fallout 4: time to upgrade my video card i think

[kaesden]

So i've been playing through fallout 4 a bit, and i'd like to get better performance, and be able to max out(or close to it) settings and my current rig just isn't cutting it anymore. I've recently upgraded to a 1440p from 1080p display and i'm really noticing the performance hit in all the games I play.

My current system
intel i5 2500 @ 3.9 turbo(runs constant at turbo, i don't have a K unfortunately so this is the best i can do)
24gb ram
gigabyte windforce 670 gtx 2gb
1440p display w/gsync(only mentioning this for why i'm not considering AMD cards)

I'm thinking of getting either a 970 or 980 as an upgrade but had a few questions as its quite hard to find direct comparisons.

1. Is the 970's issue with the 4gb actually only being 3.5gb a major issue?
2. How well does the 970 perform compared to a 670? is it a large increase or just incremental?
3. Would I be better off spending more now for a more future proof upgrade with the 980 and saving some money long term?
4. What would be the quietest card for a 970 and 980? I don't care about power draw, and i'm willing to lose 1-2% to have a more silent system. I've been pretty happy with the gigabyte card, but it is audible when under full load.

 

[RussianSensation]

The two quietest 970 cards are MSI Gaming and Asus Strix.

ASUS GeForce GTX 970 STRIX = $280

https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS/GTX_970_STRIX_OC/24.html

MSI GeForce GTX 970 GTX 970 GAMING = $280

https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/MSI/GTX_970_Gaming/26.html

Cannot go wrong with either of those.

Don't even bother with a 980 as it costs $440 vs. $280 970. Better to reduce some settings like draw distance/shadow distance and put aside $160 extra for a next generation 16nm upgrade in 2017-2018.

Performance wise, on average 970 will be 50-90% faster than a GTX670, depending on the scene at 1440P (670 ~ 760):

In FO4, the difference is less though (GTX670 can be compared to 760 or 950 when it's not in the charts):

http://www.computerbase.de/2015-11/fallout-4-benchmarks/2/#diagramm-fallout-4-2560-1440

 

[kaesden]

Thanks for the info, very helpful.

How about the 970 memory issue? I remember reading a big scandal about how the 4gb cards are only 3.5gb usable and actually using the last 512 can tank performance? Is that something I would need to be concerned with at 1440p? or even worry about at all?

 

[RussianSensation]

Thanks for the info, very helpful.

How about the 970 memory issue? I remember reading a big scandal about how the 4gb cards are only 3.5gb usable and actually using the last 512 can tank performance? Is that something I would need to be concerned with at 1440p? or even worry about at all?

Don't worry about it. The way I look at it is if you are going to pile on tons of mods, they will be so demanding that the extra 500MB on 980 won't help it much. If you need even more performance for future games, just sell the 970 and get a card 70-100% faster in 2017-2018 with the $160 saved right now by not buying a 980. If you absolutely want the best card, then might as well go for the $570 980Ti. 980 to me isn't worth $440. Next year we are going to get 16nm cards with new NV architecture (Pascal) and new AMD architecture (GCN 2.0), which means don't overspend right now unless you want the best in the 980Ti.

You can also overclock either of those 970s to 1.4-1.5Ghz. That would give you another 15-20% or so in performance gain.

 

[kaesden]

cool, I think you have me convinced. Sounds like my best bet is either a 970, or just step it up to a 980 ti. Since i dont feel like dropping 600+(including tax) i think i'll accept the 970 as sufficient. Thank you for the quick responses!!

This is all sounding quite familiar to when i was deciding back in the day between a 670 and 680, and basically the same conclusion was reached

 

[RussianSensation]

cool, I think you have me convinced. Sounds like my best bet is either a 970, or just step it up to a 980 ti. Since i dont feel like dropping 600+(including tax) i think i'll accept the 970 as sufficient. Thank you for the quick responses!!

This is all sounding quite familiar to when i was deciding back in the day between a 670 and 680, and basically the same conclusion was reached

I would personally go for the MSI Gaming card due to many bad stories about Asus U.S. GPU RMA. If you don't mind waiting for a hot deal, you could also wait until Black Friday/Cyber Monday.

 

[kaesden]

I would personally go for the MSI Gaming card due to many bad stories about Asus U.S. GPU RMA. If you don't mind waiting for a hot deal, you could also wait until Black Friday/Cyber Monday.

cool. I also just found out amex has a $25 statement credit for purchases of $200 or more from newegg, so that would bring the cost down to $255+tax, and that includes assassin's creed syndicate for free, which i was interested in anyway. Not a bad deal at all, and about half of what i was prepared to potentially spend. I dont see much point waiting for black friday to possibly save another $20-30, i don't see it going much below $220-230ish on a black friday deal, assuming i could even get one before they sell out.

