R-290X or a GTX 780ti

[grimed]

I have a R-290x on the way but was wondering what would do better water cooled.

I have to point this out too. I am not a AMD fanboy this will be the first amd based card I have hard in a very long time. I have a gtx 680 and was waiting for a card that would drive a 2560 x 1140 monitor for some time and when I could afford it. I saw the GTX 680 fall behind the AMD cards as they relased new drivers. not saying this will happen again but it may.
I dont have the time to post all the componets I have on the way but I can return the 290x if most think it wont have better stats on water than the 780ti on water. This will not be a huge O.C. I am new to water cooling so even with two rads they may not be what I need to be fairly quiet wiht a major O.C.

Thanks

 

[BallaTheFeared]

680 never really fell behind with new drivers, the 7970 only caught up... It took a new sku, GHz to actually beat the 680.

If you really what the faster card, which is the 780 Ti... Than keep the R290x, ebay it for a profit, and use that profit to turn a 780 Ti.

 

[3DVagabond]

I have a R-290x on the way but was wondering what would do better water cooled.

I have to point this out too. I am not a AMD fanboy this will be the first amd based card I have hard in a very long time. I have a gtx 680 and was waiting for a card that would drive a 2560 x 1140 monitor for some time and when I could afford it. I saw the GTX 680 fall behind the AMD cards as they relased new drivers. not saying this will happen again but it may.
I dont have the time to post all the componets I have on the way but I can return the 290x if most think it wont have better stats on water than the 780ti on water. This will not be a huge O.C. I am new to water cooling so even with two rads they may not be what I need to be fairly quiet wiht a major O.C.

Thanks

What are you paying for the 2 cards? What games? This is going to matter.

 

[velis]

Any of these cards will drive 1440p just fine

 

[Attic]

I'd wait to see what advantage mantle brings for AMD hardware, there should be results for BF4 starting to show up soon. The 290x and 780ti under water is something I haven't seen results for, but it's a big positive for the biggest drawback of the 290x (stock cooling).

The card should fetch good money on ebay for sometime as long as BTC doesn't crash.

 

[ChuckFx]

What will be your main game/usage?

If you want to play BF4 and Mantle works like it is intended or anywhere around it, there is not that many reasons to go for a 780 Ti at the moment.
As of right now (drivers may change the situation) R9 290X is great future proof value with its capacity to run higer than 1080p res. Unless you really don't mind paying the premium.. The best performance/$ is R9 290X right now.

 

[MrK6]

I have a R-290x on the way but was wondering what would do better water cooled.

I have to point this out too. I am not a AMD fanboy this will be the first amd based card I have hard in a very long time. I have a gtx 680 and was waiting for a card that would drive a 2560 x 1140 monitor for some time and when I could afford it. I saw the GTX 680 fall behind the AMD cards as they relased new drivers. not saying this will happen again but it may.
I dont have the time to post all the componets I have on the way but I can return the 290x if most think it wont have better stats on water than the 780ti on water. This will not be a huge O.C. I am new to water cooling so even with two rads they may not be what I need to be fairly quiet wiht a major O.C.

Thanks

In general I have not seen anything in the last ~4 years (since the 5xxx/4xx cards) that would make me decidedly choose a nvidia GPU over an AMD one for 1440p+ gaming. In my experience AMD has always had better performance or price/performance at higher resolutions and more memory to boot. Nvidia may step up its game now that higher resolution monitors are more common and 4K is on its way, we'll see.

That said, I think 290X is an excellent choice if you're planning to water cool. I don't think there will be a noticeable difference between a 290X or 780 Ti on water performance (as either could be faster given the randomness of overclocking limits), but the cheaper price and extra GB of vRAM on the 290X are superior in my opinion.

 

[Yuriman]

My 2 cents:

I've only had AMD GPUs in my primary desktop for the past 10 years or so, but it's not from brand loyalty. AMD has consistently been a better value.

I think the 780Ti is a better card overall and if given the choice (all else being equal) I would rather have it than the 290X. I don't think it's $200 better though, and already having all of the parts to put the AMD card under water does a lot for leveling the playing field.

