Buy now or wait?

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boozzer

Golden Member
Jan 12, 2012
1,549
18
81
So I guess my tentative plan is to wait for the new GPU, if not, snag the first mind blowing deal on a 290 or 380 that pops up in the meanwhile.
last year, about 1 month before the release date of fury, there were loads and loads of sales on 290 and the entire 200 series. you might get lucky.
 

Sonikku

Lifer
Jun 23, 2005
15,749
4,558
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Dang, I should have snatched a 290 much sooner. You know there was a time back in the 90's when your new PC was obsolete by the time you got home from the store. These days a solid gpu (or CPU, like my i5 Sandy. Even my 8gb of ram holds up) just seem to last and last, unprecedented staying power. I really missed the boat with this one.
 

moonbogg

Lifer
Jan 8, 2011
10,635
3,095
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Wasn't the 750 ti the first Maxwell?

Yes but the OP said they wanted a GPU. Not some low power piece of crap onboard replacement. That's why I didn't even consider it. What I said still stands. There will be no low cost GPU's available for a long ass time.
 

Headfoot

Diamond Member
Feb 28, 2008
4,444
641
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Are you saying the OP, running an HD 7770 released over four years ago, should wait another six months longer to play "WoW/Witcher/Inquisition/Battlefront etc." on a $250 Polaris card?

Yes. Anyone who buys a new card right now will be like the people who bought a C2D e8400 right before Nehalem dropped. Sure it was quick in its time, but it hasn't shown anywhere near the legs Nehalem has.

I acknowledge I am making logical inference. Making reasonable conclusions from the data is more than "no idea." That's all I'm saying. "No idea" is wrong. We don't have definite, 100% certain numbers. But that doesn't mean we have 100% no numbers at all.
 
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Sonikku

Lifer
Jun 23, 2005
15,749
4,558
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Alright I played your game and waited for the new GPU's. 480x nay or yay? Should I hold out for the 1060 or what?

Running an i5 2500 on h77m mobo.
 

mjdupuis

Member
Apr 14, 2015
55
10
81
Wait for comparisons of 1060 v 480. I'm waiting to purchase a card in this range as well, I would like all the cards on the table before I purchase.
 

Jaskalas

Lifer
Jun 23, 2004
33,438
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Wait for comparisons of 1060 v 480. I'm waiting to purchase a card in this range as well, I would like all the cards on the table before I purchase.

"We" already asked him to wait once.:colbert:

But yeah, this is going to be a good fall season for upgrading video cards.
 

mjdupuis

Member
Apr 14, 2015
55
10
81
What's a few more weeks? The third party cards would probably be the best option for the 480, and we should know what the 1060 has to offer by the time the AIB cards hit the street.
 

R0H1T

Platinum Member
Jan 12, 2013
2,582
162
106
Alright I played your game and waited for the new GPU's. 480x nay or yay? Should I hold out for the 1060 or what?

Running an i5 2500 on h77m mobo.
Buy the 8GB model if you wanna go CF anytime in the future, otherwise 4GB version is fine, also make sure you have a decent PSU.

The only other (possibly better) VFM GPU coming from either camp is going to be the Rx470 but perhaps that isn't the performance level you're looking for.
 

Sonikku

Lifer
Jun 23, 2005
15,749
4,558
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Buy the 8GB model if you wanna go CF anytime in the future, otherwise 4GB version is fine, also make sure you have a decent PSU.

The only other (possibly better) VFM GPU coming from either camp is going to be the Rx470 but perhaps that isn't the performance level you're looking for.

Blah! Should have bought one on launch day. They all have 8gb of ram so to score one for $200 would have been a bargain. My 7770 looks upon me with big sad puppy dog eyes at how long I'm keeping this thing chugging along. :'(

Question. Can my H77M motherboard with i5 2500 run the 480x without bottleneck or could the Pci Express socket hold it back?
http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/H77M/?cat=Specifications
 

fastamdman

Golden Member
Nov 18, 2011
1,335
70
91
Why not go with a used gtx 980 around the 250 range that overclocks really well. At 1080p you will be able to play everything with it.

If you can't afford the 1070s, the 980 will probably be very close to the 1060 if I had to take a guess, its just going to depend on price at that point.
 

