1080 vs 1070 / SLI vs Single / Any AMD cards worth considering?

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Melee

Gawd
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Jun 10, 2013
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I am finishing up the shopping for my new build and can't decide on the graphics card(s). I currently have an ITX case and motherboard which only allows one GPU but I can easily swap them out if SLI is necessary. I do not really have a set budget but I certainly don't want to waste money.

I game a lot so the graphics card is an extremely important component for me. I mostly play WoW & other Blizzard games, League of Legends, and Xbox One but I also play through single player campaigns on new games that release. I will be running either a 1440P 144Hz monitor or 4K 60Hz monitor with 1-2 extra, smaller IPS screens for productivity. I need to make sure the FPS will stay high enough for either option.


- Is the 1070 enough or will even a 1080 not be strong enough to achieve the needed FPS alone?

- Is SLI of either card worth it, especially for the games I play most which would be WoW and League of Legends? I know SLI works well in some games but in others it either makes no difference or actually hurts performance.

- Which between the 1080 and 1070 will hold its resale value better? Whenever I have bought flagship cards in the past, I seemed to get burned hard on resale. I am assuming that if a 1080Ti or 1090 releases, then I will most likely purchase one to replace whatever I have unless it is unnecessary. I usually sell my computer and rebuild every 6 months or so which is why I am asking.

- Are there any AMD cards worth considering? G-Sync is rare but Freesync I see a lot more so I figured it was worth asking. I don't think anything from AMD is in the same league as the 1070 or 1080 so I'm doubting it.

- Whichever card(s) you recommend, what brand and model is best in terms of performance, overclocking, cooling, etc.?


Thanks for the help!
 
SLI'ing 1070... maybe worth it depending on what's important or less important. I would not SLI 1080's instead of a single Txp not only due to the costs but the downsides of mgpu. In the context of your desired panel, neither 1070 nor 1080 will get you high framerate at 1440p@144hz in AAA games. The single card that can get you into triple digit fps in the biggest slice of games at that res and refresh is obviously a Titan. Balancing what you want vs cost is gonna be tough imo. But judging from your short list of games, SLI would be wasted.

The Fury X is probably closest to a 1070 in even games, loses heavily in Nv centric, and closes the gap or passes the 1070 in dx12 games. You'd have to "make" the case to go Fury X.
 
I'd say go for the 1080 or Titan X if you want to get the most out of your 1440 or 4k display. While WoW does support SLi it's pretty much wasted. The game is old and isn't exactly known for it's demanding graphics. I don't think LoL supports SLi and Crossfire at all but again, it doesn't really need the power anyway. If those are your most played games then SLi would be a waste of money.

Like Thesmokingman said it would be a hard sell to push a Radeon right now. If you can find the Fury X for something under $350 it might be worth it.
 
If you're serious about 4K you might want a Titan X, but the price is pretty prohibitive. I wouldn't plan for multiple cards right now because so many games don't support them, at least not for months after launch. It looks like we're currently transitioning from SLI/Crossfire to DX12's explicit multi-adapter support and it's creating issues. If you go for 1440p a single 1070 would probably do it in most games. But it all you're playing is WoW, LoL and Starcraft you could buy any of these cards.

thesmokingman said:
The Fury X is probably closest to a 1070 in even games, loses heavily in Nv centric, and closes the gap or passes the 1070 in dx12 games. You'd have to "make" the case to go Fury X.
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I wouldn't recommend the Fury X because it only have 4GB of RAM, we're already got games using 4GB or RAM, I don't think it will be long before it's not enough.
 
I figured as much about the AMD cards. The Fury X is also only 4GB which seems like a bad choice for high resolution gaming. I wouldn't mind but I just don't see anything AMD that matches up with the new Pascal cards.

I don't think I could justify buying a Titan X. The 1080 stays within at least 5-15% of it at all times from what I have seen and I could buy two 1080s for the same price or cheaper than the Titan X which would crush it single vs SLI. I believe even 1070 SLI at around $800 would outperform a single Titan X. For the games I play most, a single 1070 or 1080 should easily be able to handle it unless they are far more demanding at 1440P 100+ FPS or 4K 60 FPS than I am estimating.
 
Melee said:
I figured as much about the AMD cards. The Fury X is also only 4GB which seems like a bad choice for high resolution gaming. I wouldn't mind but I just don't see anything AMD that matches up with the new Pascal cards.

I don't think I could justify buying a Titan X. The 1080 stays within at least 5-15% of it at all times from what I have seen and I could buy two 1080s for the same price or cheaper than the Titan X which would crush it single vs SLI. I believe even 1070 SLI at around $800 would outperform a single Titan X. For the games I play most, a single 1070 or 1080 should easily be able to handle it unless they are far more demanding at 1440P 100+ FPS or 4K 60 FPS than I am estimating.
Click to expand...

