$ card (770) PLUS mantle (assuming it is good)
Good point. Hopefully I'll be able to muster enough for the 280X. It's basically a remodeled 7970 with improvements. Based on the benchmarks I've seen, 7970 is an elite GPU running basically everything maxed out at a good FPS. I'm actually curious to see how the 280X compares.
Its slightly better (as in like 5 FPS improvement) to the 7970 GHz edition (Which is a OC edition of the 7970), its just amazing (atleast to me) that it is 300$ and it on par with a 770
I'm quite amazed as well. It can be referenced as an OP budget card lol. And 5 frames can actually be considered quite an improvement depending on the terms. In terms of the R9 series, it's really pushing nVidia to it's edge. The 290X looks like it'll be the dominant card on the marked from what I've seen. And hopefully if Mantle wrecks everything like AMD says it will, then AMD gamers will be having a good time. Afterwards, all AMD has to do is fix their gaming CPU's up with some kind of ungodly architecture that they magically discover through spellbooks and alchemy that puts Intel hyperthreading to shame and they will be a gamer's paradise.
7950 over 760 any day. There is a small amount of games that 760 might be better. But overall 7950 beats it and it will have the same performance as the 7970 if overclocked well.
Wait an see how out of my budget it is. I don't know if I can even get the 280x, but if I can, it's just barely. I don't think I'll be able to pay for a new 600$ nVidia card.