GIS

Member
Mar 24, 2016
43
0
11
Blah! My 7770 looks upon me with big sad puppy dog eyes at how long I'm keeping this thing chugging along. :'(

Dawg, I'm still using my Radeon HD 6950 2GB and waiting to upgrade this fall as well, so don't feel like your card is too old or something.
 

Headfoot

Diamond Member
Feb 28, 2008
4,444
641
126
No dude. Raja just went on record giving a pretty good idea of what prices will be if you're willing to read in between the lines a little bit.

"no idea of what prices will be" is outright wrong. We don't have a definitive number, but we know quite a bit about it what it WONT be and therefore a narrowed range.

Reasonable Inference. Using basic understanding of product lifecycles we know that a new product which does not perform much better than an old product will not be much higher in price (much being roughly 25%). Using AMD's public demonstrations that small Polaris matches GTX 950 in SW:BF at lower Watts (= most likely somewhat higher performance with a FPS cap to 60). We already know one of the products is positioned against the GTX 950, so we already know it will be in the same price range (e.g.roughly between $150 and $250), again using basic and reasonable inference. Using the Hitman demo (http://techfrag.com/2016/03/15/amd-...t-1440p60fps-warhammer-to-utilize-directx-12/) we know big Polaris can run Hitman DX12 @ 1440p @ 60fps on Ultra. Using publicly available benchmark data
Hitman-PC-DirectX-12-Benchmarks_4-635x633.jpg
we can conclude that big Polaris therefore performs in the ballpark of 390x to Fury range in DX12 at least. Therefore, using our knowledge of product lifecycles, it will be priced similarly to the 390 to Fury range or $300 to $550.

So with a few small inferences we can conclude the new cards will fall between $150 to $250 and $300 to $550 based on what we know now, and assuming no major changes in product positioning strategy since the R300 and Fury series.

With additional, larger inferences, we know that the $200 and $250 marks are very important to consumers and that AMD will try and target them. Thus, it is reasonable if less certain to conclude there will be a SKU near $200 and near $250 (within $20).

Definitely "no idea" of what prices will be indeed.

This is a heck of a lot of inference for cards that are guaranteed not to actually hit store shelves until August. And as you've stated, the card you're referring to actually won't be that much faster than what's available, and will likely cost more.

Are you saying the OP, running an HD 7770 released over four years ago, should wait another six months longer to play "WoW/Witcher/Inquisition/Battlefront etc." on a $250 Polaris card?

Lots of prognostication in this thread, but I'll stand by my original recommendation. The OP should buy an R9 380 right now.

And the RX 480 4GB is $200 and the RX 480 8GB is $240. Looks like my predictions above (bolded) were correct. My first was exactly correct. My second was within my stated $20 + or - range. And here we are in July, and you can purchase these cards. And they are less expensive than the competing cards were in February. Waiting was definitely a good choice.
 
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Sonikku

Lifer
Jun 23, 2005
15,749
4,558
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Does my running a Sandy Bridge instead of an Ivy have any impact at all on the PCI Express slot?

Would a GPU be slower in my other GPU socket because it says it runs in x4 mode? If I could run a cpu on the 2.0 socket instead of the 3.0 socket that's in the middle of the board I could use my PCI slots as they would not obstruct gpu air flow.
- 1 x PCI Express 3.0 x16 slot (PCIE1: x16 mode)
- 1 x PCI Express 2.0 x16 slot (PCIE2: x4 mode)
 

Headfoot

Diamond Member
Feb 28, 2008
4,444
641
126
Blah! Should have bought one on launch day. They all have 8gb of ram so to score one for $200 would have been a bargain. My 7770 looks upon me with big sad puppy dog eyes at how long I'm keeping this thing chugging along. :'(

Question. Can my H77M motherboard with i5 2500 run the 480x without bottleneck or could the Pci Express socket hold it back?
http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/H77M/?cat=Specifications

It might not be too late on sites that allow you to "preorder" the reference model while its out of stock, check around.
 

Headfoot

Diamond Member
Feb 28, 2008
4,444
641
126
I would make sure that you run it at 16x. Check which slot on the mobo is the PCIE 3 slot and use that one, PCIe 2 x4 will slow your card down to answer your other question. Check the mobo user manual for that info