 

[RussianSensation]

cool. I also just found out amex has a $25 statement credit for purchases of $200 or more from newegg, so that would bring the cost down to $255+tax, and that includes assassin's creed syndicate for free, which i was interested in anyway. Not a bad deal at all, and about half of what i was prepared to potentially spend. I dont see much point waiting for black friday to possibly save another $20-30, i don't see it going much below $220-230ish on a black friday deal, assuming i could even get one before they sell out.

Ya, I forgot to tell you about the $25 off $200 AMEX deal. If you don't want to wait 2-3 weeks, a $255 GTX970 is a great deal. It gives you a solid boost in performance while doesn't leave you feeling like you've overspent too much and got diminishing returns for your $. Then once the card starts to get too slow, you just sell it for $100-125 and buy another $300 card. I find this to be a good upgrade strategy if you cannot afford to buy $500-650 flagship cards and upgrade every gen.

 

[kaesden]

the trigger has been pulled. Thanks again for all your help and info, really appreciate it. If the forums had a rep system i'd give you a +1 for sure.

 

[RussianSensation]

the trigger has been pulled. Thanks again for all your help and info, really appreciate it. If the forums had a rep system i'd give you a +1 for sure.

Thanks! Make sure to provide a 1-2 line update on how you like the card so I know you were actually happy (or perhaps not?) with the upgrade. Hope the card fits your noise level criteria, temperatures and most importantly the performance increase. Try to sell that 670 card too to offset some of the upgrade cost. You should be able to fetch $80-100 for the card since there is still nothing as good as the 670 in that price range.

BTW, for the MSI card, the rebate has to be post-marked within 15 days, not the usual 30 days. Just keep that in mind.

 

[Blue_Max]

You could always buy this one from EVGA:

[/IMG]
(no, it doesn't come with the game.)

 

[pooptastic]

I got one of the 970's slickdeals had up for a decent price. Also upgrading from a 2gb 670, also running an overclocked 1440p monitor.

There's still some fps drops in Fallout 4, but it's a massively noticeable difference. Also most everything is set to max/ultra now too, yet runs very well.

I'd grab a 970 now and enjoy this and other games more at 1440p, but save up for next year in case there's a big generational leap in the new video cards.

 

[Leyawiin]

Just bought an MSI Gaming GTX 970 100 ME for my second PC. Its easily the nicest card I've ever had from a build, noise, heat perspective. Performance is fine given it was second from the top at release and a little over a year old now. I was worried about coil whine, but its totally silent with my hardware config and adaptive vertical sync. I didn't see the use in waiting for Black Friday either - got it for $287.00. Good enough.

 

[kaesden]

I'll be curious to see the difference in power draw while gaming. I plugged in a kill-a-watt to my gaming setup(everything, not just pc) and currently it draws around 290-340 watts at any given time.(2 monitors, 1 24" 1920x1080, 1 27" 2560x1440, 5.1 speakers, computer, and a gigabit switch for good measure.)

I'll definately report back with my opinions after I get the card installed and give some feed back. Should arrive at my door by tues next week.

 

[kaesden]

Also i just started playing SC2 legacy of the void, and they've made some changes to the game or something, because it starts lagging a bit in some of the larger scale battles on my 670(i'm stubborn and keeping it at max settings) Also the cutscenes in the new one are rendered real-time for the most part and while they look absolutely incredible, several of them slow WAY down.

 

[kaesden]

the 970 arrived today, and is installed! All is working well, and the improvments are massive. Much more than i honestly expected to see.

Fallout 4 went from running on a mix of medium/high settings, and many features disabled to get my fps up to 40-75fps depending on the area, now i'm running on ultra at 80-120fps(i did disable AA as i find it pointless at 1440p, and honestly to me it degrades the image.) So performance is a huge improvement.

Reguarding noise levels...is this thing even on? Idling on the desktop the fans are mostly at a dead stop more often than not, and would probably be off all the time if i had better airflow in my case. In game under load, they spin up, or at least gpu-z says they are spun up, but i can't hear a damn thing. No coil whine on my card that i can notice, and the fans are dead silent. MUCH quieter than my windforce 670 was, which in turn was far quieter than my really old GTX285 was.

Oddly i was expecting less power consumption, but my system went from consuming ~290-330 watts to ~350-365 watts now while in games. Perhaps the increased graphics performance is demanding more of my processor or something else in my system consuming more overall power? Not a big deal either way, but it was a curious observation.

One question, I do have a spot on my case for a side panel fan, would it be best to have this be an intake or exhuast fan? Currently i have 1 front fan for intake, 1 rear fan for exhuast, and a noctura cpu cooler with 2 fans blowing air front to back and straight out the case by the rear exhaust fan. I'm thinking exhuast to keep the case air pressure lower overall so less dust gets sucked in. The side panel fan is basically directly over the graphics card slot.

