The GeForce 9-series has been released

DArtagnan said:

Not terribly impressed, to be honest. According to the two reviews I've seen, the 980 performs more or less like my 780 TI. In fact, one of them said the TI was still the fastest card around in most cases.

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Yes, performance is not too impressive but no one expected that anyway. Actually contrary to pre-release rumors that had the GTX 980 between the GTX 780 and 780Ti, it has turned out surprisingly fast since it is almost always a little faster than the GTX 780Ti.
What's impressive though is the low power consumption (= less heat = less noise) and also the overclocking headroom. Should be some nice non-reference cards with custom cooling coming up.
Another thing that is fairly impressive is the increase in image quality with DSR, a feature that is exclusive to the 9xx series for now, though I've read that they might make it available for older cards in upcoming drivers.
The real star is the 970. Price/performance is great on that one.

Maylander said:

Speaking of which, when will AMD release their next series? I thought it was late 2014, but it seems to be mostly rumors at this point.

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AMD has an event scheduled this week on 9/25 and no one really knows what it's about. Probably same procedure as every time nVidia releases new products before them, i.e. an announcement to make people not buy a GTX 9xx card but telling them to wait for what they have in store.
Some rumors indicated that their next cards would be shipping with water cooling preinstalled since AMD had quite a lot of issues with power consumption, noise and heat. Guess we'll find out very soon...

Maylander said:

Speaking of which, when will AMD release their next series? I thought it was late 2014, but it seems to be mostly rumors at this point.

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Moriendor said:

AMD has an event scheduled this week on 9/25 and no one really knows what it's about. …

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No, the correct answer is "who cares?"

The only thing AMD is good for these days is keeping Nvidia's prices in check.

Another review, this one from Tom's Hardware:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/nvidia-geforce-gtx-980-970-maxwell,3941.html

It's pretty much what you'd expect: They're the best cards around. Anything else would be rather strange. The in-depth description of the new features is nice though, so it's worth a read for enthusiasts.

Moriendor said:

Yes, performance is not too impressive but no one expected that anyway. Actually contrary to pre-release rumors that had the GTX 980 between the GTX 780 and 780Ti, it has turned out surprisingly fast since it is almost always a little faster than the GTX 780Ti.
What's impressive though is the low power consumption (= less heat = less noise) and also the overclocking headroom. Should be some nice non-reference cards with custom cooling coming up.
Another thing that is fairly impressive is the increase in image quality with DSR, a feature that is exclusive to the 9xx series for now, though I've read that they might make it available for older cards in upcoming drivers.
The real star is the 970. Price/performance is great on that one.

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When I upgrade my GPU, I expect a significant performance increase. Lower power consumption and OC potential is nice, but it's not really my priority.

Since I spent a fortune on my 780 TI, I was kinda worried that it would be outranked significantly by these new cards - because it would mean I'd have to upgrade sooner.

I didn't really expect anything, though, I just comment on what I'm seeing.

That said, I'm now seeing that the 980 does, indeed, outperform my TI - if only slightly.

That's more in line with what I feared, but thankfully not a big deal.

Nah, anyone with a 780 Ti certainly shouldn't upgrade. That would be madness.

Personally, I tend to run two desktops though, so I often have one from the current generation and one from the previous one. I'll probably upgrade the older one in about a month or so, which means I'll have one desktop with 780 and one with 980. The 780 will (most likely) stay until the next generation, even though it's quite a bit behind both the 780 Ti and 980.

JDR13 said:

I understood what you were saying. However, they've started by releasing the high-end cards first in this series. They'll no doubt follow up with a 960, 950, etc. There might be a "Ti" version later, but based on past history, it'll probably just have a higher clocked GPU and VRAM.

It is disappointing that they stuck with a 256-bit memory bus though.

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Based on past history, the high end cards don't retail at 400-500$ They've gone with 256 bit to leave headroom for the high end card and showcase the low power use.

And the power use isn't THAT amazing. 980 was 165watt while 680 was 195watt.

I'd expect the high end card release before the 960 option because, judging by the great performance of the 750ti for its price, chances are the 960 will be "good enough" for most users when you consider the crappy GPUs in the "next-gen" consoles, with the xbone having about the power of a 670 rig, that AAA developers are targeting.

edit: Stating the obvious, just in case...
...And no one will want to pay more for the higher cards when the 960 runs everything maxed out!

DArtagnan said:

Not terribly impressed, to be honest. According to the two reviews I've seen, the 980 performs more or less like my 780 TI. In fact, one of them said the TI was still the fastest card around in most cases.

Good for me, I guess - and now I don't need to worry about upgrading for a while.

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There's certainly no reason for you to upgrade.

In fact, for people looking to upgrade, it might even be worth looking for a price drop on a 780ti

Things are pretty different in Australia. Since we pay about 50% more for everything the ~350$ price on the 970 is starting here around $500. The 980 is going to be about 750$, meanwhile the 780ti is down to about $650.

