Bang for the buck at ~$200

[SickBeast]

Not really.

Not sure if serious.

 

[tweakboy]

Right now the best bang for the buck is the current gen 660 Ti ....... it overclocks like a monster if you take the fan to 100 percent. You can take memory up big time look at mine......... make it as fast as 670........ thx gl

 

[Red Hawk]

Not sure if serious.

Benchmarks show the 7870 to be ahead of the 660 GTX on average.

 

[MrK6]

This is a terrific deal if you can catch it in stock. I don't have one but I read how it's a good card and a good cooler. I wanted it but got sick of waiting so I went with the Asus which I like but it's a little loud. It comes into stock and goes away quickly so get on the email notification list if you're interested.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814161404

This is it right here, especially if you're at 1080p. The 660 starts to choke when you add AA at 1080p, the 7870 still has a lot of muscle there though.

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Once both are oced 7870 is comparable to 660 ti and both are better than 660 when all are oced.

Best bang for buck is 7950 still.

 

[Mastercommander]

EDIT: Misread

 

[Mastercommander]

Once both are oced 7870 is comparable to 660 ti and both are better than 660 when all are oced.

Best bang for buck is 7950 still.

Overclocked 660 Ti is still 10% faster than a 7870

 

[RussianSensation]

HIS IceQ 7870 for $200 on Newegg with an awesome cooler.

7870 is faster than a 660 on average and can handle MSAA better too:
http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/grafikkarten/2012/test-nvidia-geforce-gtx-660/5/

Overclocked 660 Ti is still 10% faster than a 7870

660Ti competes with the 7950 because it costs $280+ but it still loses to the 7950 OC badly. Sure the 660Ti is faster than the 7870 but it costs $280+. $200 for a 7870 is also way better value than a 660Ti or $230 660. 7950 925mhz > 660Ti and 7950 OC >>>> 660Ti OC as well because it can surpass GTX680/7970 GE in performance, something 660Ti can only dream of:

Right now the best bang for the buck is the current gen 660 Ti ....... it overclocks like a monster if you take the fan to 100 percent. You can take memory up big time look at mine......... make it as fast as 670........ thx gl

Sorry, no. HD7950 @ 1100-1150mhz trashes an overclocked 660Ti without even trying, sometimes by 20-30%. In fact an overclocked 660Ti barely comes close to a stock 670 because 660Ti cards GPU Boost to 1150-1240mhz from the factory, leaving very little room for performance improvement overclocked. Further, 7950 has the full 32 ROP and 384-bit bus of the 7970 which means you can surpass 7970 GE in performance. Spec wise, 660Ti won't surpass a stock 670 even without a massive overclock since it's a physically crippled GK104 core.

 

[zaydq]

I'll second the 7870, especially at $200!

 

[Red Hawk]

Once both are oced 7870 is comparable to 660 ti and both are better than 660 when all are oced.

Best bang for buck is 7950 still.

True, but that's way above $200.

 

[Mastercommander]

HIS IceQ 7870 for $200 on Newegg with an awesome cooler.

7870 is faster than a 660 on average and can handle MSAA better too:
http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/grafikkarten/2012/test-nvidia-geforce-gtx-660/5/



660Ti competes with the 7950 because it costs $280+ but it still loses to the 7950 OC badly. Sure the 660Ti is faster than the 7870 but it costs $280+. $200 for a 7870 is also way better value than a 660Ti or $230 660. 7950 925mhz > 660Ti and 7950 OC >>>> 660Ti OC as well because it can surpass GTX680/7970 GE in performance, something 660Ti can only dream of:

Sorry, no. HD7950 @ 1100-1150mhz trashes an overclocked 660Ti without even trying, sometimes by 20-30%. In fact an overclocked 660Ti barely comes close to a stock 670 because 660Ti cards GPU Boost to 1150-1240mhz from the factory, leaving very little room for performance improvement overclocked. Further, 7950 has the full 32 ROP and 384-bit bus of the 7970 which means you can surpass 7970 GE in performance. Spec wise, 660Ti won't surpass a stock 670 even without a massive overclock since it's a physically crippled GK104 core.

That's still only 10%. You will note from the same site, 660 Ti's reaching 69 fps 🙂

Your $280 660 Ti could easily cost $240 once Borderlands 2 is sold. It's still better for Battlefield 3 over 7870, and Total War, as well as games generally, like I explained in that other thread.

