GPU Upgrade

[chionophile]

Hi all,

I'm currently using a this Radeon HD 7950 (my computer is about three years old) and I have recently been having problems with the computer powering off when running anything remotely graphics intensive (Starcraft 2, Metro 2033, although it works when running older games like Jedi Knight).

I believe this is because the GPU is overheating due to its fan no longer working, and since I'm out of the 2 year warranty period, it seems my only option is replacement. Can anyone recommend a good, comparable video card? I like Radeon, but I'm not necessarily die hard. I'd like to keep it under $300, and preferably under $200. I was thinking something like one of these:

SAPPHIRE NITRO Radeon R9 380

SAPPHIRE Vapor-X Radeon R7 370

Also, does anyone have any brand preference? PowerColor makes an R9 380 as well (here), but it's more expensive. Seems like the Sapphire is a much better deal.

Computer specs:
CPU: Intel Core i5-3570K
MB: GIGABYTE GA-Z77-HD3 LGA 1155 Intel Z77
PS: CORSAIR HX Series HX850 850W (I know this is a little beefy for my system, but I originally thought the PS was the problem and upgraded it a while ago)
Case: Corsair Carbide Series 500R

Thanks for any help.

 

[GIS]

I have never own a Sapphire product, but it may be good if you can do some research on their recent RMA cases. Sapphire's headquarter is in Hong Kong, that means all RMA is handle by 3rd party in the US. I recalled they called Athlon Micro or something.

Anyhow, do your research and find the best brand that suits your needs!

 

[Elixer]

I don't think you can go wrong with Sapphire or XFX, they both make excellent coolers.
Since the refresh is right around the corner in a few months, if you can't wait, then I would go with the lowest price card you can play those games with, and just wait for the refresh.
The 380 is a pretty strong card for 1080p, so, if you don't want to wait, that is a good option.
370 isn't bad, or a nvidia 950 or 960.
Each of those should be able to handle those games listed without issue.

*edit, forgot to mention that the 380 is the same level of GCN as their Fury cards, and I think $20 more is worth it, if you go that route.
You may also find good deals on a 380X, those went as low as $170 before.

 

[nurturedhate]

A new high flow case fan, some zip ties, remove old fan, install new fan using said zip ties, wait til new cards are released in a few months.

Nothing in the $200 range is really an upgrade. a 370 is a significant downgrade. A 380 is a side grade, same with the 960 from Nvidia in the $200 range.

 

[Silverforce11]

A new high flow case fan, some zip ties, remove old fan, install new fan using said zip ties, wait til new cards are released in a few months.

Nothing in the $200 range is really an upgrade. a 370 is a significant downgrade. A 380 is a side grade, same with the 960 from Nvidia in the $200 range.

Highly recommend this. Don't waste your money with Polaris due soon.

 

[GIS]

I don't think you can go wrong with Sapphire or XFX, they both make excellent coolers.

I have to agree that Sapphire do make one of the best cooler if not the best, not so much about XFX. I was buy into the "lifetime limited warranty" roughly 5 years ago offered by XFX, and that was when I picked up their HD 6950 2GB. XFX double dissipation is fine but nothing come close to Sapphire's Tri-x coolers.

What concerns me and also keeps me from buying a Sapphire product is their after-sale customer service is generally poor. If you search "Sapphire RMA 2015", you see so many horror stories from their customer service end.

But then on the other hand, more people post their complaints about something on the internet than post positive experiences about a company.

I really wanted to pick up a R9 390X from Sapphire few months ago, their cooler looks sexy and the card is solid but customer service..

 

[Headfoot]

Highly recommend this. Don't waste your money with Polaris due soon.

Agreed. You can get surprisingly good results from zip tying regular 120mm (or smaller as needed) fans on to stuff

 

[KingFatty]

Why did the fan stop working? If it's due to mechanical reasons, you might want to try popping off the spinning fan part, cleaning the axle and bushing, then applying some new grease (like, bearing grease, not WD40) and seeing if that lets it spin again.

 

[mysticjbyrd]

I have never own a Sapphire product, but it may be good if you can do some research on their recent RMA cases. Sapphire's headquarter is in Hong Kong, that means all RMA is handle by 3rd party in the US. I recalled they called Athlon Micro or something.

Anyhow, do your research and find the best brand that suits your needs!

Sapphire and msi are generally considered the best for amd.

A new high flow case fan, some zip ties, remove old fan, install new fan using said zip ties, wait til new cards are released in a few months.

Nothing in the $200 range is really an upgrade. a 370 is a significant downgrade. A 380 is a side grade, same with the 960 from Nvidia in the $200 range.

I also recommend trying something like this.

My college roommate took the side panel off his case and propped a box fan against it to cool his system.

Have you checked the temps of your hardware while gaming?

 

[Bacon1]

Did you buy your card with a Credit Card? It might fall under an extended warranty from your CC company. Worth checking into, they often extend warranty by 1 year.

 

[GIS]

Sapphire and amd are generally considered the bet for amd.

I know Sapphire makes one of the best cooling solutions for AMD, and perhaps they make solid cards overall.

BUT, what about customer service? What about RMA? What about after-sale experiences? Most importantly, what if your Sapphire card have hiccups 1 year or 2 years down the road?

You know, no one can guarantee every video card works like a champ with no issues for 2 years. And this is no exception even with superior quality Sapphire card appears to be. So when issues do come up, you have to put up with Sapphire's 3rd party service, which does not have a good record to begin with?

