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770 vs R9 280x TOXIC

N

Nged72

Member
I currently have a MSi 560Ti Hawk and and contemplating upgrading my GPU. The 770 is about the same amount of money as the TOXIC, but you also get 3 games (splinter cell blacklist, ac:black flag, batman origins; in which I am going to purchased AC:BF and SP:B for sure).

Which card is overall better?

770 4GB - $389.99 PLUS 3 Games (2 of which I'm buying no matter what)
770 2GB - $349.99 PLUS 3 Games
280x TOXIC - $349.99
 
Toxic will be faster out of the box but you get three free games with the 770.

What resolution do you play at?
 
As they sit the toxic card is the fastest.

I'd say grab a 300 dollar 280x, or the MSI gamer card for 300 that is factory overclocked and go from there.

50 dollar premium is high for the 280x, even the toxic is a great version.
 
If you are going to buy those games anyway, then to me it is a no-brainer to get the 4GB 770. That will save you close to $100, unless you go with the plain 280X which is a great card as Attic mentioned...especially the Asus and MSI Gaming one....but then you will spend money for the games which will put you spending roughly $20-$30 more overall.

So, I say get the MSI Gaming 770 4 GB. However, if you are only gaming @ 1080p..then just get the 2GB version which will save you even more money. Just my .02c.
 
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Nged72 said:
I only game at 1920x1080 with my 22inch monitor.
Click to expand...

If you want the games get the 770. The 2gig of RAM could be an issue later on. I don't think the 4gig is worth $90 more than a 3gig 280X, even with the free games. As far as 280X's I'd go with the Asus DCII or the MSI Gamer. The 3gig of RAM is a plus. Don't pay extra for the Toxic. If I were going to opt for a premium 280X I'd get the Asus Matrix. It has a better PCB than the Toxic and more O/C'ing features. I'd still go with the DCII or the Gamer model over the Matrix, personally.
 
Elfear said:
Toxic will be faster out of the box but you get three free games with the 770.

What resolution do you play at?
Click to expand...

It really depends on what model GTX 770 he plans on getting. If he gets a factory overclocked model, like the Gigabyte OC or MSI Lightning, then it will be just as fast, or faster than the 280x toxic depending on the game.
 
The 770 starts at 1046 Mhz boosting to 1085 Mhz by default. The best card I can find is the Gigabyte OC which takes that to 1137 and 1189.

In comparison the 280X starts at 850Mhz, is roughly the same speed as the 770 (according to gamegpu.ru data across a wide range of games, GE comes in slight faster, 7970 slower, 280X should with linear scaling also be very slightly slower but its like 1% so a tie). But here we have a card overclocked to 1100/1150. that is a much bigger increase in clockspeed than any of the 770's can muster when overclocked, it will clearly outperform the GE and any of the OCed GeForces. Its not even going to be a small difference the 280X toxic is going to end up a good 20-25% quicker on average. That is nearly enough of a boost to make sure that its quicker in every game (the swing on gamegpu.ru is 30%).

But there are other considerations on these two cards. PhysX, gsync (future) on one side and mantle (future) on the other. Then there is your perception of driver quality and the types of bugs that are a problem to you, differences in volume of the coolers and power consumption. Lots of other considerations that might swing you one way or the other on these card choices.
 
Nged72 said:
Well the 770 4GB ACX was on sale today for 319$ before tax/shipping on Micro Center...but they cancelled almost everyones order.

http://www.microcenter.com/product/...CX_Cooler_4096MB_GDDR5_PCIe_x16_30_Video_Card

Also; since I have a 560ti already can I use that for PhysX later if I wanted to while using the 280x with my main graphics?
Click to expand...

yeah you can use physx with gtx 560 ti with an AMD primary card. but if physx is important i would advise you to get a gtx 770.
 
raghu78 said:
yeah you can use physx with gtx 560 ti with an AMD primary card. but if physx is important i would advise you to get a gtx 770.
Click to expand...

I've honestly never used PhysX and Idk if I would plan to either. I guess it's not really a selling point for me; unless it got awesome in the future.
 
