So I've been searching for the last hour on this topic and come up with that the R7 260X is a better GPU but is it more or less than £10 better?.. A friend I know was given £100 in vouchers ( from his work place ) to spend at Currys/PCWorld and so he's asked me to recommend him the right GPU upgrade to get at Currys/PCWorld!.. But what is best suited for his system?.. Is the R7 260X worth the extra costs or will he be good with a GTX 650 Ti ( in regards to his PC spec ) and spend the rest on something else too?.. He is rocking a HP ( I think ) pre-built system which consists of a Core i7 860, 8GB ( 4x2GB ) of RAM, Radeon HD 5750, and runs on HDDs with Windows 7 as the OS, all this is powered by a 500w PSU ( of unknown brand ) & unsure what motherboard it is so can't really say about this, but it could be a generic ASUS make like I see in many other prebuilt systems of this calibre... Here --> http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/s_action/compare/10010488-19338688.html is the link of the comparison between the two GPUs on the PCWorld web site... +rep to you all who respond... Thanks!..
Benches put it at about a $10 worth of increase in performance. The additional cost is about the same in performance increase. Meaning, they are pretty much the EXACT value (performance v.s. price) It's exactly the same from what I can tell. Tell your buddy to pick which one he thinks looks cooler? With the results I see, I'd go with the EVGA card simply because EVGA is a bigger company and less likely to F**** you on a warranty issue if you ever run into one.
I would check the dimensions of the cards to make sure they will fit. I have a slightly older HP Pavilion Elite hooked up to my TV. Those cases were/probably still are pretty tight. Especially if it's got all the crap mine has like the media bays and such. As for the card, my last 5 cards have been EVGA branded NVidia cards. A GTX 275 (a stupidly massive card), two 550 Tis and now two 660 Tis. Never had a problem with any of them. My 275 is sitting in a box for now, might make a decent PhysX card in another setup sometime... and I gave the 550s to a good friend of mine who is running them now in his main rig. EDIT: I see the pic of the card is pretty short, but I would still take a look at the interior to make sure there is sufficient room for airflow around the card. I had an 8800 that eventually died in the HP. When I took it out, the branding stickers on the card were all rolled back from the heat... not a good sign.
Appreciate the initial responses guys, the more the merrier... So what you're saying is, the R7 260X does not have £10 more worth of performance compared to the GTX 650 Ti as $10 USD is worth less than £10 sterling?!. lol... Really?.. Never knew Sapphire were so bad with warranty claims!.. Anyways, the EVGA does look sexier if that is the exact model though as pictures at PCWorld aren't always 100% accurate learning from past experiences!.. When it comes to these two cards space isn't of concern, seeing that his HD 5750 is about ( if not ) the same size in length with the Sapphire card!.. Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk
1. Small enough difference it's hard to measure in benchmarks especially since benchmark environments are 100% synthetic. Where one driver may handle the synthetic environment better because it's made to utilize the GPU more. TBH I've never been pinched to $30 USD in my budget so that small of a difference wouldn't be a deciding factor as well as the performance. It's so minute go with whatever one you think looks the best or whatever you determine the deciding factor is. Just saying the differences are minute. 2. Not saying anything bad about saphire, I simply have personal experience and references as to how good EVGA is. If I know one is good, why gamble on something you're unsure of? Some random person online giving you build advice etc.... The magic in it is not when someone bashes saphire but when soooo many people give their word to back up EVGA that it becomes apparent that they are a company one could stand behind without having to take the risk in buying saphire with no word on ease of returns or customer support. EVGA is just a house hold name in GPUs where as far as I can tell saphire isn't as big or advanced a company.
As general rule of thumb, if 2 graphics cards look similar on paper, go with the one that has the newest architecture. I have a GTX285 AND A gtx460, Both very similar in spec, but the 460 performs roughly a third better in the real world.
^Was going to suggest this as well, but they are only one gen apart so I wasn't sure it would make that significant of a difference, especially considering (IIRC) the R7 260X is a rename of the previous gen anyways.
It's a shame PC World doesn't sell the 750Ti. That would be the perfect choice in this situation. I would say go for whichever has the best performance for the games your friend plays.
Forgot about this thread altogether LOL They do have them on the web site but they do cost more than what his gift card can afford... Although, now he is thinking of saving up a bit and spending more money on top of the gift card amount and get a better GPU, but for what PCWorld are charging it's not worth it as those more expensive GPUs can be had for a lot less elsewhere... However, I guess ultimately it's his decision, I can only advise him on my opinions!..
Call me a fanboy but I would go with the 650 ti just because I have had a better better experiences in the past with Nvidia!
They only have the GTX 650 on the site list / in stock of which is inferior and costs the same as the R7 260X, but anyways, he wants a better GPU despite advising him with regards to PSU power consumption requirements!..
The existence of the R9 270(x) makes the 750TI from a pure performance stand point somewhat pointless. All for around £10 more. The underlying GPU is good though (especially in the 860m).
Unless the first gen i7 consumers more than 125w at full load I think he should be fine. Some venders are offering SLI titan blacks on 650W PSUs. If he stays in the GTX 760 range of GPUs he should be fine. If he sticks something along the lines of a 290 in it he might be in for some trouble.