So you can pay $100 more for better power consumption or snatch up a TI before they're all gone and still get the same performance.

That's what I did getting my 680 for $370 while the 770s were 460$.

SirJames said:

Things are pretty different in Australia. Since we pay about 50% more for everything the ~350$ price on the 970 is starting here around $500. The 980 is going to be about 750$, meanwhile the 780ti is down to about $650.

So you can pay $100 more for better power consumption or snatch up a TI before they're all gone and still get the same performance.

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The 980 is cheaper than the 780 Ti over here.

Same here, by quite a margin actually (about $50).

I'm actually considering the 750 Ti for my next GPU upgrade (from a Radeon HD 6770). I like quiet and energy efficient and the card is only ~60-70 Watt under load and ~6 when idle, which is pretty cool and would probably be sufficient for my occasional gaming needs. I only have a single 1920x1200 monitor, nothing at all like those 4K things I keep hearing about.

Arhu said:

I'm actually considering the 750 Ti for my next GPU upgrade (from a Radeon HD 6770). I like quiet and energy efficient and the card is only ~60-70 Watt under load and ~6 when idle, which is pretty cool and would probably be sufficient for my occasional gaming needs. I only have a single 1920x1200 monitor, nothing at all like those 4K things I keep hearing about.

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I hope they have at least a 4GB version or you won't be playing many new AAA releases. If you care to.

Even so, I would never settle for a 750Ti at this stage unless you're on a strict budget. I doubt you'll see much of any difference over your former 6770, temperatures aside.

Yeah, If you plan on playing newer games at 1920x1200, I would recommend at least a GTX 760. The speed is more important than the VRAM though unless you plan on having heavy anti-aliasing in all your games.

If you can hold out a couple weeks the 960 will be out. It's rumored to be around $250-300. If your budget allows that's the one I'd look at.

I'd still suggest 4GB ram as games are already recommending that and more and more will as they are ported from the consoles. Shadows of mordor calls for 6gb for ultra textures.

I've yet to try and run any of these games on less than 4gb so I'm not sure if they run fine or not. I just know that with consoles having 8GB of shared ram, seems like it ( 4GB) will become the new standard.

I would hate to end up with a card that's fast enough to run everything maxed but not be able to because your stuck with 2GB VRAM.

8 GB of "shared" RAM on consoles doesn't translate to the same amount of VRAM on a dedicated video card.

We're still a long time away from needing more than 2GB of VRAM just to run most games.

I'm not saying more RAM doesn't have it's uses, but 2GB is fine for what people like Arhu are looking to do. High-end enthusiasts are a different story.

JDR13 said:

8 GB of "shared" RAM on consoles doesn't translate to the same amount of VRAM on a dedicated video card.

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Of course, that's why I said 4GB of vram. Obviously they can't use all 8GB of ram for vram and I didn't say they would.

JDR13 said:

We're still a long time away from needing more than 2GB of VRAM just to run most games.

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We'll just have to disagree on that. I don't know what Arhu does on his computer but it doesn't sound like he's one to upgrade very often ( pure speculation) so a 2 GB card today could definitely be a liability in a year or 2. Also 4 GB cards much more in most cases.

All I'm saying is a 4GB 96o will have a much longer lifespan than a 2GB 960. I guess we will see.

sakichop said:

We'll just have to disagree on that. I don't know what Arhu does on his computer but it doesn't sound like he's one to upgrade very often ( pure speculation) so a 2 GB card today could definitely be a liability in a year or 2. Also 4 GB cards much more in most cases.

All I'm saying is a 4GB 96o will have a much longer lifespan than a 2GB 960. I guess we will see.

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2GB certainly won't be a liability in only a year. It sounds like you're talking about running games on their highest settings. I'm talking about just running them. For a non-enthusiast, a fast 2GB card will easily last a few years. The key word there is "fast".

JDR13 said:

2GB certainly won't be a liability in only a year. It sounds like you're talking about running games on their highest settings. I'm talking about just running them. For a non-enthusiast, a fast 2GB card will easily last a few years. The key word there is "fast".

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Your right there I don't ever think of running games at any other settings than max. So yes when I talk about it, running on lower settings didn't even cross my mind.

However I still wouldn't buy a 2gb card now. The cheapest 4gb 760 on newegg is $199 after $30 rebate. The cheapest 2g 760 is $189.

Seems silly not to go 4GB.

sakichop said:

However I still wouldn't buy a 2gb card now. The cheapest 4gb 760 on newegg is $199 after $30 rebate. The cheapest 2g 760 is $189.

Seems silly not to go 4GB.

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Sure, but value is beside the point.

I agree though. Obviously it makes sense to get the 4GB card if the price difference is really that small and everything else on the card is the same.

Yeah the value is just one more reason.

I still stand behind my initial point. I just think developers are going to want to push the abilities on the next gen consoles and won't be bothered too much with optimizing it for pc so specs will continue to rise.

We can revisit this in a couple years and 1 of us can say I told you so.

Oh, the suspense is killing me.:lol: