nVidia 980 upgrade question

[patseguin Global Moderator]

My PC is in my sig. Been itching to upgrade my dual 670 SLI to something better for modern games. Would a single 980 GTX be a worthy upgrade for the money?

[Jim K Global Moderator]

I wouldn't.  Your performance improvements will be minimal (unless you're running into games that cannot utilize SLI optimally).  I would wait for Pascal's probable release sometime this year...and then do an upgrade especially if your itching to spend money.

[patseguin Global Moderator]

3 hours ago, jjkusaf said:

I wouldn't.  Your performance improvements will be minimal (unless you're running into games that cannot utilize SLI optimally).  I would wait for Pascal's probable release sometime this year...and then do an upgrade especially if your itching to spend money.

Thanks. The only sticky point is that I've been eyeballing a Samsung 4K monitor. From my understanding, the 670 supports it but only with reduced color and 30Hz. That's not good right?

[Jim K Global Moderator]

Guess that is why it is good to include all relevant information in the original post...I probably wouldn't have responded.  My knowledge re: 4K monitors is limited to what I've read on the net.

 

If you hook up the display in DisplayPort (MST) it should be fine @ 60Hz.  You didn't specify if you have the 2 or 4GB version of the 670s.  If you have the 4GB versions then a 980 will just give you a bump in performance (probably not worth it).  If you have the 2GB versions ... the purchase of a 980 will be more justified.

 

If you really want the monitor ... get it ... see if your current setup is adequate ... if not then go for the 980.  If it is ok ... then I recommend just waiting for Pascal.

[MorganX]

I'm looking to go for a reconditioned 980 from a 970. Want a little more juice at 1440p, but I don't want a 980ti, cost too much and too much power required. If I'm going to spend that much I'll wait for the next gen, Pascal, like jjk suggests.

[Odom Member]

4K and gaming modern games don't go well in the same sentence. You need really good GPU to play modern games in full quality at that resolution. Most of these games don't even make it with a GTX980Ti.

I would recommend you wait until summer when the new nVidias come out. Until then there will be plenty more 4K monitors as well. After the first reviews we'll see if those new cards can manage the latest games at full settings.

 

I was also looking to upgrade my GTX970, as I cannot push the latest games to full details at the resolution I am playing, however I don't want to invest so much money in a GTX980Ti when the new cards are coming out (supposedly) in the next quarter.

[patseguin Global Moderator]

Good advice, thanks guys. My 670's have 2GB each. I run a 2560 1440 monitor and I can pretty much max out every game I have still. I haven't tried anything like Rise of the tomb raider yet though. I do want to eventually get an Oculus so I know I will HAVE to upgrade. 4k is really less of a priority because the 2560 is pretty nice.

 

Do they still make those "X2" single card SLI solutions like they used to? I used to have one a long time ago.

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

i have (2) 680s, and i used to run a 4k monitor at 30Hz over HDMI. The monitor (tv) didnt have DP, so i was limited to only using HDMI.

 

This 600 series is capable of 30Hz over HDMI, or 60Hz over DP. This series does not have HDMI 2.0.

 

I played several games at 4k resolution. it worked just fine at 30Hz/fps. all i needed to change were some of the unnecessary 'eye candy' settings like AA, AF, Depth of Field, Volumetric this and that.

 

as for upgrading the video card(s) now? i'd wait. if anything i'd start to consider a new CPU. that CPU's architecture is 8yrs old now... plus, you're missing out on other tech like PCI-e 3.0, USB3/3.1, etc.

[patseguin Global Moderator]

18 minutes ago, Jason S. said:

i have (2) 680s, and i used to run a 4k monitor at 30Hz over HDMI. The monitor (tv) didnt have DP, so i was limited to only using HDMI.

 

This 600 series is capable of 30Hz over HDMI, or 60Hz over DP. This series does not have HDMI 2.0.

 

I played several games at 4k resolution. it worked just fine at 30Hz/fps. all i needed to change were some of the unnecessary 'eye candy' settings like AA, AF, Depth of Field, Volumetric this and that.

 

as for upgrading the video card(s) now? i'd wait. if anything i'd start to consider a new CPU. that CPU's architecture is 8yrs old now... plus, you're missing out on other tech like PCI-e 3.0, USB3/3.1, etc.

Hmm really? I figured with the 3.4GHz clock speed of my CPU I'd be fine for a long time. I'm pretty sure I built it right when Gulftown came out in 2010. I have an Asus Rampage III Black Edition mobo with USB 3.0 on it http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131726.