No way a 1080 stays within 15% lol, the gap is more like 40% on average.
 
thesmokingman said:
No way a 1080 stays within 15% lol, the gap is more like 40% on average.
Click to expand...

Nope.

NVIDIA Titan X Vs. GTX 1080 Overclocked Benchmarks

In most games they are quite close with an exception or two. It is certainly nowhere near 40% or worth $700+ more. As I said, you can get two 1080s for the price if one Titan X which will absolutely dominate the Titan.

That is beside the point though. I don't think I have a need for that much GPU power. I am thinking that a single 1080 or maybe 1070 would be plenty for my needs. I am not certain though and need to know whether I will need a multi-gpu setup before I keep this ITX case and motherboard.

Anyone have any benchmarks of WoW Legion or LoL using Pascal cards?
 
You post chart list from wfftech? You want to be taken seriously? You're free to think/believe what you want. Btw, did you run the math on some of wfftechs numbers?
 
Melee said:
I figured as much about the AMD cards. The Fury X is also only 4GB which seems like a bad choice for high resolution gaming. I wouldn't mind but I just don't see anything AMD that matches up with the new Pascal cards.

I don't think I could justify buying a Titan X. The 1080 stays within at least 5-15% of it at all times from what I have seen and I could buy two 1080s for the same price or cheaper than the Titan X which would crush it single vs SLI. I believe even 1070 SLI at around $800 would outperform a single Titan X. For the games I play most, a single 1070 or 1080 should easily be able to handle it unless they are far more demanding at 1440P 100+ FPS or 4K 60 FPS than I am estimating.
Click to expand...

Doesn't sound right. I've had both, OC to OC (2GHz on both cards) the Titan X is consistently around 35-40% faster in every game I've played so far.
 
What is "high enough"? To me 30 fps is high enough. But some claim that 100fps is not enough for them.
 
TBTH, with the games you listed, buy any card that costs more than $250. I'm avid gamer/developer. I have an r9 390, and it slays LoL and Blizzard games.

I have 2 of these:
BenQ BL3201PH 32" Widescreen LED Backlit LCD IPS BL3201PH

I play overwatch on 4k set to Ultra. I haven't measured the fps, and I don't care, since I never have framerate issues. I don't use VSYNC, i've never liked it personally.

I play Heroes of the Storm on 4k set to Extreme, no VSYNC or antialiasing (AA).

I play Starcraft 2 on Extreme, no VSYNC but I do use AA. However, I lowered the resolution to 1440 since I could see lag during the fighting cutscenes. fps would probably dip to the 15-20 range during fights. The game plays fine on 4k w/ Extreme settings though.

For your gaming needs, I'd recommend a 980 or 1070 or AMD 480. You'll be able to max out your graphics, so you'll get literally nothing for $300 more on a 1080. I don't play AAA games, and I'm okay with tweaking my graphics down a bit. I play some Indie games, which when you can't max out graphics it's usually a bug on their end, not the fault of the card.

I'm probably going to hop over to a 980 Ti because Gentoo supports nvidian better than AMD. Ubuntu does fine with AMD but I'm not a fan of Ubuntu. But last time I owned a 980 Ti it would randomly bluescreen during Starcraft 2, so I'm a bit wary of nvidia... i'm kind of in a pickle.
 
Melee said:
I am finishing up the shopping for my new build and can't decide on the graphics card(s). I currently have an ITX case and motherboard which only allows one GPU but I can easily swap them out if SLI is necessary. I do not really have a set budget but I certainly don't want to waste money.

I game a lot so the graphics card is an extremely important component for me. I mostly play WoW & other Blizzard games, League of Legends, and Xbox One but I also play through single player campaigns on new games that release. I will be running either a 1440P 144Hz monitor or 4K 60Hz monitor with 1-2 extra, smaller IPS screens for productivity. I need to make sure the FPS will stay high enough for either option.


- Is the 1070 enough or will even a 1080 not be strong enough to achieve the needed FPS alone?

- Is SLI of either card worth it, especially for the games I play most which would be WoW and League of Legends? I know SLI works well in some games but in others it either makes no difference or actually hurts performance.

- Which between the 1080 and 1070 will hold its resale value better? Whenever I have bought flagship cards in the past, I seemed to get burned hard on resale. I am assuming that if a 1080Ti or 1090 releases, then I will most likely purchase one to replace whatever I have unless it is unnecessary. I usually sell my computer and rebuild every 6 months or so which is why I am asking.

