What's the general opinion on the GTX 960?

[poofyhairguy]

This thread makes me value an EVGA warranty a little more.

 

[dpk33]

You made out like a bandit if they're giving you a GTX 960 for a GTX 570. I own one right now, I at one time owned a GTX 670 and with new drivers favoring Maxwell its pulling ahead. I would estimate its about as fast as a GTX 680 now (and definitely faster than a GTX 760). I think you would be quite foolish to get rid of it when it cost you nothing for an R9 280X (which is not tremendously faster). If you're going to do an upgrade do it right, sell it and get a GTX 970. The 960 is quiet, cool running, low power usage and 35-40% faster than your GTX 570. I don't understand how you could be disappointed with that RMA upgrade.

Agreed, were I in EVGA's position, op would be getting a 750 ti instead.

Yeah, I do realize I'm coming off as very ungrateful haha. I am much more content than I seem with the 960, considering that 570 was basically sitting in my closet unused because it wasn't working.

 

[poofyhairguy]

I would love a 960. Has the best HEVC decoder around, plus it barely gets hot. Would be fun to overclock, sometimes the cooling on my EVGA 970 can't keep up. It was a good deal for you OP.

 

[sm625]

A 7970 may be faster, but not by much. Unless you can make at least $40 off the deal, it is not worth it to switch. You will spend almost $40 in extra electricity over the course of two years by going with the AMD equivalent, assuming 6 hours a day of actually loading the card. (6*.12*0.07*365*2)

 

[MongGrel]

You made out like a bandit if they're giving you a GTX 960 for a GTX 570. I own one right now, I at one time owned a GTX 670 and with new drivers favoring Maxwell its pulling ahead. I would estimate its about as fast as a GTX 680 now (and definitely faster than a GTX 760). I think you would be quite foolish to get rid of it when it cost you nothing for an R9 280X (which is not tremendously faster). If you're going to do an upgrade do it right, sell it and get a GTX 970. The 960 is quiet, cool running, low power usage and 35-40% faster than your GTX 570. I don't understand how you could be disappointed with that RMA upgrade.

I tend to agree, use a 280X myself but it sounds like you made out like a bandit on the RMA and I would just use it. I doubt you would notice a game changing difference.

 

[xorbe]

Yeah GTX 560Ti448 was the same silicon as the 580 but cut down (I checked, yes). Now, the 960 is different than 970/980 is different than 980Ti/Titan. It's waaay down the totem pole.

 

[iiiankiii]

A 7970 may be faster, but not by much. Unless you can make at least $40 off the deal, it is not worth it to switch. You will spend almost $40 in extra electricity over the course of two years by going with the AMD equivalent, assuming 6 hours a day of actually loading the card. (6*.12*0.07*365*2)

While I agree it's not worth the hassle of selling and rebuying, a straight up trade would make sense. I would do that in a heart beat. If you can find somebody that's willing to trade with you, it might be worth considering.

Plus, you're reaching with the whole saving $40 over 2 years thing. When you factor in other things that you're required to do during the day, it's rather hard to spend 6 hours a day on gaming.

Also, we're talking chump change here. It's basically $1.67 more a month. Yeah, in the grand scheme of things, that's not much. I really believe cost savings is rather mute in this situation. It would not be the reason for me to pick a GTX 960 over a 7970.

You can bring up the TDP when dealing with something more immediate. Like increased room temperature, noise and/or restricted by your PSU. Those matter way more.

 

[RussianSensation]

A 7970 may be faster, but not by much. Unless you can make at least $40 off the deal, it is not worth it to switch. You will spend almost $40 in extra electricity over the course of two years by going with the AMD equivalent, assuming 6 hours a day of actually loading the card. (6*.12*0.07*365*2)

In the latest TPU charts, once TPU removed heavily NV biased tests like ProjectNvidi, added an even faster Skylake CPU as the foundation to the test platform and the R9 280X is now smashing 960 by 27% at 1080P - more than ever. While it's debatable if the effort is worth switching to and from between these 2 cards (i.e., might as well step up to an R9 290/970/390 at that point), the 960 2GB continues to look worse and worse. 770 is also falling part with even the R9 380 now beating it. In general, NV's cards besides the GTX980Ti/Titan continue to age worse with time, a similar theme we've seen in the last 3 years.

 

[Magic Carpet]

^ Dang, that new Lightning card is stealing the show!

 

[RussianSensation]

^ Dang, that new Lightning card is stealing the show!

Oh yes! The 980Ti is the star of this generation. What's ironic is it's the ONLY definitive card in NV's line-up that's hands down uncontested in all key metrics. A pure home run. Probably NV's best flagship card since 8800GTX. :thumbsup:

 

[bononos]

In the latest TPU charts, once TPU removed heavily NV biased tests like ProjectNvidi, added an even faster Skylake CPU as the foundation to the test platform and the R9 280X is now smashing 960 by 27% at 1080P - more than ever. While it's debatable if the effort is worth switching to and from between these 2 cards (i.e., might as well step up to an R9 290/970/390 at that point), the 960 2GB continues to look worse and worse. 770 is also falling part with even the R9 380 now beating it. In general, NV's cards besides the GTX980Ti/Titan continue to age worse with time, a similar theme we've seen in the last 3 years.
......