Nged72 said:
Well the 770 4GB ACX was on sale today for 319$ before tax/shipping on Micro Center...but they cancelled almost everyones order.

http://www.microcenter.com/product/...CX_Cooler_4096MB_GDDR5_PCIe_x16_30_Video_Card

Also; since I have a 560ti already can I use that for PhysX later if I wanted to while using the 280x with my main graphics?
Click to expand...

Damn. That is a good price for that card. And yeah, you can use PhysX with the AMD card, but you have to use a driver hack.

It is still showing $319 for that card, btw...so seems to me the sale should go through.

/Looks like you have to update the quantity once you put in your basket.
 
Teizo said:
Damn. That is a good price for that card. And yeah, you can use PhysX with the AMD card, but you have to use a driver hack.

It is still showing $319 for that card, btw...so seems to me the sale should go through.

/Looks like you have to update the quantity once you put in your basket.
Click to expand...

It gets cancelled after you order it.

Mine was cancelled 2 hours after ordering; if you order online you wont get one, but if you find one in a store near you, you will get one but they are out of the 3 free games.
 
Nged72 said:
It gets cancelled after you order it.

Mine was cancelled 2 hours after ordering; if you order online you wont get one, but if you find one in a store near you, you will get one but they are out of the 3 free games.
Click to expand...

Meh. That is weak. I'd never do business with them again. From the looks of it, their prices are not competitive anyway.
 
Nged72 said:
I've honestly never used PhysX and Idk if I would plan to either. I guess it's not really a selling point for me; unless it got awesome in the future.
Click to expand...

then go with asus r9 280x dcii top

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814121803

best reviewed and quietest r9 280x :thumbsup:

noise tests
http://www.tomshardware.de/amd-radeon-r9-280x-roundup-test,testberichte-241401-6.html

http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphi...oundup-ASUS-MSI-and-Sapphire/Closing-Thoughts

http://techreport.com/review/25466/amd-radeon-r9-280x-and-270x-graphics-cards/10

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/R9_280X_Direct_Cu_II_TOP/3.html

http://www.anandtech.com/show/7400/the-radeon-r9-280x-review-feat-asus-xfx/20

http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/graphics/61013-asus-radeon-r9-280x-directcu-ii-top/?page=10
 
BrightCandle said:
The 770 starts at 1046 Mhz boosting to 1085 Mhz by default. The best card I can find is the Gigabyte OC which takes that to 1137 and 1189.
Click to expand...

I have the Gigabyte OC, and the boost clock is 1241.

In comparison the 280X starts at 850Mhz, is roughly the same speed as the 770 (according to gamegpu.ru data across a wide range of games, GE comes in slight faster, 7970 slower, 280X should with linear scaling also be very slightly slower but its like 1% so a tie). But here we have a card overclocked to 1100/1150. that is a much bigger increase in clockspeed than any of the 770's can muster when overclocked, it will clearly outperform the GE and any of the OCed GeForces. Its not even going to be a small difference the 280X toxic is going to end up a good 20-25% quicker on average. That is nearly enough of a boost to make sure that its quicker in every game (the swing on gamegpu.ru is 30%).
Click to expand...
Anandtech reviewed the 280x Toxic and it wasn't nowhere near 20 to 25% faster on average than even the reference GTX 770, much less one of the aftermarket editions.

Basically, AMD had the edge in the games which favor it's architecture, and NVidia had the edge in the games that favor theirs.

Metro Last Light was at outlier, but NVidia have since released a driver with optimizations that increased performance.

AMD made some major optimizations to the performance of that game in their last driver updates. I wonder how it performs with the AMD optimized tessellation setting disabled?
 
Carfax83 said:
It really depends on what model GTX 770 he plans on getting. If he gets a factory overclocked model, like the Gigabyte OC or MSI Lightning, then it will be just as fast, or faster than the 280x toxic depending on the game.
Click to expand...

Lets look at what the reviews say.

Over a broad range of reviews, the reference 280X is on par with the reference 770.

Hardware Canucks - 1% slower vs 770

Hardware France - 2-4% faster

Computer Base - 1% slower to 5% faster

TPU - 3% slower to exactly even


Based on Anandtech's review, the 280X Toxic gains 13.3% more performance on average over the reference 280X.

Based on Hardware Canuck's review, the 770 Lightning gains 7.1% more performance over the reference 770.