- Are there any AMD cards worth considering? G-Sync is rare but Freesync I see a lot more so I figured it was worth asking. I don't think anything from AMD is in the same league as the 1070 or 1080 so I'm doubting it.

- Whichever card(s) you recommend, what brand and model is best in terms of performance, overclocking, cooling, etc.?


Thanks for the help!
Click to expand...
I've been playing WoW Legion maxed out at 4k with my 970 and have been getting 40-50FPS consistently. Entirely playable. Out of the games you listed this is probably the most intensive one, so you will be fine with a single 1070 or 1080. I would not recommend 1070 SLI. If you're prepared to drop that kind of money, I would just go for a single 1080 and you won't have to worry about SLI scaling and getting bang for your buck.
 
Melee said:
Nope.

NVIDIA Titan X Vs. GTX 1080 Overclocked Benchmarks

In most games they are quite close with an exception or two. It is certainly nowhere near 40% or worth $700+ more. As I said, you can get two 1080s for the price if one Titan X which will absolutely dominate the Titan.

That is beside the point though. I don't think I have a need for that much GPU power. I am thinking that a single 1080 or maybe 1070 would be plenty for my needs. I am not certain though and need to know whether I will need a multi-gpu setup before I keep this ITX case and motherboard.

Anyone have any benchmarks of WoW Legion or LoL using Pascal cards?
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Really have to compare OC vs OC. Titan XP gets a hearty lead once OC'd. This might be where the discrepancies in this thread are coming from.
 
Dayaks said:
Really have to compare OC vs OC. Titan XP gets a hearty lead once OC'd. This might be where the discrepancies in this thread are coming from.
Click to expand...

Its wccftech. They consider gossip a source. For ex. one time Kyle made a passing comment, unverifiable, that was passed to him and within hours it made front page at wccftech a a bonafide source, fucking hilarious.

AMD Radeon RX 480 Video Card Review @ [H]

Clearly, it is not that easy to get any rx480 to 1600mhz, let alone 1480mhz. And what's even worse is that they couldn't even spell his name right lol.
 
By "high enough" on the fps, I mean at least 100+ consistently if going 1440P 144Hz (preferably 144+) or 60+ consistently if going 4K. I am also still on the fence about the Ultrawide 3440x1440 monitors.

I think I am going to go with a single 1080 for now. That should handle my needs well at any of those three resolutions. I'd rather have a little too much GPU power than not enough and that allows flexibility for whatever I decide to do.

Which 1080 brand and model would you guys recommend? I am going to order from Amazon since I get a discount through work and want the easy return policy. There is a $150 or so price range between different 1080s. The Founders Edition or Reference models start around $600. The MSI Armor and Asus Strix are $649 and $669. Everything else is a lot more expensive. Which card(s) offer the best performance, overclocking, cooling, and resale value? Thanks!
 
Just think a single 1080 or Titan xp. Don't bother with 2 cards in sli unless you wana blow more money and grab a larger case for cooling!

Yeah 2 founders edition cards with blower style fans are best for sli but then the loud fans will drive you to water cooling.

So it's simple question. Single card.

Want to say Titan but the loud blower fan on that might drive ya nuts..

Cooling on the card is most important. Most cards will be runing 70-82c. The card will down clock big time at 80c.

I hope your case has good air flow to the graphic card area.

I've had a pair of zotac 1080 amp edition cards. Single good cooling but once I added the 2nd with 1 slot spacing in between they were cooking eachother.

Exchanged for 2 pny 1080 fe cards with the idea to water cool them. Ran good and cooled good but with 85-100% fans. Pny don't want you water cooling so I exchanged them for evga.

2x evga 1080 fe cards with plans on water cooling. Overclocked great but the small single 8 pin power connector limits the power to 185watts. The card clocks with dance up and down basic lyrics constantly. If it's not from heat it's from power! So no thanks.. like that on all fe cards.

Then bought 2 evga ftw 1080 hybrids. Those I thought were perfect. Hybrid cooling for only $30 more over a fe card! No spending $125 for ea water block and another $34 for the bridge and another $34 for back plate.

In the end.. there should be a recall on the registration and hybrid evga 1080 ftw cards.

Evga states a small amount of cards have a hardware issue that's been found that will make the cards fan go 100% and the screen go black!

Happends on one of the 2 I have.. had it happen atleast 4 times.

Bought them from evga so I either send the one back free cross ship or return both cards. Members have said the new card they got back is clocked lower.. yuck.

So now I don't know what direction to go!

Single titan??? Evga classified with home made water cooling or order a block for it down the road?