 

[RussianSensation]

Assuming you are not interested in mining litecoins to have R9 290 pay for itself, if you are going to overclock + watercool, and your choices are only 290X vs. 780Ti, I would grab the 780Ti. Right now the prices of R9 290X are $600+, which means you can sell your used card for $600 due to such shortages and pick up a 780 for $100 more. IMO, the 780Ti is worth $100 more over R9 290X. Having said that, personally I would go for $530 Classified 780 over 290X/780Ti.

 

[blackened23]

The 780ti has demonstrated superior results over the 290X in terms of 24/7 gaming benchmark stable overclocks that have been verified by hardware tech websites. If you're going water, a 780ti with a custom PCB (such as a classified) is the much better choice.

These cards are scaling 20% with air overclocks, 24/7 stable, with the reference PCB and passes the GTX 690 by a good gap, just to put things into perspective.. You aint getting that with a 290X on air or water. That 20% scaling over stock will be much higher with a classified 780ti under water. That said, a 780ti for 1440p? Seems like overkill, but if you want the faster card and are willing to pay for it - the 780ti is better. It doesn't help that 290X cards are inflated due to mining right now, so the price difference is insignificant and the 780ti is more readily available at etailers.

You can also get a custom (such as a classy) 780 instead which will also overclock crazy and will be faster than the Titan by a very good margin. On air, the vanilla 780 can overclock to be faster than Titan by 15% or more, depending on which card you get. So that's another option to save some coin.

The other option is try to make money via LTC with the 290X (although I cant' see that being sustainable) or ebay'ing it for a profit. People are buying those cards at CRAZY markups now, 7950s have been going for 400$ with buyers readily willing to pay that for mining purposes...

 

[ICDP]

The 780ti has demonstrated superior results over the 290X in terms of 24/7 gaming benchmark stable overclocks that have been verified by hardware tech websites. If you're going water, a 780ti with a custom PCB (such as a classified) is the much better choice.

These cards are scaling 20% with air overclocks, 24/7 stable, with the reference PCB and passes the GTX 690 by a good gap, just to put things into perspective.. You aint getting that with a 290X on air or water. That 20% scaling over stock will be much higher with a classified 780ti under water. That said, a 780ti for 1440p? Seems like overkill, but if you want the faster card and are willing to pay for it - the 780ti is better. It doesn't help that 290X cards are inflated due to mining right now, so the price difference is insignificant and the 780ti is more readily available at etailers.

The other option is try to make money via LTC with the 290X (although I cant' see that being sustainable) or ebay'ing it for a profit. People are buying those cards at CRAZY markups now, 7950s have been going for 400$ with buyers readily willing to pay that for mining purposes...

The guy has already bought an R9 290X and given the fact it is within 10% of a GTX780Ti telling him to sell it and get a 780Ti is a tad silly. In actual gaming even at max OC both cards will be so similar in performance you would only tell the difference by putting an FPS readout on the screen.

My friend has two R9 290X cards. Testing max overclocks on the reference air cooler gives the following results.

Card 1: 1150/1400 - actual increase = ~14% increase over stock.

Card 2: 1180/1450 - actual increase = ~17% over stock.

These are not killer overclocks by any stretch of the imagination as I have seen 1230/1600 clocks posted on air let alone water. So I can see a water cooled R9 290X easily reaching or even exceeding 20% real terms performance increase.

Having said that I feel the 780Ti will give better stats overall (even if they are marginal) in current games. So if the OP must have the current best then 780Ti is a better option. I just wanted to stress that 20% real term performance increase on R9 290X is not out of reach as you imply.

