Advice on Physx card with GTX970

[werepossum]

Now that we're seeing the most excellent GTX970 for as low as $300 (MSI Gaming LE on NewEgg) I'm pretty much decided that is what I am going to buy. So now I'm considering adding a cheap second card for Physx. My last few cards have been AMD so I have nothing suitable squirreled away, so it's not an open and shut thing for me. I am looking for advice on it.

I see a lot of games listed because their engines support it, but in which games is Physx actually implemented well enough to want it enabled?

What is the cheapest card suitable for a GTX970 and i5-2500K?

Is 16GB worth the upgrade cost with Physx enabled? I game at 1080p, so I am assuming that 8GB is sufficient even for modded 64 bit games with 4GB VRAM.

Thanks!

 

[MongGrel]

I didn't even know they sold those anymore.

I have an old ASUS one laying around somewhere, I guess you ca buy a older NVidia to do that, I had that for a dual 4870 at the time.

 

[Sabrewings]

8GB will be plenty, considering the 980 Ti comes with 6GB. Not sure why they would even bother with that much other than it's easy for packaging to increase over 4GB.

At 1080p with full DSR on my 980 Ti, the most I've seen is around the 4GB mark. But that's in Elite with every possible goody turned on.

Regarding PhysX cards, why not buy the 970 and try running games and see if you even need it? I doubt you will at 1080p. If you do, a 750 Ti or perhaps a rumored 950 Ti will be good. PhysX isn't very intensive so a light weight card would do the trick.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Do you actually play many PhysX enabled titles? It's not used in that many games. You're probably better off saving up to buy a second 970 for SLI than getting a dedicated PhysX card, as the benefits of SLI will be available in every game. But at the very least, I'd see how PhysX runs on a single 970 before you go any further; you might not need any additional hardware either way.

 

[ShintaiDK]

You dont need a second card for PhysX.

 

[PG]

You dont need a second card for PhysX.

I second this.

As we all know, Arkham Knight is a mess right now on PC, but a 970 is one of the few cards that can deliver good framerates at 1080P with all the PhysX features turned on according to gamegpu:
http://gamegpu.ru/action-/-fps-/-tps/batman-arkham-knight-test-gpu.html

A lower end card just for PhysX may actually slow things down. A 970 is really powerful by itself.

 

[2is]

I wouldn't buy a second cart just for PhysX. If I had one laying around, i'd probably use it, but I wouldn't spend more money on one

 

[werepossum]

8GB will be plenty, considering the 980 Ti comes with 6GB. Not sure why they would even bother with that much other than it's easy for packaging to increase over 4GB.

At 1080p with full DSR on my 980 Ti, the most I've seen is around the 4GB mark. But that's in Elite with every possible goody turned on.

Regarding PhysX cards, why not buy the 970 and try running games and see if you even need it? I doubt you will at 1080p. If you do, a 750 Ti or perhaps a rumored 950 Ti will be good. PhysX isn't very intensive so a light weight card would do the trick.

That's a good point. NVidia really pushes its list of PhysX-enabled games, but it actually says games using PhysX-enabled engines. So I'm thinking a game could be on the list with little or no implementation?

Do you actually play many PhysX enabled titles? It's not used in that many games. You're probably better off saving up to buy a second 970 for SLI than getting a dedicated PhysX card, as the benefits of SLI will be available in every game. But at the very least, I'd see how PhysX runs on a single 970 before you go any further; you might not need any additional hardware either way.

That was why I asked - I just didn't know if running it at all was pointless in most games.

Thanks everyone, that was very helpful.