I haven't kept up on what game engines/games favor which company and which website charts are less biased. So is the most recent TPU charts good for a general performance check? How does the AT benches compare?

 

[Zodiark1593]

In the latest TPU charts, once TPU removed heavily NV biased tests like ProjectNvidi, added an even faster Skylake CPU as the foundation to the test platform and the R9 280X is now smashing 960 by 27% at 1080P - more than ever. While it's debatable if the effort is worth switching to and from between these 2 cards (i.e., might as well step up to an R9 290/970/390 at that point), the 960 2GB continues to look worse and worse. 770 is also falling part with even the R9 380 now beating it. In general, NV's cards besides the GTX980Ti/Titan continue to age worse with time, a similar theme we've seen in the last 3 years.

Nvidia's focus seems to be more on the efficiency side, do the job with as little silicone and power as possible. Utilizing as close to 100% as possible of their compute resources to achieve competitive performance has been Nvidia's goal for the past few years. Of course, if your GPU utilization is already 90-95% of it's full compute potential, driver optimizations won't get any more out of it as the compute simply isn't there. GPUs with lesser resources are easier to optimize for, and thus, lower end GPUs will peak out and fall behind more quickly.

AMD on the other hand seems to favor a more brute-force approach. Put enough compute resources at it to get competitive performance today, sort out utilization through driver optimizations later. The result being AMD GPU's having higher theoretical performance than an equally priced Nvidia GPU, but performing on par, at least initially. Though arguably an expensive and inelegant approach, it seems to be paying off in dividends as of now, particularly with their console wins and DX12 focusing on maximizing utilization of available compute.

 

[VirtualLarry]

In the latest TPU charts, once TPU removed heavily NV biased tests like ProjectNvidi, added an even faster Skylake CPU as the foundation to the test platform and the R9 280X is now smashing 960 by 27% at 1080P - more than ever. While it's debatable if the effort is worth switching to and from between these 2 cards (i.e., might as well step up to an R9 290/970/390 at that point), the 960 2GB continues to look worse and worse. 770 is also falling part with even the R9 380 now beating it. In general, NV's cards besides the GTX980Ti/Titan continue to age worse with time, a similar theme we've seen in the last 3 years.

Interesting chart. That one shows the R9 270X ahead of the GTX950, and almost butting heads with the GTX960. Amazing.

 

[bononos]

Why hasn't AT done a 960 review yet? There was discussion about it being delayed previously.

 

[Mondozei]

The under-$300 dollar solutions from AMD continue to put further distance between them and NV's GPUs at 1080p. Wouldn't get a 960.

On an unrelated note, that 980 Ti Lightning is crazy! I just looked at the review and thought to myself, smugly, "well I'm sure the temps and noise are shattered, hahahaha".

Nope. If you look at their noise chart, the 980 Ti is one of the quietest cards they have even with massive overclocks. It's also running at a very cool 65 Celsius. All this on air. (Take that watercooling!)

This is truly spectacular. I just might get one of these when they go on a minisale in the coming weeks, even if I know I shouldn't. In Sweden, the price differential between this card and the reference 980 Ti can be just $100. I saw a price chart that tracks the prices and it already dipped there by the 16th October. It's bound to come down to that level again.

 

[Silverforce11]

There's a ton of good 980Ti models that hit 1.5ghz even at TPU's testing of the Lightning. Paying $100 premium is ridiculous for no real gains. Sure its quiet, but so are other good custom cards. It doesn't actually OC better on air.

 

[Magic Carpet]

Interesting chart. That one shows the R9 270X ahead of the GTX950, and almost butting heads with the GTX960. Amazing.

Considering 270X is Pitcairn which is 3 or 4 years old, this is impressive indeed.

There's a ton of good 980Ti models that hit 1.5ghz even at TPU's testing of the Lightning. Paying $100 premium is ridiculous for no real gains. Sure its quiet, but so are other good custom cards. It doesn't actually OC better on air.

This is the best, non-limited production 980Ti on the market, bar none. If you want the best, you gotta pay, bro. There are only two other cards that are slightly better and more exclusive but are both limited edition:

this one and that one.

And when it comes to noise, the only card that comes close is Palit but it's done at the expense of higher temps. If you study those graphs more carefully, you will realize that it is also one of the best performance-per-watt cards on the market too, despite being the fastest of them all. Well done, MSI. The price tag is justified, imo.

it's the ONLY definitive card in NV's line-up that's hands down uncontested in all key metrics.

Pretty much this.

And speaking of the 960 GTX. What a failure card it will go down to history books, man. Neither fast, nor power-efficient (even AMD R9 Fury has better performance per watt, lmao). No wonder, it wasn't even reviewed here at AT. I'd rather get myself a 750 Ti 2GB, the one without a 6-pin plug, if I didn't need performance and wanted something truly power-efficient.