 

[blackened23]

Well, custom 290X cards are on the horizon and I fully acknowledge that things can change - we don't have the full picture quite yet. I'm basing my opinion solely on tech websites that have achieved 24/7 gaming stable overclocks, and not on 3 minute valley suicide runs. Literally anyone can do an overclock that is borderline unstable with artifacts and still get a score, I don't put any stock in that in the context of gaming performance. If you look at the OC scaling achieved at sites like TPU, Guru3d, hardwarecanucks, among others, the 780ti is proven even with the ref pcb on air whereas the 290X, not so much. It also doesn't help that finding solid data on water overclocks are hard to find, and the data you DO find consists of nothing but suicide runs. I find 3dmark and valley suicide runs to be rather worthless in terms of extrapolating any real world performance data.

Like I said, we'll have way more data on this in the coming weeks. Things can change, I acknowledge that. I can't see an OC 290X catching an OC 780ti, because the OC 780ti is already like....5-10% faster than GTX 690. But, I could be wrong. We'll see what the custom PCBs bring for the 290X. If i'm wrong about the OC ability and the 290X with custom PCB is flat out amazing? I should add, that a custom PCB on air in many ways will mirror the potential for a GPU under water. A custom PCB classified shows what a custom PCB classified can do under water, shows the potential. Anyway, if i'm wrong about the 290X and the custom 290X cards OC like crazy - I'll be the first to admit my error.

But I do agree with you. If he has a 290X already and is planning a loop, I see little reason to switch even if the 780ti has more proven potential. I would just happily use the 290X in that situation, definitely no disagreements here. He'd have to pay for a restock fee (most likely) and then deal with the hassle of returning and waiting for another card. Just keep the 290X imo.

 

[Z15CAM]

Under water for both GPU's, I would bet the R9 290X will out perform the 780 Ti or to say benefit more.

I know for sure the 290X will take a +156 mv off-set voltage running at 1195/1500 with the noisy STK Cooler screaming at 95% with out throttling and should do around 1300/6000 under water with approx a +1.44 or under off-set.

I'm presently waiting deliver of my Water Solution for the 290X.

I can't comment on the 780 Ti as I don't own one but considering Crypto Mining and the future of Mantle both are very close in Brute Performance.

 

[Skurge]

Well, custom 290X cards are on the horizon and I fully acknowledge that things can change - we don't have the full picture quite yet. I'm basing my opinion solely on tech websites that have achieved 24/7 gaming stable overclocks, and not on 3 minute valley suicide runs. Literally anyone can do an overclock that is borderline unstable with artifacts and still get a score, I don't put any stock in that in the context of gaming performance. If you look at the OC scaling achieved at sites like TPU, Guru3d, hardwarecanucks, among others, the 780ti is proven even with the ref pcb on air whereas the 290X, not so much. It also doesn't help that finding solid data on water overclocks are hard to find, and the data you DO find consists of nothing but suicide runs. I find 3dmark and valley suicide runs to be rather worthless in terms of extrapolating any real world performance data.

Like I said, we'll have way more data on this in the coming weeks. Things can change, I acknowledge that. I can't see an OC 290X catching an OC 780ti, because the OC 780ti is already like....5-10% faster than GTX 690. But, I could be wrong. We'll see what the custom PCBs bring for the 290X. If i'm wrong about the OC ability and the 290X with custom PCB is flat out amazing? I should add, that a custom PCB on air in many ways will mirror the potential for a GPU under water. A custom PCB classified shows what a custom PCB classified can do under water, shows the potential. Anyway, if i'm wrong about the 290X and the custom 290X cards OC like crazy - I'll be the first to admit my error.

But I do agree with you. If he has a 290X already and is planning a loop, I see little reason to switch even if the 780ti has more proven potential. I would just happily use the 290X in that situation, definitely no disagreements here. He'd have to pay for a restock fee (most likely) and then deal with the hassle of returning and waiting for another card. Just keep the 290X imo.

I don't think any of the tech sites have overvolted. I'm not completely sure.

 

[blackened23]

Under water for both GPU's, I would bet the R9 290X will out perform the 780 Ti.

I know for sure the 290X will take a +156 mv off-set voltage running at 1195/1500 with the noisy STK Cooler running at 95% and should do around 1300/6000 under water with approx a +1.44 off-set.

I can't comment on the 780 Ti as I don't own one but they are both very close Performance wise.

