660 ti & 7950 - same price, "wrong" decision?

[Isbiten]

(Info: I live in Sweden so prices might differ from US/RoW)
I ordered a Gigabyte 7650 WF last week.
Now, after reading even more I realize there are some things that are better on the 660 Ti.
1. BF3 - it runs better because of optimization
Comment: I think the 7950 will still do the job for me

2. PhysX - I read through the list and the ONLY game I will be missing it in will be Borderlands 2
Comment: Buying a card for that one game, meh. Still, there might be a a lot more coming and this buy is long term for me so this might be a problem in the future.

3. It seems to me (looking at Anandtech bench) that the games where 660 Ti beats the 7950 the FPS from the 7950 is still ok, whereas in games where the 7950 < 660Ti you go from 40 > 50 FPS which is much bigger than going from 70 > 80 FPS. Example, Crysis Warhead (1920x1080) 7950 @49.4 FPS, 660 Ti @38.8FPS
Comment: Do you understand what I'm trying to say? It's a little messy I know...

Now, in the end, I'm like everybody else (most people at least) in trying to protect my decision.
The fact is, I don't have a preference when it comes to GPUs, I don't care if it says Nvidia or ATI/AMD. All I care about is getting sexy graphics @ high FPS.

What it came down to for me was price.
I got a great deal on the 7950 and had it cheaper than any 660 Ti I could find (from a reputable seller) and that's kinda what did it for me in the end.
Really hope the extra GB of ram and the bigger bus will make this a LITTLE more long term than the 660 Ti.

This is my first ever high end card (GTX 260 is what I have right now)

EDIT: 7950 of course

 

[Greenlepricon]

Assuming you mean 7950 in your title? You made the right choice for sure! 660ti won't last as long and is the worse of the two. BF3 lost most of its advantage for Nvidia with the newest drivers, so don't worry about that one. Physx is sorta overrated at this point and won't really do much for you in my opinion. Trading that feature for better graphics is the way to go!

If you overclock at all you'll be more than pleased with your choice. The 660ti probably won't stick around effectively for more than one or two generations of GPUs, but hopefully you'll get at least one more out of the 7950, so have fun with it!

 

[3DVagabond]

The 7950 is the better performing card of the 2 and the wider memory bus with 3gig of RAM will make it even more so as time goes on.

As far as PhysX goes, you are right. Only 1 game all year that supports GPU PhysX isn't worth choosing a card for it. There were 7 games in 2009, 3 in 2010, 2 in 2011 and now only 1 in 2012. The trend speaks for itself.
SOURCE

 

[raghu78]

OP I think you mean the 7950. change that in the title too. With the latest 12.11 beta drivers AMD wins BF3. In fact on overclock.net there are users who have switched from GTX 680 to HD 7950 and the performance feedback is HD 7950 (1150 Mhz) beats GTX 680 (1250 Mhz) in BF3.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1318674/...atalyst-12-11-driver-update/150#post_18428759

here is a GTX 680 OC vs HD 7970 OC review

http://muropaketti.com/artikkelit/n...x-hd-7970-platinum-vs-msi-n680gtx-lightning,5

BF3 Ultra 2x MSAA 2560 x 1440

HD 7970 (1275 Mhz) - 69.6
GTX 680 (1346 Mhz) - 62.7

At the same clocks HD 7950 is 3 - 5% slower than HD 7970. So its very clear that even a HD 7950(1.15 Ghz) will be ahead of a GTX 680 at 1.25 Ghz clocks. With the GTX 660 Ti its a no contest.

 

[Isbiten]

OP I think you mean the 7950. change that in the title too. With the latest 12.11 beta drivers AMD wins BF3. In fact on overclock.net there are users who have switched from GTX 680 to HD 7950 and the performance feedback is HD 7950 (1150 Mhz) beats GTX 680 (1250 Mhz) in BF3.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1318674/...atalyst-12-11-driver-update/150#post_18428759

here is a GTX 680 OC vs HD 7970 OC review

http://muropaketti.com/artikkelit/n...x-hd-7970-platinum-vs-msi-n680gtx-lightning,5

BF3 Ultra 2x MSAA 2560 x 1440

HD 7970 (1275 Mhz) - 69.6
GTX 680 (1346 Mhz) - 62.7

At the same clocks HD 7950 is 3 - 5% slower than HD 7970. So its very clear that even a HD 7950(1.15 Ghz) will be ahead of a GTX 680 at 1.25 Ghz clocks. With the GTX 660 Ti its a no contest.

Yeah, found out about the new drivers.
All of a sudden my buy got even better

 

[wand3r3r]

When physx gets wild all the NV cards have drops to 10-20 fps, I have tried the gtx 690 and now the gtx 670 on an i7 980 @4+GHz. Physx is pretty slow on the 670 with multiplier and is regularly around the 30 fps mark and it's noticable. Without physx BL2 isn't demanding. So basically you can try use it with NV and in heavy battles (almost every mission) in multiplayer are brutal on the 670 (faster then the stock 680) (1920x1200).

The 7950 will easily run BL2 without physx (I have one of them too). They are supposedly working on a patch for BL2 but who knows what it will do. If someday you want to try physx you can always do the hack to use it with your 7950.

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Unless you are an nvidia fanboy or need nvidia only features the 7950 is clearly worth more than a 660 ti. With newer drivers and oc 7950 oc ~ 670 oc > 660ti oc

 

[Spjut]

You can try using your GTX 260 as a dedicated physX card

 

[zaydq]

7950 > 660ti in majority of bench marks in terms of stock reference speeds. It was the superior buy before the release of CAT 12.11 and with the new drivers its even better.

When it comes down to overclocking ability, the 7950 is leagues ahead of the 660ti, match OC'd GTX 670s and stock/slightly OC'd GTX 680s. I doubt a 660ti can do that for the same money.

