Update: 970 SLI or 290X CF ? Type of cooler?

[destrekor]

For the 970s, does a backplate matter, even with moderate memory overclocking (I see a lot of people getting 8000MHz out of the memory).

cmdrdredd, do you have the MSI Gaming model with or without backplate?

It seems you have to step up with a little more money to get the backplate, but if it doesn't really matter in the long run, I'll probably skip it, but not if it will reduce stability.

 

[96Firebird]

Backplate is mostly for aesthetics, while possible adding a little more rigidity to the card. No need to sway buying choices one way or the other. And I say this owning a 970 with a backplate...

 

[destrekor]

Ugh, I really do hate how these things have to go down.

It seems the 970 is still a damn good card. But then all this memory and frame-timing above 3.5GB has to come to light, and now I'm a little worried about long-term implications. I'll certainly be getting GTA V for PC, and I expect future games will have more VRAM requirements that Nvidia cannot work around with driver magic. Perhaps they can and I don't need to worry, and some driver corrections will fix things up more in regards to the stuttering in certain games.
Perhaps SLI will also help alleviate the problem, but considering I'll be playing some games in triple-monitor Surround (pixel count about 75% of 4K), the SLI will help but that is still a VRAM burden.

I really wish the R9 series didn't create such a hassle on Hackintosh systems. Even with working cards, I'm seeing a lot of issues getting even dual-monitor setups to work correctly. Yeah, I can't have that.

Perhaps if I buy into the 970 now I might get something out of this in the end. :\
I'm considering one 980 now and picking up another when I can afford it, but that's still more money than I'd prefer to spend on that performance. Either way, I'm sort of hoping something nice comes along within 90 days of purchase, as I'll be getting EVGA products, and they offer Step Up. I'm not worried about coil whine because either Newegg will take them back, or EVGA will, as they accept coil-whine as an RMA reason, and they even pre-test new cards to ensure one they send for RMA doesn't have the whine.

 

[96Firebird]

EVGA is great, I used their step-up program to go from a 970 SC to the FTW because I liked the HSF on the FTW more. Just remember to register your card(s) within 14 days to enable the option to step-up.

The VRAM issue is something you'll have to consider, I cannot help with that decision. I am not bothered by it, as I am sticking to 1200p for the foreseeable future.

 

[cmdrdredd]

EVGA is great, I used their step-up program to go from a 970 SC to the FTW because I liked the HSF on the FTW more. Just remember to register your card(s) within 14 days to enable the option to step-up.

The VRAM issue is something you'll have to consider, I cannot help with that decision. I am not bothered by it, as I am sticking to 1200p for the foreseeable future.

At 1440p it probably won't be a real problem either and depending on the game and what settings you try to push, 4k may be acceptable too. Personally I'll take a lower resolution with higher detail settings selected. There are a few things one can turn on or off that eat resources for very little IQ gain and I think everyone should judge those for themselves. Like the shadow of Mordor ultra textures. I cannot tell the difference except in the performance of the game. To my eyes, high looks the same.

 

[Headfoot]

970 SLI = 290 Aftermarket CF, except .5 less GB of usably fast RAM per GPU and $175 more expensive. This whole "OMG YOU'RE DUMPING SO MUCH HEAT IN YOUR CASE!!!" is completely overblown. If it's such a disaster, why can't people provide some evidence of "disaster." If you have a well ventilated case, your cards and cpu might run 3-4 degrees warmer. Hardly a disaster. I'd never pay nearly $200 just so that my cards run a couple degrees cooler. At triple monitor resolutions, the 5-7% gap between the 970 and aftermarket 290 shrinks to nearly nothing...
http://www.hardocp.com/article/2014..._970_sli_4k_nv_surround_review/3#.VMfbaf7F83I

Recall while you read that review, they are still using stock 290s which perform a good bit worse than aftermarket 290s you'd actually buy (which perform nearly identically to stock 290x)

 

[destrekor]

Are there actually no 290X's that have 3 DisplayPort connections?

If I go the AMD route, I'd like to have Adaptive Sync compatibility for the future, and preferably I'd like to have all three monitors connected to one card instead of splitting them up between cards.

 

[cmdrdredd]

For the 970s, does a backplate matter, even with moderate memory overclocking (I see a lot of people getting 8000MHz out of the memory).

cmdrdredd, do you have the MSI Gaming model with or without backplate?

It seems you have to step up with a little more money to get the backplate, but if it doesn't really matter in the long run, I'll probably skip it, but not if it will reduce stability.

No backplate on mine. Don't see the need, never had one on any card.

