Best high performance card setup for 2-3 month stopgap?

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Neon01

[H]ard|Gawd
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Jan 22, 2008
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I know this seems strange, but I've been trying to get on the 7970 bandwagon, and I keep hit and missing. I'm holding out for a Asus DC2 7970 (or possibly two, eventually), but it really looks like decent supply for these is going to be another month or so, and even the vanilla 7970s are rather hard to find. Frankly, I just hate playing the "who will notice that we happened to get 3 cards in stock today and can actually buy one before they're OOS" game...

I sold two 6950s a couple weeks ago thinking I could actually buy a 7970 that fits my needs, but at the time I didn't realize that they took one of the outputs away when going from the 6000 to the 7000 series cards. I need 5 outputs for a 4 monitor/1 HDTV setup (mutually exclusive). The idea was to divest myself of a (what I assumed to be a) rapidly depreciating "asset", but now it seems my choice was hasty.

I was planning to use my old Nvidia 8800GT, but I honestly don't know if I could stand that for long, especially with so many good games out now. So I'm looking for suggestions on a card/cards to pick up to give me excellent performance so I can wait out the supply train for the non-reference 7970s - or possibly even kepler, if it shows up on time. Used or new, doesn't matter, and having all of the outputs for this solution isn't a must, but it'd be nice. Eyefinity (or equivalent) capability would be nice too. Primary interest here is maximum cost recoop 2-3 months down the road.

Any thoughts? I'm inclined to look into an Nvidia dual card setup, but I don't think they offer good multi monitor support. Do they? Looks like all their cards just have 3 outputs.
 
Hold out until you can find the 7970 that you've been wanting, else you'll only have buyer's remorse.
 
Melon said:
Hold out until you can find the 7970 that you've been wanting, else you'll only have buyer's remorse.
Click to expand...

That's really what I intend to do. This is just a couple month solution while I give the 7970s time to build stock. It's also why I'm asking for suggestions for setups (used are fine) that won't depreciate that much over the next couple months. After all, I assume that whatever hit the 7970s caused is pretty much already come and gone.
 
For 2-3 months it doesn't seem like a good investment, especially in the "high end". Probably the best cheap high end right now would be a 6970, as people seem to be dumping them to upgrade.

Nvidia cards will give you 2 monitors per card, so 2 will give you a maximum of 4.
 
Happy with my MSI GTX 560 ti 448 Twin Frozr PE/OC that I got from Amazon for $239.99 out the door to my house after MIR and a $10 Amazon coupon I was awarded.
 
DeathPrincess said:
For 2-3 months it doesn't seem like a good investment, especially in the "high end". Probably the best cheap high end right now would be a 6970, as people seem to be dumping them to upgrade.

Nvidia cards will give you 2 monitors per card, so 2 will give you a maximum of 4.
Click to expand...

Ahhh, so that's how it works. Huh. I haven't used an Nvidia card since the GTX295, and I hated that card because it had all kinds of problems - mostly bad gaming support for it's dual GPU.

With the ATI cards, only the "master" card in a two card arrangement actually outputs video, so I wasn't sure.
 
I unloaded my 2 6950s thinking that I would pick up a 7970. That hasn't happened yet. I've been surviving on a GTX 460 1GB for the past week or two and it has been managable. I could be evil and pull the other one out of my wife's computer, but I don't think it would be worth the hassle.

So... I'm stuck with the GTX 460 until non-reference 7970s come back in stock or Keplar is released. By the time 7970s are in stock, it may be worth the wait to see what Nvidia will do. So many rumors out there about that chipset.

So... at the least a GTX460 1GB if you have the cash. I have been playing APB:Reloaded, Rift, SWTOR and a few other games. None of the heavy hitters. I figure I can wait till later for those.
 
daines1 said:
I unloaded my 2 6950s thinking that I would pick up a 7970. That hasn't happened yet. I've been surviving on a GTX 460 1GB for the past week or two and it has been managable. I could be evil and pull the other one out of my wife's computer, but I don't think it would be worth the hassle.

So... I'm stuck with the GTX 460 until non-reference 7970s come back in stock or Keplar is released. By the time 7970s are in stock, it may be worth the wait to see what Nvidia will do. So many rumors out there about that chipset.

So... at the least a GTX460 1GB if you have the cash. I have been playing APB:Reloaded, Rift, SWTOR and a few other games. None of the heavy hitters. I figure I can wait till later for those.
Click to expand...

Misery loves company, right? ;) Thanks for the tip. Just curious, you say Rift isn't a heavy hitter, has that changed in the past year or so? I was heavily involved in the closed beta about a year ago, but for whatever reason never really picked up and ran with it, but I recall that at the time the game gave my 6950 CFX setup a pretty good workout (30-40 FPS with most settings sliders on the upper end, but certainly not maxed), on my 2560x1600 display, let alone my eyefinity setup. Has driver support for it gotten better?

Part of me is thinking I'll just snatch up a used 580 SLI setup and stick with that and sit this one out. Or, knowing how I buy and sell this stuff, at least until next year. :p The 580s seem relatively reasonable, and I've read that the Nvidia cards don't stutter like the ATI cards in SLI. Or at least, not as much. It also puts me at a final price of around $800-900, which is where I want to be. The 7970 is $600 each (for the DC2), so $1200 for two is more than I want to pay, but I'm looking for more performance than a single 7970 yields. The 7950 CFX is an option, but still at the upper end of my budget, and it's not a long term solution because I couldn't plug in 5 displays (for some stupid reason the DC2 7950 output is totally different than the DC2 7970 output - it doesn't get the 6 outputs).
 
I started playing Rift for the first time this past week. (Rift Lite) I need to check the settings, but at 1920x1080 I haven't noticed a slow down. I'll fire up Fraps tonight to check FPS. I'll let you know when I get home. Could be driver improvements and differences as well.

I've been tempted to pick http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102963 up. I almost got 2 of them yesterday. Price was just north of $900.

Good luck. It has been pretty frustrating. I did like my 6950s flashed to 6970 speeds. Eyefinity was nice when it worked. I have almost convinced myself to wait until Keplar. Almost. If http://www.hardocp.com/article/2012/02/08/gigabyte_radeon_hd_7970_oc_video_card_review is available, it will be hard not to pull the trigger.
 
Dude, a Sapphire and an HIS branded HD 7970 are available on newegg as-of this posting!
Go Get Some!. :D
 
Runt. said:
Dude, a Sapphire and an HIS branded HD 7970 are available on newegg as-of this posting!
Go Get Some!. :D
Click to expand...

The issue is the multi monitor support. They cut the number of ports back from 5 to 4 on the 7900 series reference cards. I need the Asus 7970 DC2 to give me the adequate number of ports.

Thanks for the heads up though!
 
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