I've been going threw this upgrade phase for prob over 2 months now. The wife is sick of it and I'm about done myself.
 
eclypse said:
I've been going threw this upgrade phase for prob over 2 months now. The wife is sick of it and I'm about done myself.
Click to expand...

You would have come out so far ahead if you had just gotten a single TXP right from the start man.
 
Best manufacturer to deal with if a prob comes up would be evga. I don't think there's a question about that. The worst would be asus.

Asked me 2 weeks ago I'd say evga ftw 1080. Maybe still if you can get the newest revision fixed card that has been going out since Aug 31st.

Though even if you do have a problem with it evga will cross ship it for free if it is one of the black screen 100% fan issue cards.

If you could order a evga 1080 classified I'd say do that but I don't think there up on amazon.

If you can order a card from amazon directly then it's a good price but theres a lot of 3rd party sellers on there with high prices on 1080s.

I'm prob going with a titan xp next..

I think it would work fine with 1440 res. A single 1080 does so that extra hours power will prob make me happy enough.
 
thesmokingman said:
You would have come out so far ahead if you had just gotten a single TXP right from the start man.
Click to expand...

Umm.. no doubt I bet. Haha but I'd just be wanting 2 of them ando no chance.

If i wasn't giving my son my current rig and got him a new monitor and needing to buy me 2 ssd drives since I had to give him mine and also upgrading the rest of the rig as well.. I could of easily went with Titan xp sli.
 
So grab a card that has a great cooler and atleast dual 8 pin power connections so in the end you'll have stable clocks that wont bounce around.

Now I've seen people put a evga 1080 hybrid cooler on a titan with little modification.

Same can be done to a fe 1080.. evga makes a hybrid cooler for the fe cards.. there all the same. That will help quiet the cards big time but then you'll still see the clocks moving a lot do to the power and voltage limiter. That's why you want cards with dual 8 pin connections.
 
Melee said:
I am finishing up the shopping for my new build and can't decide on the graphics card(s). I currently have an ITX case and motherboard which only allows one GPU but I can easily swap them out if SLI is necessary. I do not really have a set budget but I certainly don't want to waste money.

I game a lot so the graphics card is an extremely important component for me. I mostly play WoW & other Blizzard games, League of Legends, and Xbox One but I also play through single player campaigns on new games that release. I will be running either a 1440P 144Hz monitor or 4K 60Hz monitor with 1-2 extra, smaller IPS screens for productivity. I need to make sure the FPS will stay high enough for either option.


- Is the 1070 enough or will even a 1080 not be strong enough to achieve the needed FPS alone?

- Is SLI of either card worth it, especially for the games I play most which would be WoW and League of Legends? I know SLI works well in some games but in others it either makes no difference or actually hurts performance.

- Which between the 1080 and 1070 will hold its resale value better? Whenever I have bought flagship cards in the past, I seemed to get burned hard on resale. I am assuming that if a 1080Ti or 1090 releases, then I will most likely purchase one to replace whatever I have unless it is unnecessary. I usually sell my computer and rebuild every 6 months or so which is why I am asking.

- Are there any AMD cards worth considering? G-Sync is rare but Freesync I see a lot more so I figured it was worth asking. I don't think anything from AMD is in the same league as the 1070 or 1080 so I'm doubting it.

- Whichever card(s) you recommend, what brand and model is best in terms of performance, overclocking, cooling, etc.?


Thanks for the help!
Click to expand...

4K screen? Get the best single card that you can afford. Can never have too much power. Ever.

Later on if you feel the need to upgrade add a second for SLi.
 
So I should definitely get an aftermarket 1080 then? If so, which one(s) would be best? As I said, the Asus Strix and MSI Armor are $50-$70+ cheaper than the rest but I will pay the extra if it is worth it. I have always had excellent experience with both Asus and MSI but I do not know how good those particular two models are. I don't believe Amazon has EVGA or Gigabyte aftermarket 1080s.
 
For pascal, the cheaper, the better is the rule I'd use.

Unlike Maxwell, Pascal gains comparatively little with higher clock rates, so I'd just go with whatever is cheapest.
 
FWIW I'm playing WoW Legion on the 1070 in my sig. I haven't been looking at framerates because I never see it dip low enough to care. I'm currently running it on a 1080p monitor with plans to upgrade to a 1440p (thus having purchased the 1070 over the 1060 or the RX 480 which were being considered). If you plan on maxing out all details at 4K I doubt the 1070 would be powerful enough.

EDIT: So I got curious as to what my frame rates are (CTRL-R will open up WoW's built-in one); I finally just moved all settings to max and I'm running around the world with frames going between 55 to about 100 (view distance is set to max, which is why it's swinging so wildly). I think 1440p will pull the rate down by a bit.
 