I'm gaming at 1080p so it's just fine compared to 7950

 

[RussianSensation]

Yes, but 7950 cards have Sleeping Dogs that can also be sold. That's a circular argument. HD7950 is the faster card overall vs. the 660Ti in games generally as you put it. So if you are going to say after-selling BL2, 660Ti drops to $240-250, the same is true for a 7950 + SD. It's also meaningless to compare 660Ti to an HD7870 since one costs $200 and that's OP's target price. BF3 is nearly the best case scenario for a 660Ti. Take a look at 15-20 other games and 7950 OC destroys an OC 660Ti. $280 660Ti hardly makes sense against the 7950 since it can't handle MSAA well, has less VRAM for texture mods, has worse overclocking performance/scaling.

BF3 and Shogun 2 performance with latest drivers has narrowed down to single digits % wise between 7950 and 660Ti anyway, while in games where 660Ti loses, it gets pummeled into the ground:

That's been the story this entire generation: the minute you leave BF3, Shogun 2, WOW, Crysis 2 and a handful of other titles like SC2 and Lost Planet 2, AMD cards are just faster in more games, and in older games too. Plus, NV cards perform worse in the most demanding games such as Metro 2033, Crysis 1 / Warhead, Witcher 2 EE and all the DirectCompute 2012 titles.

 

[Mastercommander]

Lol, this post has taken a few revisions more than its share. Too sleepy to be posting.

But a couple of points:

I already knew all this.

1. No one buys a 660 Ti for 1440p

2. Those benches use 8x MSAA, which I have no need of when I can use something like SMAA injector for minimal performance hit and it even eliminates jagged edges MSAA does not.

Those games run fine already, including Metro, and Batman runs better on Nvidia when heavy MSAA is not needed. Civilization V? Dirt Showdown? Crysis? Who cares. And there is nothing upcoming on those engines that holds any interest.

I have great confidence in future TXAA for anti-aliasing. The 660 Ti is fine @ 1080p. As well, Nvidia is stronger in tessellation.

3. I've been recommending 7870 in this thread, so address your 7950 boosterism to someone else

 

[Mastercommander]

EDIT

 

[fffblackmage]

Uh, is there some confusion with the 660 and 660 Ti? From a quick look at newegg, the Ti version seems to sit just under $300. I didn't notice this before, but there's an MSI 660 for $205 AR.

I ended up buying the HIS IceQ 7870 just a moment ago. The leaf blower design should be good for my case's airflow, and the included game is definitely a nice bonus. I haven't bought an Nvidia graphics card since the 6600GT (AGP version), and I was actually kind of hoping I would this time. I guess Team Red wins my wallet again.

 

[Mastercommander]

Now that prices have just come down on the Sapphire Vapor-X 7950 to $310 after rebate, it's looking pretty great. And it uses hynix, not elpidra memory chips - good thing Sapphire isn't skimping on a high end model

 

[fffblackmage]

^That's great and all, but it's $110 above my budget. And for ~50% more, I doubt it'll get me 50% more performance, so it doesn't sound like it's gonna get me better bang for the buck. Anyways, it's good to see prices dropping. I still feel spoiled by the cheap prices of the HD4000 series.

 

[zaydq]

Uh, is there some confusion with the 660 and 660 Ti? From a quick look at newegg, the Ti version seems to sit just under $300. I didn't notice this before, but there's an MSI 660 for $205 AR.

I ended up buying the HIS IceQ 7870 just a moment ago. The leaf blower design should be good for my case's airflow, and the included game is definitely a nice bonus. I haven't bought an Nvidia graphics card since the 6600GT (AGP version), and I was actually kind of hoping I would this time. I guess Team Red wins my wallet again.

660 and 660ti are not the same card. 🙂

 

[fffblackmage]

Thought I'd post some pics on my shiny new 7870. Please excuse my dusty and messy case.

A comparison against my old XFX 4890. I used to have an Asus 5870 as well, but sold it. I thought that was pretty big, but the HIS IceQ 7870 is just absurdly huge.

It was a narrow fit. My crappy Gigabyte mobo's SATA port and USB header placement is just stupid. It was ok when I had a 4830, but it's always hitting something when I upgraded to the 4890 and 5870.

 

[blastingcap]

The IceQ Turbo is one of the best coolers for the 7870 in terms of quiet but powerful cooling... but it is rather large, as you said. Kinda phallic looking in a way.

 

[fffblackmage]

WTTTTTTTTTTTFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF

The Sleeping Dogs promotion thing expired..... :'(