 

[Isbiten]

Yeah, I found PhysX mod.
BUT, I don't have SLI/CF compatible MB, is this a problem?
How hard is it to get it work?
If it works is there any chance of it slowing down the 7950?

How DOES it work?

 

[wand3r3r]

I believe you don't need a motherboard that supports SLI.

 

[kaihonsou]

Im about to buy a 7950 soon (currently have a 460 SE) for my new 1920x1200 monitor that im getting tomorrow. My last ATI card was a X1800XT.

It should run cooler and quieter while being so much faster. I cant wait

 

[Isbiten]

I don't understand .
What I need is?
1. Nvidia Graphic Driver? 285.62-desktop-win7-winvista-64bit-english-whql < GTX 260
2. PhysX driver? PhysX_9.11.0621_SystemSoftware
3. Physx Mod? < PhysX-mod-1.05ff
4. ATI driver? AMD_Catalyst_12.11_Beta4_dotNET4.exe HD7950

 

[zaydq]

Yep. Its a user made hack, don't expect it to be as simple as pressing "Next, next, next, finish"

 

[wand3r3r]

I asked about it recently, there are a few members who have done it. I haven't gotten around to it, I have both AMD and NV high end gpus but haven't had a chance to test it out. They gave some tips and I'm sure you can ask them if you have specific questions.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2278248

Anyways, I recently saw another article where using an older limited gpu for physx (with a modern NV gpu) actually hampered performance vs. running everything on the modern gpu. So you can just test it out and see what it does.

This guy tested the gtx 6xx cards and concludes that a gtx 650 is good for BL2. My experience firsthand with both a gtx 690 and a gtx 670 oc have been to see slideshows/major drops in big battles especially in multiplayer, whereas he is finding minimum fps around 60 in single player so I would take everything with a grain of salt. Interesting nonetheless.
http://1pcent.com/?p=169

 

[biostud]

not to hijack the thread, but I might be able to buy a 670 (slightly used an still within warranty) for the same price as the 7950, which would you choose for 1440p? I mainly play borderlands 2 atm.

 

[lehtv]

For 1440p, definitely the 7950. Overclocked, it will be faster, and it has more VRAM which is important for 1440p.

 

[NIGELG]

not to hijack the thread, but I might be able to buy a 670 (slightly used an still within warranty) for the same price as the 7950, which would you choose for 1440p? I mainly play borderlands 2 atm.

If you want GPU PhysX and CUDA as well as Nvidia 3D Vision then 670 GTX is better for you...

Otherwise if you want more VRAM,Eyefinity,GCN,and a sweet bundle which has Farcry 3 AND Hitman Absolution THEN get the 7950.

 

[zaydq]

I'd still say the 7950 over the 670 simply due to new vs used, game bundle, 1440p performance and overclocking ability.

 

[ZimZum]

not to hijack the thread, but I might be able to buy a 670 (slightly used an still within warranty) for the same price as the 7950, which would you choose for 1440p? I mainly play borderlands 2 atm.

Will you be overclocking?

If yes 7950
If no 670

 

[raghu78]

not to hijack the thread, but I might be able to buy a 670 (slightly used an still within warranty) for the same price as the 7950, which would you choose for 1440p? I mainly play borderlands 2 atm.

With the latest drivers HD 7950 beats GTX 680 when both cards are overclocked. For your 1440p resolution and with a good game bundle HD 7950 is the card to get.

 

[Isbiten]

The card (7950) will hopefully arrive in the end of this week.
Now, to clarify.
If I don't want to touch the voltage (which I don't) there is the integrated OverDrive which should be sufficient, correct?
Now there are three settings:
1. GPU Clock
2. Memory Clock
3. Power?

What does the last one do and how does it effect how much you can OC?
What kind of stable OC can you expect at stock voltage on a Gigabyte 7950 WF?

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Just put power to the max, that is +20%.

 

[raghu78]

The card (7950) will hopefully arrive in the end of this week.
Now, to clarify.
If I don't want to touch the voltage (which I don't) there is the integrated OverDrive which should be sufficient, correct?
Now there are three settings:
1. GPU Clock
2. Memory Clock
3. Power?

What does the last one do and how does it effect how much you can OC?
What kind of stable OC can you expect at stock voltage on a Gigabyte 7950 WF?

The power control setting controls the power supplied to the board. It can range from - 20% to +20%. at stock settings its at 0%. When the GPU is overclocked it requires more power. If your power control is at 0% your GPU will throttle because power will be a constraint. By increasing power supplied to the chip you are allowing the GPU to run without any clock throttling.

The Gigabyte HD 7950 WF is factory overclocked and runs at 900 Mhz stock. AMD CCC allows to overclock upto 1.05 Ghz. You can easily aim for that. If its stable keep it. if not stable run at 1 Ghz. Most HD 7950 OC cards run completely stable at 1.05 Ghz at stock voltage using AMD CCC overclocking. :thumbsup:

 

[Isbiten]

The power control setting controls the power supplied to the board. It can range from - 20% to +20%. at stock settings its at 0%. When the GPU is overclocked it requires more power. If your power control is at 0% your GPU will throttle because power will be a constraint. By increasing power supplied to the chip you are allowing the GPU to run without any clock throttling.

The Gigabyte HD 7950 WF is factory overclocked and runs at 900 Mhz stock. AMD CCC allows to overclock upto 1.05 Ghz. You can easily aim for that. If its stable keep it. if not stable run at 1 Ghz. Most HD 7950 OC cards run completely stable at 1.05 Ghz at stock voltage using AMD CCC overclocking. :thumbsup:

Ok!
So its totally safe to just push the power to +20% and then go as high as possible as long as it's stable?