 

[RussianSensation]

Fallout 4 went from running on a mix of medium/high settings, and many features disabled to get my fps up to 40-75fps depending on the area, now i'm running on ultra at 80-120fps(i did disable AA as i find it pointless at 1440p, and honestly to me it degrades the image.) So performance is a huge improvement....

One question, I do have a spot on my case for a side panel fan, would it be best to have this be an intake or exhuast fan? Currently i have 1 front fan for intake, 1 rear fan for exhuast, and a noctura cpu cooler with 2 fans blowing air front to back and straight out the case by the rear exhaust fan. I'm thinking exhuast to keep the case air pressure lower overall so less dust gets sucked in. The side panel fan is basically directly over the graphics card slot.

Glad things worked out for you. What's the point of the side fan if things are running cool and quiet? Normally the side fan is an intake, not exhaust. Maybe just leave it as is? Using a small 120-140mm fan is hardly going to impact interior case temperatures. The reason we used it in the past for intake is to blow cooler air (from the outside) onto hotter motherboard/GPU VRM components/areas around the CPU socket. All of that is not needed anymore.

 

[kaesden]

Glad things worked out for you. What's the point of the side fan if things are running cool and quiet? Normally the side fan is an intake, not exhaust. Maybe just leave it as is? Using a small 120-140mm fan is hardly going to impact interior case temperatures. The reason we used it in the past for intake is to blow cooler air (from the outside) onto hotter motherboard/GPU VRM components/areas around the CPU socket. All of that is not needed anymore.

Cool. I pretty much did intend to leave it as is, was just curious which direction it should go if i ever did decide to hook it up again.

 

[Arachnotronic]

the 970 arrived today, and is installed! All is working well, and the improvments are massive. Much more than i honestly expected to see.

Fallout 4 went from running on a mix of medium/high settings, and many features disabled to get my fps up to 40-75fps depending on the area, now i'm running on ultra at 80-120fps(i did disable AA as i find it pointless at 1440p, and honestly to me it degrades the image.) So performance is a huge improvement.

Reguarding noise levels...is this thing even on? Idling on the desktop the fans are mostly at a dead stop more often than not, and would probably be off all the time if i had better airflow in my case. In game under load, they spin up, or at least gpu-z says they are spun up, but i can't hear a damn thing. No coil whine on my card that i can notice, and the fans are dead silent. MUCH quieter than my windforce 670 was, which in turn was far quieter than my really old GTX285 was.

Oddly i was expecting less power consumption, but my system went from consuming ~290-330 watts to ~350-365 watts now while in games. Perhaps the increased graphics performance is demanding more of my processor or something else in my system consuming more overall power? Not a big deal either way, but it was a curious observation.

One question, I do have a spot on my case for a side panel fan, would it be best to have this be an intake or exhuast fan? Currently i have 1 front fan for intake, 1 rear fan for exhuast, and a noctura cpu cooler with 2 fans blowing air front to back and straight out the case by the rear exhaust fan. I'm thinking exhuast to keep the case air pressure lower overall so less dust gets sucked in. The side panel fan is basically directly over the graphics card slot.

Congrats!!

 

[FFL]

I'm thinking exhuast to keep the case air pressure lower overall so less dust gets sucked in.

I think the opposite is true. Higher internal pressure prevents dust from beeing sucked in through other openings. From that standpoint, it should be advisable to have more intake than exhaust fans, or at least an equal number.

BTW, did you take the ASUS or the MSI?

 

[Seba]

I think the opposite is true. Higher internal pressure prevents dust from beeing sucked in through other openings. From that standpoint, it should be advisable to have more intake than exhaust fans, or at least an equal number.

Correct, but you omitted to specify that all fan intakes should have dust filters.

 

[FFL]

Correct, but you omitted to specify that all fan intakes should have dust filters.

Absolutely right. Thanks for the completion!

 

[kaesden]

I think the opposite is true. Higher internal pressure prevents dust from beeing sucked in through other openings. From that standpoint, it should be advisable to have more intake than exhaust fans, or at least an equal number.

BTW, did you take the ASUS or the MSI?

Doh... you're right. Late night brain fart. I'm just leaving it disconnected, it ain't broke, so i wont fix it; also I ended up with the MSI card.

 

[maddogmcgee]

Also i just started playing SC2 legacy of the void, and they've made some changes to the game or something, because it starts lagging a bit in some of the larger scale battles on my 670(i'm stubborn and keeping it at max settings) Also the cutscenes in the new one are rendered real-time for the most part and while they look absolutely incredible, several of them slow WAY down.

Thats not the fault of your GPU, your CPU is limiting the FPS. Go into graphics settings and turn down things like physics, creep reflections etc (you can mouse over to see what is CPU and what is GPU restrained). FPS should be much higher in the big battles when the CPU is processing tons of bodies being strewn in chunks all over the place with its rag doll physics.

 

[tweakboy]

Or lower res for supra fast with current card 1440p ,