I was wondering if it's wise to purchase a refurbished card (for ex. a GTX 580 for $174.99) or a card priced at around the same point (for ex. a GTX 660 for $169.99) ? Can older cards like the GTX 580 still run modern games like at High Setting on 1080p ? What are your thoughts on purchasing older cards ?
ps: If you can link me to a site where you can benchmark cards I would really appreciate it :)
My thoughts are that older GPU's are fine, provided you can get them at a low enough price to balance out the lack of efficiency and features compared to newer similarly performing GPUs. If the price is to close, the older GPU almost never provides an incentive.
In your example, the GTX 660 performs around the same level as the 580, with significantly reduced power consumption, and has access to newer NVidia technologies, such as G-Sync and Shadow play; to top it all off, the 660 is also cheaper. In that case, there is no reason to go for the 580 as a gaming GPU. However, the Fermi architecture is better suited for CUDA applications, so it might be worthwhile if you use After Effects or something along those line.
Thank you for you help.