There's quite a gap to catch. An overclocked 780ti is around 5-8% faster than the GTX 690 and is 25-40% faster than the uber mode 290X depending on the game. And this was with reference PCB cards on air....

You could be correct, but i'll reserve judgement for when actual tech websites have custom PCB cards and verify 24/7 stable overclocks. I put zero stock in valley or 3d mark suicide runs. It should also be noted that 3dmark firestrike favors AMD heavily - so even if AMD wins that benchmark , it doesn't mirror the real world. Like I said, I could be completely wrong on this but i'm just going on verifiable information so far which is limited. If i'm wrong when the custom 290X cards hit, i'll happily admit my mistake. I just want verifiable information, not some 3dmark score that random OCN user #432432 submits. That literally means nothing because all of those guys do suicide runs and nothing but.

If i'm wrong in two weeks when the custom 290X cards hit and they overclock like crazy (and by the way, this will give a much better idea of potential under water), feel free to call me out on it via PM or whatever. I have no problems admitting an error if that happens.

 

[Erenhardt]

The 780ti has demonstrated superior results over the 290X in terms of 24/7 gaming benchmark stable overclocks that have been verified by hardware tech websites. If you're going water, a 780ti with a custom PCB (such as a classified) is the much better choice.

These cards are scaling 20% with air overclocks, 24/7 stable, with the reference PCB and passes the GTX 690 by a good gap, just to put things into perspective.. You aint getting that with a 290X on air or water. That 20% scaling over stock will be much higher with a classified 780ti under water. That said, a 780ti for 1440p? Seems like overkill, but if you want the faster card and are willing to pay for it - the 780ti is better. It doesn't help that 290X cards are inflated due to mining right now, so the price difference is insignificant and the 780ti is more readily available at etailers.

You can also get a custom (such as a classy) 780 instead which will also overclock crazy and will be faster than the Titan by a very good margin. On air, the vanilla 780 can overclock to be faster than Titan by 15% or more, depending on which card you get. So that's another option to save some coin.

The other option is try to make money via LTC with the 290X (although I cant' see that being sustainable) or ebay'ing it for a profit. People are buying those cards at CRAZY markups now, 7950s have been going for 400$ with buyers readily willing to pay that for mining purposes...

So your saying a card that have lots of thermal headroom will benefit more from additional thermal headroom than a card that throttles because of fan speed cap?

 

[rgallant]

just saying
what gpu's to pick up has never been so up in the air , prices all over the place now fud is saying maxwell in 2014 Q1

gave up 2 weeks ago and picked up 2 gtx 780's evga's sc 941 boost to 1097 stock @30c heaven loop. [in-stock ,week later 980 mhz'er's came in stock @ $10.00 more]

imo 780ti sli will hit the game vram wall at the same time.-so no point buying 780ti nv knows what the up coming games are going to do and selling cards@$700++++ that can't play games@1440 in a year will be a joke.

 

[el etro]

The "3GB wall" can be hit(at 1440p) at the end of next year.

My recommendation for today is to buy a ASUS/EVGA custom GTX 780.

My other recommendation is to wait Christmas and pick a Custom 290-X.

Only 780Ti custom cards worth the buy at $700.

Why do not focus budget and not performance with high end cards too?

 

[SolMiester]

We hear the vram limit scenario every-time AMD's flagship card comes out with more ram than NV, and yet every-time the NV card bring out the double ram version vram limit is shown to be nonsense.
As for 4K, I imagine when they are affordable and can do 60hz, NV will deliver on its promise to have the drivers ready......

 

[Z15CAM]

The Ref R9 290X - Is NOT Voltage Locked"

Load the latest AMD Beta Drivers, Disable the USELESS CCC AMD Overdrive and Install MSI Afterburner 300 b17

Use these CMD Commands to you your R9 at whatever Voltage Off-Set you want: At your RISK

MSIAfterburner.exe /wi4,30,8d,20 ..... +200mv offset This gets HOT
MSIAfterburner.exe /wi4,30,8d,19 ..... +156mv offset This seems to work BEST
MSIAfterburner.exe /wi4,30,8d,18 ..... +150mv offset
MSIAfterburner.exe /wi4,30,8d,17 ..... +144mv offset
MSIAfterburner.exe /wi4,30,8d,16 ..... +138mv offset
MSIAfterburner.exe /wi4,30,8d,14 ..... +125mv offset
MSIAfterburner.exe /wi4,30,8d,12 ..... +113mv offset
MSIAfterburner.exe /wi4,30,8d,10 ..... +100mv offset AB's Optimum Setting
MSIAfterburner.exe /wi4,30,8d,0 ...... Return to 0

ROUTE to my MSI Afterburner Directory:

CD C: : \Program Files (x86)\SYSTEM TOOLS\AMD Radeon R9 290X\MSI Afterburner

Cooling the AMD GPU is not much of an issue compared to cooling the VRM's but the AMD GPU can take more Voltage Off-Set.

Advise - GO STK AMD Cooler or Water for a Great Card or Play with the GTX 780 T for What! - There is no answer.

Hated to bring up BitCoin but it's a Reality.

 

[ICDP]

There's quite a gap to catch. An overclocked 780ti is around 5-8% faster than the GTX 690 and is 25-40% faster than the uber mode 290X depending on the game. And this was with reference PCB cards on air....

You could be correct, but i'll reserve judgement for when actual tech websites have custom PCB cards and verify 24/7 stable overclocks. I put zero stock in valley or 3d mark suicide runs. It should also be noted that 3dmark firestrike favors AMD heavily - so even if AMD wins that benchmark , it doesn't mirror the real world. Like I said, I could be completely wrong on this but i'm just going on verifiable information so far which is limited. If i'm wrong when the custom 290X cards hit, i'll happily admit my mistake. I just want verifiable information, not some 3dmark score that random OCN user #432432 submits. That literally means nothing because all of those guys do suicide runs and nothing but.

If i'm wrong in two weeks when the custom 290X cards hit and they overclock like crazy (and by the way, this will give a much better idea of potential under water), feel free to call me out on it via PM or whatever. I have no problems admitting an error if that happens.

The numbers I gave are in actual game testing and are not in benchmarks. Considering we were limited to +100 Mv and the awful cooler I was happy that 17% real gameplay performance was easily achievable.

At release date very few if any tech sites overvolted their R9 290X cards. This fact alone would seriously limit OC potential. Like I said 780Ti should still be better OC Vs OC the silicone lottery not withstanding.

 

[rgallant]

We hear the vram limit scenario every-time AMD's flagship card comes out with more ram than NV, and yet every-time the NV card bring out the double ram version vram limit is shown to be nonsense.
As for 4K, I imagine when they are affordable and can do 60hz, NV will deliver on its promise to have the drivers ready......

yea but I feel it in my wallet , when my nv sli runs out of vram that my friend is not a idle opinion when it cost $$$ to upgrade.
8800gts 512 sli
gtx285 1gb sli
gtx580 1.5 sli

580sli had another year in them close to a stock gtx 780 when oc but the 1.5 vram will kill them when the next gen. of games start coming out.
-until we see the top games built from the ground up for the new consoles and play those games can we guess when my gtx 780 3gb get added to the list above.

 

[Jacky60]

If money is no object then the 780ti is clearly the faster card but at a pretty high premium. Can't see the 290x keeping pace even under water but you could mine LTC with the 290x and if you're playing BF4 mantle may very well make the 290x quicker possibly by a big margin. Then again Gsync for the 780/Ti would obviate the need for blistering high fps but then you have another monitor to buy too. I have a pair of 290's arriving today so will report back on noise and performance vis a vis my 'thundercat' 6990's.
In value terms as usual AMD provide a much better offer but again as usual Nvidia sell a slightly more refined, better performing much more expensive product. You could mine LTC's and use those to buy an Nvidia card shortly

 

[OCGuy]

Cant imagine buying a Hawaii card until the miners are done driving up the price.