 

[96Firebird]

It's almost as if people aren't even reading the OP...

You got a great deal receiving a 960 for an RMA'd 570. The only way I'd sell it is if you think you can make money and don't mind buying a used 280X or similar. The 960 probably sells for more used than a 280X, being an Nvidia card, and yours is virtually new so you might be able to get a little more.

Do keep in mind fees if you decide to sell on something like eBay, that will eat into your profit and make the switch less appealing...

 

[poofyhairguy]

In the latest TPU charts, once TPU removed heavily NV biased tests like ProjectNvidi, added an even faster Skylake CPU as the foundation to the test platform and the R9 280X is now smashing 960 by 27% at 1080P - more than ever.

Yeah but that is best case scenario for the CPU. I don't think anyone who has a brand new i7 skylake CPU is choosing between these cards for gaming. An overclocked GTX 960 in a system with a weaker CPU would be much closer to the 280x.

 

[boozzer]

anyone who recommends a 960 is screwing people over asking for help in this forum.

my opinion is that is not an opinion, but a statement of fact.

but if you got it for free via rma, op should be asking if 960 is comparable to 570 in performance and it does. op should be happy he got newer tech from his rma.

 

[crisium]

Keep the 960 if you want HDMI 2.0. Otherwise, assuming you got a 2GB 960, then if you're confident you can swap it for a 280X without losing money then you may as well. If it is a 4GB 960 I'd just keep it.

As for the question asked in the thread title, it is a misleading card that has no right to its name. I understand that tiers change - AMD went from *80 being top, to *90, to now Fury X. But that's no excuse for the tremendous, oceanic gap that exists between the 960 and 970.

In terms of overall shaders, ROPs, and buswidth, a GTX 660 is closer a GTX 680 then a GTX 960 is close to the GTX 970. And there are 2 cards between the 660 and 680, and we don't even have a 960 Ti!

I think the card sells droves because it is the next closest to the popular 970 in name, but in any other generation it would be 2-3 card below the 970.

 

[Leyawiin]

anyone who recommends a 960 is screwing people over asking for help in this forum.

my opinion is that is not an opinion, but a statement of fact.

Sorry, that's not a fact, its just a lame generalization. Both the GTX 960 and R9 380 (same class/price point) fit the bill in a lot of instances. Do you own one? If you do have you had enough experience with other graphics cards both weaker and better to be able to make an educated judgment? If not you opinion is pretty much worthless since you're just regurgitating what you're read on the internet for the last year from people who again, don't own it but say it has to be worthless because its got a 128 bit bus width and sits between a GTX 760 and GTX 770 from the previous gen. I guess they felt it should have been much faster and it was a little overpriced at release, but what new card isn't to some extent? Now at $170 its a valid option.

One thing we can agree on is that the OP did fine with this RMA upgrade from a performance perspective. EVGA didn't screw him around.

 

[boozzer]

Sorry, that's not a fact, its just a lame generalization. Both the GTX 960 and R9 380 (same class/price point) fit the bill in a lot of instances. Do you own one? If you do have you had enough experience with other graphics cards both weaker and better to be able to make an educated judgment? If not you opinion is pretty much worthless since you're just regurgitating what you're read on the internet for the last year from people who again, don't own it but say it has to be worthless because its got a 128 bit bus width and sits between a GTX 760 and GTX 770 from the previous gen. I guess they felt it should have been much faster and it was a little overpriced at release, but what new card isn't to some extent? Now at $170 its a valid option.

One thing we can agree on is that the OP did fine with this RMA upgrade from a performance perspective. EVGA didn't screw him around.

so you are one of those screwing people over asking for help. got it. D:

 

[iiiankiii]

It's not that the GTX 960 sucks (which it does), it's really due to the price point. The $200 price range is hideous. It wasn't a good value during the past 6 months. It was really hard to recommend when you can grab a R9 290 for around $230 bucks for the past 6 months and get DOUBLE THE PERFORMANCE.

However, things have changed. The GTX 960 is a lot less now. Its price is settling at around $170 (or even as low as $150 every now and then). In addition, the stock of the R9 290s are slowly depleting. It's a lot harder to grab one for ~$230. It's no longer a no brainer pick over the GTX 960. The price differential is too big.

At $170, it's a fine price point for the GTX 960. It's pretty competitive at its price range. But, that doesn't make value of those cards at ~$200 any better. It sucks.

I feel that there is a huge performance gap between the GTX 960/R9 380 and the GTX 970/R9 390. It would make sense for Nvidia and/or AMD to fill that gap with newer cards (GTX960TI/R9380x).

 

[alexruiz]

Answering the OP's original question regarding a GTX960 as replacement for a GTX 570, I think you got less.

The GTX 570 was second in the hierachy of nVIdia GPUs, the GTX 960 is like 5th. I think a x70 series should have received a x70 series as replacement based on the target price point of when the GPU was bought.