6950 or 560 ti 448?

T

TheSmJ

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My brother has about ~$250 he wants to spend on a gaming video card. I've been looking at benchmarks of the 6950 and 560 ti 448 and they seem to be very closley matched.

Simple question: Which card is best? He plays a lot of Skyrim and various FPSes. Right now he's using my old 8800 GTS 512 so either of these cards would be a large improvment over what he has. The monitor is 1680x1050 so I think 1 GB VRAM should be enough for his needs.

What say you [H]?
 
Even know i like the 448 core more and it is faster then a 6950 id go 6950 for the extra vram alone,Make sure he snags the 2 gb model
 
Pretty sure you can't get a 560 ti 448 for $250, unless the price has come down a ton in the last week or so. I think the last time I looked at newegg the lowest price 448 was like $289 or $299. For that price you're not far off a 6970, which is what I just got a few weeks ago and the 6970 will blow both cards out of the water and no, the 448 isn't faster, they are about as equal as they can get according to this I'd go with the 6950 if I had to chose, you can get it with 2gb of ram for like $269. You can also flash the 6950s to 6970s if you get a reference card with a bios switch.
 
Pitbully said:
Pretty sure you can't get a 560 ti 448 for $250, unless the price has come down a ton in the last week or so. I think the last time I looked at newegg the lowest price 448 was like $289 or $299. For that price you're not far off a 6970, which is what I just got a few weeks ago and the 6970 will blow both cards out of the water and no, the 448 isn't faster, they are about as equal as they can get according to this I'd go with the 6950 if I had to chose, you can get it with 2gb of ram for like $269. You can also flash the 6950s to 6970s if you get a reference card with a bios switch.
Click to expand...

I agree on the pricing, but the GTX 560 Ti 448 core trades blows with the 6970, and handily beats the HD 6950. It is basically the same as the GTX 570. I would get it over the 6950 in a heartbeat if the price was the same (although I doubt that's the case). At 1680x1050, though, the 6950 is plenty of card

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Zotac/GeForce_GTX_560_Ti_448_Cores/27.html
 
there have been several sales lately on the 448 between $230 and $260 for various models. Just sayin ;)
 
Pitbully said:
Pretty sure you can't get a 560 ti 448 for $250, unless the price has come down a ton in the last week or so. I think the last time I looked at newegg the lowest price 448 was like $289 or $299. For that price you're not far off a 6970, which is what I just got a few weeks ago and the 6970 will blow both cards out of the water and no, the 448 isn't faster, they are about as equal as they can get according to this I'd go with the 6950 if I had to chose, you can get it with 2gb of ram for like $269. You can also flash the 6950s to 6970s if you get a reference card with a bios switch.
Click to expand...

No a 6970 does not beat a 560 ti 448 core they trade blows and in more games then not the 448 core beats the 6970
 
Erik in sac said:
there have been several sales lately on the 448 between $230 and $260 for various models. Just sayin ;)
Click to expand...

Yup, this. I was very close to pulling the trigger on a msi 448 for $250 after rebate. Decided to just wait for a radeon 7870 or kepler if around $350 or less. I should have just bought a radeon 6950 2gb when they were going for $200-$220. Now prices are up on the 6950, makes me just want to wait for other options.
 
as everyone else said - depends what you are going to play with it and if you plan to CF or SLI. Last week I saw 560 ti 448 cores go for 180 (if I recall that right), but that was a refurb - on the positive side additional warranty was available for 15$ for another year

if you/your brother wants 6950 - older ones can be unlocked to 6970, but not all of them. And just 3 companies do their warranty through serial number - Asus, MSI and Gigabyte (might be wrong on last one)
 
for that kind of money you should be able to find SOMETHING.

Personally I say go 6950.

I'm running a 6970+6950 in Xfire and love it. I picked up the unlocked 6950>6970 for 190 shipped here on the hardforum. Helluva deal for the performance.

If he has time and is patient and or vigilant, then keep looking for deals here. There are still quite a few people unloading their 69XX series cards here to upgrade to the 7XXX series.

Others are right -- get the 2GB RAM version -- no sense in paying money for an upgrade and then about a year or so later when 2GB is the new minimum for all games you will be pretty stuck.
 
If you buy a card with less than 2gb these days. Well, that is just dumb.
 
I have to agree with most of the replies. The GTX560Ti w/2GB is one 'sweet' card. I don't even own the 448 model....which is faster. I have just the plain Palit 2GB 'vanilla' versions in SLI and they absolutely 'chew-up' everything I throw at them. I love the smoothness. No crashes. No microstutter. No excess heat or noise. They just run right. Here's a small video to show how smooth they run. This is run at 2304x1440 16x AF 32x CSAA on a 24" monitor.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jhqbH_TOXM&feature=youtu.be
 
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Erik in sac said:
there have been several sales lately on the 448 between $230 and $260 for various models. Just sayin ;)
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Yea, got a galaxy version for $215 AR w/arkham city code. Some definite deals to be had.
 