 

[garagisti]

At 1440p it probably won't be a real problem either and depending on the game and what settings you try to push, 4k may be acceptable too. Personally I'll take a lower resolution with higher detail settings selected. There are a few things one can turn on or off that eat resources for very little IQ gain and I think everyone should judge those for themselves. Like the shadow of Mordor ultra textures. I cannot tell the difference except in the performance of the game. To my eyes, high looks the same.

A fair few are reporting problems with SLI at 1440p, nevermind higher. I don't think it will get better with more demanding games coming in. Will advise caution to OP, as in know what you're buying. If it must be Nvidia, know what you're getting into, wrt costs, and abilities of hardware.

Are there actually no 290X's that have 3 DisplayPort connections?

If I go the AMD route, I'd like to have Adaptive Sync compatibility for the future, and preferably I'd like to have all three monitors connected to one card instead of splitting them up between cards.

I believe 290s are reportedly good for ASync. Also, you could connect multiple displays on one monitor using adapters, but question becomes at what resolution. 1080? I think you should have no problem with a couple of adapters, but refresh rates may vary. The right person to ask questions regarding multi-card and multi-display solution is Karlitos (can't spell his handle correctly, sorry). I would also recommend going through this following thread:
http://forums.amd.com/game/categories.cfm?catid=474

There are people using 3 or more monitors on multi card setup there and they could advise you as to how to get it rolling.

 

[cmdrdredd]

A fair few are reporting problems with SLI at 1440p, nevermind higher. I don't think it will get better with more demanding games coming in. Will advise caution to OP, as in know what you're buying. If it must be Nvidia, know what you're getting into, wrt costs, and abilities of hardware.

I have SLi 970s running 1440p and every game is maxed out (except AA) and no issues. People are trying to run unrealistic AA settings and hitting a brick wall.

 

[garagisti]

I have SLi 970s running 1440p and every game is maxed out (except AA) and no issues. People are trying to run unrealistic AA settings and hitting a brick wall.

Not what i read a couple of users using SLI on OCN suggest. Good to know that it is working for you, but that 970 thread had owners running SLI complaining intermittently. I read that a couple of them moved on to 980 SLI to avoid stutters. On the other hand, a couple of users either switched to 290 or 290x. I repeat, not any of them reported running extreme AA settings.

edit: if you read my earlier post, i only advised caution. 970's aren't exactly cheap. A good pair will easily cost $200 over a pair of 290s for similar performance, so there you go.

 

[cmdrdredd]

290 is slower than 970.

I think people are complaining just to complain about it a lot of times. If it was as bad as you say, I'd have noticed something.

 

[Ichigo]

I have SLi 970s running 1440p and every game is maxed out (except AA) and no issues. People are trying to run unrealistic AA settings and hitting a brick wall.

LMAO

"Any AA setting except the one I use (which is none at all) is unrealistic"

 

[cmdrdredd]

LMAO

"Any AA setting except the one I use (which is none at all) is unrealistic"

I didn't say no AA, I said everything is max except AA. Nice try. There are many AA modes that are simply unrealistic from a performance standpoint in many games when you are at 1440p or even higher. I can run the next resolution up from 1440p in FC4 and it's actually better than running FXAA or SMAA. Performance is on par with 1440p + SMAA.

 

[garagisti]

290 is slower than 970.

I think people are complaining just to complain about it a lot of times. If it was as bad as you say, I'd have noticed something.

Again, you have 2 cards. Not all the shipments of 970s. So while it is representative as a sample, but experiences may vary, no? Or do you think your word is the last thing when it comes to this? What is wrong with urging caution before the purchase is made? I did not exactly ask him to NOT buy Nvidia, did i? I merely asked him/ her to be more aware of the choice he/ she is making.

In CF/ SLI? You do know that CF scales better? Are you sure 970 is faster in every game? Are you sure that 970 is faster at all resolutions? Please spare a thought before making blanket statements.

 

[Ichigo]

I didn't say no AA, I said everything is max except AA. Nice try. There are many AA modes that are simply unrealistic from a performance standpoint in many games when you are at 1440p or even higher. I can run the next resolution up from 1440p in FC4 and it's actually better than running FXAA or SMAA. Performance is on par with 1440p + SMAA.

"a performance standpoint" being your own personal opinion I guess. Just because the games you're running don't use enough VRAM then well there isn't a problem.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Again, you have 2 cards. Not all the shipments of 970s. So while it is representative as a sample, but experiences may vary, no? Or do you think your word is the last thing when it comes to this? What is wrong with urging caution before the purchase is made? I did not exactly ask him to NOT buy Nvidia, did i? I merely asked him/ her to be more aware of the choice he/ she is making.

In CF/ SLI? You do know that CF scales better? Are you sure 970 is faster in every game? Are you sure that 970 is faster at all resolutions? Please spare a thought before making blanket statements.

Check the benchmarks, the 290 is in the dust even at 4k. (nothing is playable as a single card IMO). 290x and you have an argument.

"a performance standpoint" being your own personal opinion I guess. Just because the games you're running don't use enough VRAM then well there isn't a problem.

Such ignorance...when your minimums drop below 30 when you're not using that much VRAM there's a problem related to performance.

 

[Headfoot]

aftermarket 290 = stock 290x in performance when translating reviews to real world. Pretty sure nobody is buying new stock 290s today...

 

[destrekor]

Check the benchmarks, the 290 is in the dust even at 4k. (nothing is playable as a single card IMO). 290x and you have an argument.

Such ignorance...when your minimums drop below 30 when you're not using that much VRAM there's a problem related to performance.

Well, that's sort of cherry-picking, to be fair.

970 vs 290X

970 v 290

You give and take, and your choice of game and resolution does have some impact.

What story isn't told so well is frame time performance, and most bench results are from early driver releases, so it's difficult to determine if hardware or driver is truly at fault. There have been limited follow-up analyses with recent driver releases, and honestly, the ones that exist now are in the effort to find the issues.

I'd like to see frame time analyses of games at 4K or 5760x1080/5760x1200 - all done at settings that actually have playable framerates. That concerns me most, 1440p tests do nothing for me, and a lot of the 4K tests are done with atrocious framerates. And I don't think I've seen good SLI testing, outside of a reddit thread, and that one focuses on absolute max settings, which results in, once again, atrocious minimum framerates. I've heard Shadow of Mordor essentially requires 6GB of VRAM for the Ultra texture pack, and the other games, even with averages in the 30s, you see the low minimum framerate, which alone is indicative of expected stuttering. It's tough to really say if the memory or the framerate/settings alone are responsible.

Even with other cards, I can't hardly stand to play any game when the average is in the 30s, because I know it will dip into the 20s or lower and it just plays very roughly. Don't be fooled into thinking 30fps is playable like on consoles, because those are capped at 30 (unless they are capped higher on some games, especially the current gen), and the games rarely cross below 30fps, and people complain when that happens because it's usually obvious.

 

[destrekor]

aftermarket 290 = stock 290x in performance when translating reviews to real world. Pretty sure nobody is buying new stock 290s today...

So... overclocked.

Okay, you also don't find many stock 290x, so now they no longer match the 290x.

And, if we are going to compare overclocked cards, you can, you know, overclock 970s or 980s, and many come overclocked.

"Hey guys, this overclocked card is a better value because it performs the same as all your non-overclocked cards."
"Well, how about we overclock?"

 

[cmdrdredd]

aftermarket 290 = stock 290x in performance when translating reviews to real world. Pretty sure nobody is buying new stock 290s today...

Hope not but if one is considering 970 price then why not consider a 290x over a 290? The 290x in aftermarket configurations with some overclocking is real nice as well.

 

[Headfoot]

Check the benchmarks, the 290 is in the dust even at 4k. (nothing is playable as a single card IMO).

Like this benchmark?

Agreed that nothing is playable on a single card at 4k. We'll probably have to wait a generation or two before that's realistic it seems

 

[Headfoot]

So... overclocked.

No.

Even at 947 clock aftermarket 290s are still quite a bit faster, because the stock 290 throttles at the stupid low fan speed they decided to set. You can get the same effect by increasing fan speeds on a stock 290. Obviously a 290 isn't actually a 290x, but it performs very similarly to one when the 290 is not throttling and the 290x is throttling. It's just shorthand equivalence.

Most reviews dont incude aftermarket 290s, so looking at the stock 290x is a quick way to determine what the aftermarket 290 (e.g. ones you can actually still buy new) will perform like. Even better, read the Techspot review I linked above where they actually compare OC to OC and aftermarket to aftermarket which is the most realistic comparison out there: http://www.techspot.com/review/898-geforce-gtx-970-sli-4k-gaming/page2.html. It includes frame times. It shows that the 970 and 290 tie some times, and the 970 wins some times but never more than 15% and usually closer to 10%... which reduces to 0-5% at 4k. There is a clear trend that the 290 does relatively better vs the 970 as resolution goes up towards 4k, shrinking the gap and sometimes even passing the 970. 3x1080p is closer to 4k than it is to 2560x1600. And the 290 costs less by quite a bit.

That review shows an average of only 3% lead for the 970 at 4k, and a 4% lead when both are overclocked

 

[Headfoot]

And before power consumption sophistry takes hold here:

From http://www.techspot.com/review/898-geforce-gtx-970-sli-4k-gaming/page6.html

 

[cmdrdredd]

All these benchmarks need a redo too because of newer drivers. I think AMD has new drivers as well.