Just note, I'm not pushing other brands over Sapphire, else I'm just being like someone working for a company. What I'm trying to tell the OP is to do research and make the wisest decision that fits his/her needs.

 

[DownTheSky]

A new high flow case fan, some zip ties, remove old fan, install new fan using said zip ties, wait til new cards are released in a few months.

Nothing in the $200 range is really an upgrade. a 370 is a significant downgrade. A 380 is a side grade, same with the 960 from Nvidia in the $200 range.

I also recommend this.

 

[Fallen Kell]

Yeah, I too would highly recommend trying to see if you can simply jury rig something together and/or fix the fan of the card and wait the couple more months for the new cards to be out. Case fans can work wonders if you can simply direct the air into the graphics card's air intake if you can't fix the original fan (usually it is pretty easy to fix the fan with some simple cleaning unless the bearing(s) are completely shot).

 

[Elixer]

A new high flow case fan, some zip ties, remove old fan, install new fan using said zip ties, wait til new cards are released in a few months.

I don't think you could get away with doing zip ties on a replacement for a blower type of fan, you would most likely need to remove the shroud, then ziptie a 80/120/140mm fan on the heatsink itself, and that should be better than trying to force air into that little hole.
But, yeah, that is a valid alternative as well, I would most likely do this while waiting for the refresh.

 

[Ketchup]

Agree with waiting it out. You have basic graphics with your CPU. And you can look for something that might keep the card cool enough. Nine times out of ten waiting is not the answer, but this is that one time.

 

[MWink]

I had to RMA a card (Radeon HD5830) to Sapphire a couple years ago and the experience was not very good. There were issues with communication (not responding to emails). When I finally got the card replaced they sent me a defective card. It was obviously not the same card as the issues were different. When I contacted them about that they threatened to charge me if I sent the second card back and they did not find it defective. Luckily they did determine it was defective and sent me another replacement which did work (and I'm still using today).

While things could have gone worse that was definitely not a very positive experience. I've used a lot of Sapphire cards over the years and I think this will be my last one.

 

[Denithor]

I know Sapphire makes one of the best cooling solutions for AMD, and perhaps they make solid cards overall.

BUT, what about customer service? What about RMA? What about after-sale experiences? Most importantly, what if your Sapphire card have hiccups 1 year or 2 years down the road?

You know, no one can guarantee every video card works like a champ with no issues for 2 years. And this is no exception even with superior quality Sapphire card appears to be. So when issues do come up, you have to put up with Sapphire's 3rd party service, which does not have a good record to begin with?

Just note, I'm not pushing other brands over Sapphire, else I'm just being like someone working for a company. What I'm trying to tell the OP is to do research and make the wisest decision that fits his/her needs.

Sapphire bash much? I mean, come on, you're a completely new member here, literally your first three posts (count them, 3/3) are spent trash-talking Sapphire customer service? I've had several Sapphire cards over the last 20 years, have never needed to contact their customer service because, well, their cards just performed like champs. Sapphire custom coolers are pretty much considered #1 in the business.

If you have nothing constructive to add to the conversation, please just refrain from posting.

 

[poofyhairguy]

I would look on eBay for new fans for your card. Most major models have them, I replaced a Sapphire 7970's fans that way last year.



Your GPU aged very well, will be hard to beat.

 

[DigDog]

grab a cheap aftermarket cooler for your 7950 ??

nobody thought of mentioning this? maybe even just new fans - and then he can wait on the new series.

 

[Ketchup]

grab a cheap aftermarket cooler for your 7950 ??

nobody thought of mentioning this? maybe even just new fans - and then he can wait on the new series.

That is an option, for sure:
https://www.google.com/search?q=hd+7950&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8#q=hd+7950+cooler&tbm=shop

 

[GIS]

If you have nothing constructive to add to the conversation, please just refrain from posting.

You should seriously get off your "seniority ego" in this forum, and being new does not mean I don't add values to OP's post.

My main point was to make OP aware Sapphire after-sale experiences in recent years, especially RMA cases. Isn't this clear?

And BTW, if I were to bash Sapphire, I would not have praised their customer cooler as "one of the best cooling solutions for AMD if not the best" stated in the previous posts.

You had great experiences with Sapphire, good for you, keep buying their cards then! You and OP may not even care about the after-sale experiences as much. But some of us do!

Again, all these postings were to get OP do research on each brand before s/he make the purchase. If OP does not care after-sale customer service, then by all means go for Sapphire.

I know you get defensive when I just try to speak the truth, which you can totally pay a visit to Google and read some recent Sapphire RMA experiences.

Since you are questioning my inner ability to make "constructive feedback" to OP's questions, how about we talk facts from now on huh?

I found Graphic Cards' Failure Rate by Brands on this site too, thanks Anandtech. The research was conducted by a French site, and they do have data for 2014 too. The link below is for 2015.

Overall, Sapphire GPU failure rate was 2.71% in 2015, against 4.04% in 2014. (This data includes all GPU Sapphire made, and please refer to the list for individual failure rate by model). According to the research, Sapphire GPU have the highest failure rate in 2015 and 2014.

Here's the link: http://www.hardware.fr/articles/934-5/cartes-graphiques.html

Not sure if we are allowed to post links here, but since you wanted to get to the bottom of this matter - Sapphire reliability; then maybe, just maybe, you won't question and judge one's postings based on his "seniority status" in the future.