Saabjock said:
I have to agree with most of the replies. The GTX560Ti w/2GB is one 'sweet' card. I don't even own the 448 model....which is faster. I have just the plain Palit 2GB 'vanilla' versions in SLI and they absolutely 'chew-up' everything I throw at them. I love the smoothness. No crashes. No microstutter. No excess heat or noise. They just run right. Here's a small video to show how smooth they run. This is run at 2304x1440 16x AF 32x CSAA on a 24" monitor.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jhqbH_TOXM&feature=youtu.be
Click to expand...
Holy crap...about all this video did for me was make me want to return to one of my long forgotten and favorite video game genres ever...Rfactor2 huh? *starts googling*
 
If he is only playing at 1680x1050.. hell you can get away with just a GTX 560(non TI) then when he upgrades the monitor(if he ever does) slap another GTX 560 in there!

Though the GTX 560 Ti 448 is a good card as well, i personally like nvidia cards but the AMD cards such as the 6950 are good as well depending on the games he plays its a toss up but Nvidia should be better route simply because of PhysX
 
shaks said:
as everyone else said - depends what you are going to play with it and if you plan to CF or SLI. Last week I saw 560 ti 448 cores go for 180 (if I recall that right), but that was a refurb - on the positive side additional warranty was available for 15$ for another year

if you/your brother wants 6950 - older ones can be unlocked to 6970, but not all of them. And just 3 companies do their warranty through serial number - Asus, MSI and Gigabyte (might be wrong on last one)
Click to expand...

PowerColor also does warranty by serial number, IIRC. I have 2 PowerColor 6950's that are unlocked to 6970's (they are weird the really old ones and the really new ones seem to unlock, but not the middle aged ones).

If you ever dream of doing 2 cards, you want 2GB vram per card.
 
If you can get a hot deal on a GTX 560 ti 448 go for it. It's a great card. I scored a hot deal on a MSI TFIII PE GTX560ti 448 a few weeks ago. The card is a monster over clocker.

It really comes down to what games you are playing. Some games favor AMD or NVIDIA so investigate what games you like to play to get the best card. Clock for clock I think the GTX560ti 488 is the better performer but the 2GB of the HD6950 may benefit certain games/applications.

I got killer deal on my MSI TF3 448 at $239.99.

The 2GB GTX560ti has some good deals on it right now. If you want a good 2GB card it looks great as well.
 
shaks said:
as everyone else said - depends what you are going to play with it and if you plan to CF or SLI. Last week I saw 560 ti 448 cores go for 180 (if I recall that right), but that was a refurb - on the positive side additional warranty was available for 15$ for another year
Click to expand...

Just out of curiousity, if I bought a Refurb EVGA model from the 'Egg, would it be eligible for the Step Up program if I bought the extended warranty?


Ian
 
I tried to get the EVGA 560 Ti 448 card for $249 for him using the $20 MIR and the $20 off [H]ard code "HARDOCPX215D" but the code expired... oh well.

I guess I'll keep an eye on the forums + slickdeals. My bro isn't hard set on spending no more than $250 but for his sake I'd like to keep the cost at or below that.
 
TheSmJ said:
I tried to get the EVGA 560 Ti 448 card for $249 for him using the $20 MIR and the $20 off [H]ard code "HARDOCPX215D" but the code expired... oh well.

I guess I'll keep an eye on the forums + slickdeals. My bro isn't hard set on spending no more than $250 but for his sake I'd like to keep the cost at or below that.
Click to expand...

CAll up Newegg tommorrow and tell them that you were thinking about ordering it but hesitated and then the coupon expired and would like to still get the $20 of with the coupon if possible.

Newegg is great at doing business. They might honor the coupon and give you a great deal.

That is a nice card, especially at that price.
 
Looks like recent hot deals on the GTX 560 ti 448 has caused increased popularity of the card and the prices have gone up quite a bit.


GTX500 series cards stock must be getting low and the retailers are milking stock for max cash till the 600 series come out and then possibly more deals.

GTX 560ti 448 is supposed to be a limited number produced card so it may soon be out of stock as well.
 
'salright. Found a unlocked 6950 in the FS/T forum at a great price. My bro will be very pleased.
 
Yep.. the HD6950 2Gb is not as limited of a card as the 560Ti when you want to go with eyefinity ..

this is my ref HD6950

HD69502Gb.gif
 
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