xx80 vs xx80 Ti: Best Value Upgrade Cycle?

[GoodRevrnd]

Let's say you could commit to a biennial high performance upgrade. Which upgrade cycle is giving you the best bang for the buck over time--buying every xx80, or buying every xx80 Ti? For sake of argument, let's throw out Founder's Edition cards and assume you are buying the first available reasonably priced aftermarket solution (o ~1-2 months into product life, better cooler). Factor resale of previous card into your decision.

I'm inclined to think the Ti might be the better choice, but I really haven't paid close enough attention over the last few product cycles. I expect the Ti probably keeps resell value a bit better. Also any new features implemented in each generation usually take a bit of time before they make much difference anyway, so there's no real benefit to immediately hopping to a new card other than the performance gains.

 

[Qwertilot]

iirc someone worked it out recently and the performance gains from generation to generation are really very, very similar. So much so that its near certain that NV are keeping things that way on purpose. You'd expect it to continue.

So if you're on a strict 2 (or 4 I guess) year upgrade cycle, its mostly a wash. The xxTi's maybe get some pluses like you say but the xx80's do have notably less power use which is nice too.

Honestly most people have already made the choice when specifying their computer The one thing that doesn't really make sense, unless in possession of considerable money!, is upgrading from the xxTi to the next gen xx80 then to the Ti etc.

 

[GoodRevrnd]

The one thing that doesn't really make sense, unless in possession of considerable money!, is upgrading from the xxTi to the next gen xx80 then to the Ti etc.

I recall a thread about doing this and I think it was something like a $200-300/yr commitment which isn't all that bad. I'm just not convinced the FPS gains are really worth it against the slow pace of game image quality advancement. Granted, 4k probably changes that consideration quite a bit.

 

[Snarf Snarf]

I wish Russian was still around, he had some excellent numbers on this exact topic. It works out to be roughly the same, as was mentioned before, the % gain over previous generations is almost guaranteed these days since NVidia is an execution monster. Ideally the most money can be recovered if you sell the month before imminent launch, selling either x80 or x80ti for about 15% below MSRP and using an old graphics card or IGP for a month.

980ti's were going for about 499-550 the month before 1080 launched, and the 1080ti will likely be selling for around 550-600 before GV104 launches. If you can stay ahead of the curve and not game for a month you can upgrade for $100-150 every cycle which is a phenomenal deal. If you don't want any downtime in gaming you're likely going to lose about $150 off resale value and end up paying about $300 for your upgrade every release cycle.

 

[GoodRevrnd]

Waiting a month is really more like waiting 2-3 months though since you'd ideally want a nice aftermarket top-down cooler (especially if you went the two year instead of annual route).

 

[Grooveriding]

I would always go with the big chip. The mid tier cards like 680/670/770/980/970 don't hold up well over time performance wise, and if you are considering resale, lose value fast on the used market when new cards arrive. Nvidia's big chip overclocked is generally equal to the performance of the X70 chip in SLI without the headaches of SLI. Whereas their X80 chip is usually only about 120% the performance of a single X70 chip.

Why settle for the mid tier performance on a longish upgrade cycle? Buy the ti on release day and you will get a good ride out of it until the next ti. The only issue with nvidia's current release strategy with each new generation is you will have to wait for them to release their mid range cards, then their Titan and then they will release the ti. I'd get a 1080ti today and wait on the ti volta cards, which I think reasonably are going to be a year away.

 

[GoodRevrnd]

Right. I'm strictly opining on whether it's better to go with an x80 to x80 upgrade cycle, or an x80 Ti to x80 Ti upgrade cycle (long term, whether or not I "need" a card today is not relevant to the question).

 

[Head1985]

TI or big SKu is always better-more oc headroom, more performance headroom.Small SKU are made for milking.Nv using them to make money.TI card so far was always best card in generation(980TI,1080TI)
Small pascal was worst of all small gpus-overpriced(1080 700usd,1070 450usd) and then they released 1080TI for 700Usd which is almost 70% faster than GTX1070 and 35% faster than 1080.

 

[crisium]

In a way either cycle gets you fastest GPU in the world for a while.

Ti is getting more room at the top now-a-days it seems. It wasn't like that before with 980 coming only 10 months after the 780 Ti. But in the past 2 generations the x80 release date was closer to its Ti then the Ti was to the next x80.

Therefore, Ti cycle should get you flagship performance longer, but it has 2 drawbacks in price and power consumption. That being said 1080 FE and 1080 Ti FE pricing ended up being the same this time around. I don't expect that to continue due to NV likely ending the FE tax.

x80 cycle is preferable though if you consider Ti TDP to simply be unacceptable. Aftermarket 1080 Ti's are too power hungry for my current mood, mainly due to heat output in my room. Though I suppose one could always underclock the Ti, it seems somewhat wasteful.

Then there's the Titan cycle which is early adopters Ti tax... and don't forget the x70 cycle which is essentially buying the old Titan but it sips power and is super discounted.

It's unknown if Nvidia can keep this 2 year cadence up but I wish them success. Lot's of great choices for 2 year upgrade cycles.

 

[ElFenix]

you're losing less actual money in depreciation going x80 to x80 than Ti to Ti. further, since nvidia likes to milk the crowd, if you're doing Ti to Ti you're behind in the cycle and the next x80 is going to be faster for a decent chunk of time.

 

[Head1985]

you're losing less actual money in depreciation going x80 to x80 than Ti to Ti. further, since nvidia likes to milk the crowd, if you're doing Ti to Ti you're behind in the cycle and the next x80 is going to be faster for a decent chunk of time.

But x80 is not much faster than x80TI if we compare both oc to max.
GTX980 1500/8000 is not much faster than 1300Mhz 780TI
GTX1080 2000/11000 is not much faster than 980TI 1500/8000.
Those small SKU using x80 dont have any oc headroom because they need beat old x80TI(throtthling).But when both oc to max the gap is very small around 15%.But when you compare x80TI max oc vs x80 max OC the TI is 35-40% faster.So yeah with x80 you get faster card, but its small gap.With x80TI its huge gap.
x80TI is just better no matter what.Only power consuption is bad, but its not problem.I have MSI 1080TI gaminx and it runs cool and very quiet +- same as gainward GTX1070 GS(which have best cooler of all 1070)

 

[ElFenix]

well, the question wasn't which is best no matter what, the question was which is best value.

 

[GoodRevrnd]

well, the question wasn't which is best no matter what, the question was which is best value.

But per/$ is still a factor. I suspected the resell value would be better x80 to x80, but that may get washed out some from performance differences, time spent with Ti, Ti perf relative to next gen x80...

 

[crisium]

Well, $550 new GTX 980 became $250 new GTX 1060.
$650 new GTX 980 Ti became $380 GTX 1070.

I'm not sure about inefficiencies on the used market, but these should have been the ceiling if not the next floor above the best you could hope for your used cards. The x80 depreciated more in absolute and relative terms.

$500 GTX 680 = $200 GTX 960
$650/$700 GTX 780/780 Ti = $330 970

A little weirder because of the 700 series extending the life of Kepler, this one is a little closer. Even the 780 Ti though depreciated less.

Though I have heard stories about used Nvidia cards holding value longer, strangely sometimes going for more than new generation comparable cards, so who knows.

 

[GoodRevrnd]

Yeah, I couldn't believe how long it took used 980 Ti to drop below new 1070 price.