 

I also installed liquid cooling and corsair RAM with fans. Really involved setup and it seems to perform well enough that it would be a major pain to rip it all apart wouldn't it? I mean, upgrading the CPU now would mean a new mobo and new RAM and I wouldn't be getting ny clock speed improvement, just features like PCI 3 and such right?

[Jim K Global Moderator]

28 minutes ago, patseguin said:

Good advice, thanks guys. My 670's have 2GB each. I run a 2560 1440 monitor and I can pretty much max out every game I have still. I haven't tried anything like Rise of the tomb raider yet though. I do want to eventually get an Oculus so I know I will HAVE to upgrade. 4k is really less of a priority because the 2560 is pretty nice.

 

Do they still make those "X2" single card SLI solutions like they used to? I used to have one a long time ago.

I think the last nVidia dual GPU was the Titan Z for an eye watering $2Kish...I think it is discontinued now (though you can find it on Amazon, eBay, etc)  This article mentions an upcoming dual nVidia GPU card...but it is 4 months old so I'm not sure how true it is especially with Pascal around the corner...the article mentions it using two Maxwell GPU's.  Sooo...I dunno.  AMD is suppose to release the Fury X2 in Q2 this year.

[patseguin Global Moderator]

I know I am hijacking my own thread kind of because now I am onto CPU upgrades (thanks to Jason S). I am wondering what a worthy upgrade for my Gulftown would be.

 

Would this be a good upgrade?

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboBundleDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.2466098

 

EDIT: I can't find much info online about worthy upgrades from Gulftown. I mean, it's a 3.47GHz 6 core CPU and Skylakes while at 4GHz are only 4 core. Would I really see a major boost in my performance from the 6 core Gulftown to a 4 core Skylake?

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

im not suggesting that your CPU would bottleneck a graphics card. Im just saying that, personally, an 8yr old architecture is too old for me. I'd like to have the latest tech that a Skylake CPU can offer.

[patseguin Global Moderator]

2 hours ago, Jason S. said:

im not suggesting that your CPU would bottleneck a graphics card. Im just saying that, personally, an 8yr old architecture is too old for me. I'd like to have the latest tech that a Skylake CPU can offer.

Yeah that totally makes sense. I'm just wondering if in addition to the improved architecture, I could expect a meaningful performance improvement in CPU power.

 

I certainly won't LOSE CPU power will I going from 6 core to 4 core? I'm thinking the architecture will almost be a necessity for the eventual GPU upgrade plus I'm wondering if I'll see an improvement in SSD performance.

[Odom Member]

It would depend what you use your PC for. For gaming, there are plenty of reviews online that show you have hardly any benefit at all if you go higher than 4 cores on the CPU (with HT). There are only a handful of games that benefit from that. Same goes for the RAM. Stick too much RAM into the machine and it will actually hinder the performance in gaming.

 

On the other hand, if you do anything else than gaming that would require this, I don't know, rendering I guess, CAD, transcoding,..., as long as the applications were properly optimized for multiple CPUs then you would probably notice a decrease.

 

Also, I recently read a couple of articles (let me see if I can find them) that tested gaming with high res and multiple CPUs with different numbers of cores. The conclusion was that a modern quad-core CPU will last you for the coming years, as in the last two years the tendency is to push the resolution higher and higher (from the standard that was Full HD, to ultra-wide, then 1440p, now 4K and they are already bringing out 5k and 8k monitors this year) the load will be on the GPU. So, whilst the CPU mostly stagnated and is plenty enough for gaming (how many modern games actually balance out properly a quad core with HT?), the GPU is getting all the load. Just look at any reviews with games at 4K resolutions and higher. To play most modern games with full effects at that level they are talking about GTX 980 Ti in SLI, and even then it's not perfect.

[McCordRm]

I'm still running my 680GTX and looking to upgrade it. I was just about to buy a 980 when I stumbled on an article talking about Pascal. Now, I'm definitely waiting. Even if the price of the Pascal is too wicked crazy to justify buying it, it's release will still drop the price on the 980s. 

[wiretap]

Pascal Titan's are to be released in what looks to be April. I don't see the prices of 980's dropping much, unless AMD also releases their new cards that are more competitively priced. The 970/980/980Ti equivalents using the Pascal chip are slated for later on, more towards the 2nd half of 2016.