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Would you recommend this card?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125385
Gigabyte Radeon HD 6950 1GB
I'm wanting to make a significant upgrade from a GTX260 for now. In about 3-6months I'll build a new PC with this in it and possibly will do crossfire in 2 years.
Comments
Yes this is a great card, cant go wrong with it.
The biggest problem is this card is going to be 11.4 inches long and my card which is 10" is already too snug. May get a 6870 instead
I upgraded from a 260GTX to a 6970 back in December when the 6970's and 6950's first came out.
Honestly - I couldn't tell the difference.
Granted, I don't play many of the latest games. But my 260GTX could run pretty well everything at or above 60FPS anyway. The 6970 benchmarks faster sure, and I can flip on a few more options in games that weren't maxed out, but in terms of gameplay, realistically, it didn't make any difference.
Now the latest crop of games may stress a 260GTX a bit, and a 6950 is a nice card (I love PowerTune) and you will definitely benchmark faster with it, but for me I didn't see any huge difference.
As far as the length - most all the upper tier video cards are going to be nearly that long. I don't think a 6870 would give you nearly as much upgrade power over the 260 that the 6950 would - if it were me knowing what I know now, I'd just hold out until the new 7000 series comes out "soon" and see what that brings to the table.
Also, with regard to "Crossfire in 2 years" - either do Crossfire now, or upgrade to whatever the latest generation card is in 2 years. 2 years from now, you will either have trouble finding a suitable matching card to Crossfire it with, the card will be nearly the same price as a brand new current generation card is anyway, or technology will have shifted (DX12, OpenCL, something) to where you want hardware support that only newer generation cards have anyway. Crossfire/SLI isn't really as good an upgrade path as it sounds on paper - not to mention all the hidden costs (bigger power supply, better motherboard, higher power bills, more cooling, etc).
What resolution do you game at and what CPU do you have where you did not notice a difference between a 260GTX and a 6970? What games? Do you have every option turned off? I apologize for the 3rd degree, but this just seems unpossible.
Otherwise, I would agree about waiting for the 7000 series cards. The 2nd tier cards are mostly likely going to start arriving in December and the 6950 equivalents will come some time in 1Q. Certainly in the 3-6 month time frame where the OP will be building a new system. Also of note is that the 7900 series will be PCI 3.0 cards, so you might want to wait for Ivy Bridge (Intel's tick-tock update coming out by next spring-ish) or at least shop around for a Sandy Bridge-E motherboard that bins high and the maker certifies as pci 3.0.
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/amd-southern-islands-28nm-gpu-ati,13715.html
Otherwise, I would agree about waiting for the 7000 series cards. The 2nd tier cards are mostly likely going to start arriving in December and the 6950 equivalents will come some time in 1Q. Certainly in the 3-6 month time frame where the OP will be building a new system. Also of note is that the 7900 series will be PCI 3.0 cards, so you might want to wait for Ivy Bridge (Intel's tick-tock update coming out by next spring-ish) or at least shop around for a Sandy Bridge-E motherboard that bins high and the maker certifies as pci 3.0.
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/amd-southern-islands-28nm-gpu-ati,13715.html
Intel Core i7 920 - OCed to 4.0Ghz.
Original Everquest, WoW, FFXIV, FFXI, Global Agenda, GTA4, a few Valve source games. Rift wasn't out yet, I did play Champions online with the 260 and it played fine, didn't play it after I had got the 6970 to retest it though (but I can't imagine it getting much better).
Gaming at 1920x1200 - most options on (the only one that wasn't max maxed was FFXIV, and that one had enough options on to look great - I usually don't play with shadows, motion blur, DOF, or FSAA any higher than 4x though because I just don't like those things), with Vsync enabled (because my LCD tears badly if I don't).
VSync is the reason that the upgrade didn't really matter much.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130651
get this and call it a day
But how affordable are they going to be as soon as they come out or 3 months after? I'm not going to spend more than $250.
I'd be willing to bet, that provided they keep the same relative naming convention and video memory options, that a 7870 will be priced +/- 10% of what the 6870 was when it was first released.
Ahh yeah, you wouldn't see a difference with any of those games. You should be able to turn on every bell and whistle though that those game engines allow and not see a drop at all in your fps. Try it.
Rift on the other hand, yeah you would have had noticed a definite increase in fps with it if you'd used the 260 first.
Yeah I'd still wait with a a budget of $250 if you aren't building anything for 3-6 months. At the very least you'll be able to buy a card with the same graphics power but with a much lower TDP (power usage and heat generation) for the same amount of money.
Also at the far end of 6 months Nvidia should have their Kepler based cards coming out so hopefully it will cause some price competition, not to mention just yields in general of the 28nm process will be much higher by then.
Good to know. Wait it is.
Thanks