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Personally I'd only buy from amazon. Not threw some other 3rd party off amazon.

So with that said I see amazon sells the msi gaming and the asus rog strix.

You'll have to read threw those reviews to see which one is for you.

I'd say which ever one cools the best but most likely you'll have to up the fan curve on either one to get the best balance of cooling.

There's also the zotac extreme edition though the cooler is so large it just about takes up 3 slots! Hehe. Zotac only has a 2 or 3 year warranty.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B01G...zotac+1080&dpPl=1&dpID=51kCS0qMoiL&ref=plSrch. If you have the room for that I'd go with it.

Every card clocks and overclocks differently so it's a crap shoot there. Between 2000-2100 is golden though.
 
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Oh and be careful reading reviews on amazon. It's hard to know what product the person is leaving a review on as amazon like to mix the reviews up for different models from the same manufacturer. I can't stand that..it's nice when they list what the review is for but most times they dont.
 
What exactly is that Gigabyte Premium Pack? That looks interesting. I have an ITX case atm so the Zotac wouldn't fit and I don't see a reason to pay an extra $100 for it anyways. The ASUS Strix has excellent reviews everywhere and is actually the second cheapest non-reference card. Should I go with it, the Gigabyte, or one of the MSI models?
 
That is a smart way to narrow it down. Thank you. Is there any reason to pay $50 or $80 more for the MSI Gaming X or Gigabyte G1? Or should I just snag the Asus Strix and call it a day?
 
They're all about the same caliber. Also, most of teh blocks on that list are used for the 1070 as well, which is a big plus. Btw, check the strix out, listen to it. Fwiw its freaking loud. Careful of some of these reviews, as they are all gushing and colorful and crap.

 
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Melee said:
That is a smart way to narrow it down. Thank you. Is there any reason to pay $50 or $80 more for the MSI Gaming X or Gigabyte G1? Or should I just snag the Asus Strix and call it a day?
Click to expand...

You'll have to weigh it all out and choose what will fit your rig.. read reviews on amazon and newegg.com and youtube and other review sites.
 
never get SLI unless it s SLI of the 2 best cards or you only play a game that is very very very well SLI optimized like COD/BF. most games SLI is a joke and it is a waste of money.
 
They now have the EVGA ACX 3.0 for $649, the EVGA FTW GAMING for $679, and apparently the Asus Strix is out of stock. Is either of the EVGA models clearly better than the rest? I know a lot of people love EVGA but I don't believe I have ever owned an EVGA card.
 
I'd go for the ACX at $649 then just OC it myself. Most 1080's I've seen boost to 2050-2150, even my FE cards stabilize at 2076 boost. Might as well save yourself $30.

As far as EVGA goes I've never had any issues. The one card of theirs I did have to RMA it was a quick and painless process. I haven't used any of their GPU's in the 10x0 line but I would assume they are of the same quality as the other recent products of theirs.
 
What is the difference between the FTW GAMING and SC GAMING versions? They appear to have the same cooler. Newegg lists the SC as only having a single 8 pin while the FTW has two. I've read to steer clear of the single connector cards. Is that the only difference? I don't mind paying extra if it is a worthwhile upgrade but most of the highly revered versions of the 1080 are within the $650-$700 range so I am lost and have no idea what to do. lol They are have excellent reviews and all would look great in my build....not to mention apparently all 1080s perform identically well so I guess it mostly comes down to cooling, noise, and customer service.
 
Melee said:
What is the difference between the FTW GAMING and SC GAMING versions? They appear to have the same cooler. Newegg lists the SC as only having a single 8 pin while the FTW has two. I've read to steer clear of the single connector cards. Is that the only difference? I don't mind paying extra if it is a worthwhile upgrade but most of the highly revered versions of the 1080 are within the $650-$700 range so I am lost and have no idea what to do. lol They are have excellent reviews and all would look great in my build....not to mention apparently all 1080s perform identically well so I guess it mostly comes down to cooling, noise, and customer service.
Click to expand...

They have a comparison table if you scroll down into the description on the evga site.

EVGA GeForce GTX 1080 GAMING
 
Well, the FTW has an extra 8 pin connector, 6 extra power phases, and more available wattage. That means it should be undoubtedly better for overclocking so I will pay an extra $30 for that over the SC. Thank you for the link.

The question now would be is the EVGA FTW better than the ASUS Strix, MSI Gaming X & Armor, and Gigabyte Premium Pack?
 
What about R9 295x2? It gets hot but never over 65 degrees.
I am not sure about Crossfire support for LoL or WoW though.
 
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