Hi all, I'm looking to upgrade from a 560ti. As the R9 390 and 970 are the same price what do you think would be better? I don't plan to overclock. My case is a Fractal Define R3 (so a bit warm). Is the extra VRAM likely to be useful in the future as I'd like this card to see about 4/5 years. Thanks in advance for your help! P.s. I hear Nvidia are releasing a new line, should i just get a cheap card and wait?
There probably won't be a huge amount between them, but the 390 will be hotter and hungrier. As for waiting, that's up to you - there's almost always a new card on the horizon so, unless you buy a new card at launch, you're only ever going to be a few months away from potential disappointment. As ever with PC components, buy the best one you can afford and be content.
I am a big AMD fan but the 970 is prob better value, the 390 is a rebadged 290 which while it is light years ahead of the 560ti it cannot keep up with the 970. There maybe some great deals around Christmas/ Newyear, I picked up a 290 last year for about £180 delivered.
At 1080p both cards have enough VRAM for length of time either card will be viable at the settings that would need high vram requirements. A 2gb gpu is only just this year starting to see VRAM issues in certain titles ( batman mainly) You can always be waiting on the next step in GPUs the approach I take is to buy 1-2 high end gpus every 2 years and sell the cards on after that point and buy the next set.
About the same, go for what's cheapest IMO. Personally, I'd go for the 390, mostly because while Maxwells power saving features are impressive (unless running some form of 144hz or possibly multi-monitor it seems), I'd still rather take the 8GB over 4GB, even if the 4gb on the 970 wasn't 'unusual'.
I went for a 970 due to the lower power draw and because the Asus one is semi-passively cooled. Strix 970s fans won't even spin up below 60C, and when they do finally kick in they are almost silent. Power and silence, love it!
Thank you all for your advice. Would it be different if I was hoping to run a VR headset off the card?
I have just installed a 970 into my rig today, a strix infact. It runs on 1 8pin, compared to 2 6 pins my 4 years old 6870 ran on. My system is noticeably quieter. FPS is dirty smooth at 1920 1080 maxed out in bf4 and guild wars 2 with sweet fx running! Reason i went for 970 was because its quieter and less power hungry, also i fancied a change. Last 2 cards have been AMD.