Bottom line, the Toxic is faster than the 770 Lightning. Now the delta isn't huge enough to notice most of the time so the three free games might make the 770 worth it, especially if you were going to buy them anyway.

OP - If you only upgrade every one or two years, I would get a card with more than 2GB of ram. My personal vote would be to get a non-reference 280X for $300, overclock it, and buy the games you want on Ebay when people sell their codes for cheap. That way you could get everything for $350-360.
 
How would these 4GB 770 compare to the TOXIC?

(I upgrade every...3-4 years most of the time)
(25$ off 250$+ today)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130945
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814125462

Or get the TOXIC for 359.99+6$ shipping - 25$ = $340

Some of y'all say the TOXIC is worth it. Others do not. I can see spending money on one of those 770 especially with the free games, but I don't want to buy a 770 if the 280 is better.

So which is the best bang for the buck? 770 v 280. Reference or not?
 
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Nged72 said:
How would these 4GB 770 compare to the TOXIC?

(I upgrade every...3-4 years most of the time)
(25$ off 250$+ today)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130945
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814125462

Or get the TOXIC for 359.99+6$ shipping - 25$ = $340

Some of y'all say the TOXIC is worth it. Others do not. I can see spending money on one of those 770 especially with the free games, but I don't want to buy a 770 if the 280 is better.

So which is the best bang for the buck? 770 v 280. Reference or not?
Click to expand...


Non reference 280x, the $300 MSI gamer is a good one.
 
Nged72 said:
How would these 4GB 770 compare to the TOXIC?

(I upgrade every...3-4 years most of the time)
(25$ off 250$+ today)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130945
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814125462

Or get the TOXIC for 359.99+6$ shipping - 25$ = $340

Some of y'all say the TOXIC is worth it. Others do not. I can see spending money on one of those 770 especially with the free games, but I don't want to buy a 770 if the 280 is better.

So which is the best bang for the buck? 770 v 280. Reference or not?
Click to expand...

Stock vs. stock they are very close, with a very slight edge to the 770 at 1080p.
83% vs. 86% at 1080p, tied at 1600p.
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/R9_290X/27.html

The problem (as I see it) is that the 770 standard model has a meager 2GB. If you plan on keeping it for 3-4 years there is no way this is a smart buy. 2GB is a bad decision.

So looking at 3GB 280x Gaming at $310 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814127759
vs. 4GB 770 at $380+ http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...CE&PageSize=20

I would go for the 280x Gaming and manually overclock it a little.

There is no way the 770 is worth $80 over the 280x. OC vs OC is a wash, and the 770 can't pull ahead $80 worth. Granted it's down to the silicon lottery regarding OCing, but the 770 is voltage locked and limited more unless you want to lose the warranty and flash the bios.

So +1 vote for the 280x.

I'd probably take the toxic over a 770, but I'd still rather save the additional $40-50 and take the gaming (or comparable) since they have good coolers and are solid cards.
 
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Yea the Toxic is OOS so I won't be able to use the 25$ off on it. The MSI gamer is in stock though. Had bad experiences with MSI but I could give them another try.

The whole "coil whine" on the Msi also makes me nervous. And the asus is OOS and has higher memory clock and core clock (only slightly)


Edit: damn the Toxic has Core Clock of 1600 vs 1000 MSI. Grrr
 
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Yeah coil whine would really annoy me. MSI has one of the best warranty policies, however as the thread the other day informed us, they don't replace cards with coil whine. (I doubt any company would, perhaps if you RMA from the place of purchase?)

For a ranking between the two, the Tech Buyers Guru has rated/ranked them.

Radeon R9 280X 3GB - P/P Rating (Oct. 2013) = 1.67
vs.

GeForce GTX 770 2GB (~$400)
Released May 2013, $400
P/P Rating at Release = 1.25
P/P Rating (Oct. 2013) = 1.25 (at $400)

Since the 770 just got a price cut, that P/P ranking is very close for the 770 4GB which is $380+. The 4GB model is no faster than the 2GB, so it's off by about 5%, but it's still a poor value around 1.3ish vs. 1.67 P/P.

http://www.techbuyersguru.com/VideoCardRankings2.php
 
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