GTX 970 and GTX 980

So the new cards from Nvidia have been launched yesterday. Both are only slight improvements in performance from previous GTX 770/780 cards - seemingly much smaller improvements than anticipated by most. Nevertheless, as expected, GTX 980 is now the fastest single-GPU on the planet (dethroning the GTX 780 Ti). What wasn't expected is the sudden jump in efficiency from the GTX 700 series, as both of the new GTX 900 cards have a significantly lower power requirement than their predecessors. This can generally be considered a strength of these new video cards. On the other, it's very silly of Nvidia to show us how absolutely fucking terrible their previous GPUs were in terms of efficiency.

Probably for the sole reason of GTX 980 being the fastest single GPU, there is an astronomical price difference between it and the GTX 970 - at about $200 (which translates to an even larger gap in other regions which aren't blessed with "decent" PC tech prices like the US); even though the differences in performance aren't anywhere near large enough to justify such a price contrast. This makes GTX 970 a surprisingly affordable high-end graphics card, whilst the GTX 980 may be considered an overpriced piece of crap. But, of course, since most of us are human beings with money to spend on actual necessities and a not so high income - the lexical combination of "affordable" and "high-end" is an oxymoron in terms of PC hardware, in effect making both of these cards overpriced pieces of shit.

Quite accurate, no?

 

Yeah, jokes aside, I do think the GTX 970 is a lovely piece of hardware and its price - for such a high-end graphics card - is very competitive. The smartest move made by Nvidia in a long time. The GTX 980 on the other hand... no, just no.

 

Long post in spoiler tag ahead; it is not 100% on-topic, but I didn't see the point in creating a new thread just for this and it's somewhat related.

Spoiler

I've actually been saving up for quite some time in order to afford a significant upgrade from my current set-up. I managed to save up enough for a Zotac 970, but my pre-built PC had a case that was too small for it and everything was very cramped in there. So, since the GTX 770s are being discontinued and have dropped in price considerably (in some shops they continue to drop), I grabbed an MSI GTX 770 TwinFrozr (2 GB) OC edition and a new case for my rig (a Zalman Z11) instead. It is a shame that the GTX 970 went out of my reach at a moment when I've managed to save up so much money (it seemed all to convenient that it was released not long before I was planning to upgrade), but so far I'm very happy with the GTX 770.

Previously I was using a Radeon 7770 HD, so the GTX 770 is quite a step up for me and it's the most powerful GPU I've ever owned. I'm not actually using its potential to the fullest at this moment since I'm not even on a 1080p display. My monitor is fairly old, it's 1440x900 and non-HDMI. I'm used to it, but I do plan to upgrade late next year if my finances allow it. On this resolution though, I can run Metro: Last Light maxed at a consistent 60 fps with v-sync, but without SSAA. If I turn SSAA up to 2X, I can mostly keep it at a sweet 50 fps. At 3X, I can do 40-45 with drops to the high-30s every now and then. When it's maxed at 4X, I'm looking at 30-something at the most and as low as 15 fps during some special effects (I did all tests on a surface level as it's much more demanding than underground levels).

The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings runs at a smooth 60 fps when maxed without ubersampling (with ubersampling on it stays between 50-60 fps, with occasional drops into high to mid-40s); Battlefield 3 runs maxed at an almost constant 75 fps in multiplayer with about a second long drop to 60 fps right after I spawn and then it's always back to normal; Red Orchestra 2: Heroes of Stalingrad can be maxed with continuous 60 fps; Far Cry 3 maxed with 45-60 fps (though the test I did was fairly short); Crysis – the first one – seems to jump about between 30 fps and 60 fps on ultra, but the frame rate never goes any higher or lower than these numbers; Crysis 2 runs maxed at a fairly consistent 60 fps, though there are occasional drops and they happen more frequently during the fancier scripted sequences (however it never dropped below 30 fps).

So I’m very satisfied with how it performs, even though this is only 1440x900. If I’m lucky, I’ll be able to run The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt maxed with decent fps when it comes out. However, since that probably won’t be the case, I’m prepared to drop the crazy AA options It will probably come with in favour of keeping everything else at ultra and hopefully above 30 fps at all times (perhaps many more fps if CDPR manage to optimize it well enough in time for release). We’ll see. The GTX 770 and other video cards around this level are great for pretty much any game out there even at 1080p, though the most demanding games always have a crazy option or two that makes little visible difference when not compared side-to-side and eats up a lot of resources (e.g. SSAA) just so that people who paid twice as much for a GTX 980, Titan or 780 Ti yet still play 1080p can feel as though they haven’t wasted their money. And I guess it makes sense.

 

Back when I had my first PC, I used to have to cope with terrible frame rates on some games. However, ever since I started playing on mid-range hardware (now high-end considering the GTX 770), 30 FPS has been the bare minimum for me to play a game and find it enjoyable. Though 35 FPS is probably a better number to use, because this reduces the probability of drops below 30. Anything above 50 FPS is a sweet spot indeed. However, if game manages to maintain a fairly stable frame rate of 50 FPS or higher and drops down to the 30s every time certain special effects occur, then it can also get annoying since it becomes a noticeable difference.

 

Gotta make the most of it while it lasts.

I had the same experience, above 20 fps used to mean good frame rate for me. Though that was already after migrating to the West. Back when we used to live in Poland we were a pretty damn poor family, even for Polish standards. I still remember it fondly because it's my childhood, but I didn't really have video games or anything to play them on at "home" before moving to England. This will make me sound like a helluva noob, but my first gaming platform was the PS2... in 2007. Before then, I'd only play games from the late 80s/early 90s at school or at a friend's house. There was one upside though: I didn't have to worry about FPS at all. :lol:

I haven't tried many old games after upgrading my GPU thus far, but I'll let you know once I do. Though I think I'll probably have more problems with the incompatibility of my OS (Windows 8) than I will with older games not recognising new hardware. Most likely I'll have to look up some tweaks online to even get them running. It's what I had to do with my Steam copy of Dark Forces to get it running and fix the terrible frame rate (no mods or anything, it's just changing things in the game's files) - and this was prior to upgrading.