How's this Sapphire 6950?

In the grand scheme of things, an HD6950 wouldn't be a significant upgrade from a GTX460 (basically a single small generation and small step up). Is there something that your GTX460 can't do?
 
IdiotInCharge said:
Is there something that your GTX460 can't do?
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It's struggling in World of Tanks, which is what I play just now almost exclusively. Performance actually improved with the 8.0 update, but I'd like to be able to enjoy the extra graphics.

Even if I put everything on standard settings, I can have 60-100 fps sometimes, but rotating the camera will drop below 30, causing stutter. IDK is that's caused by the 768 MB of RAM, or the CPU bottlenecking (I'm leaning towards VRAM). Oddly enough, the improved setting with some shadows and lighting is more consistent. I still get choppiness in sniper mode though, even with 50 fps. It's weird.
 
Before dropping cash on it, take a look at what task manager records for CPU usage and GPU-Z records for GPU usage while playing (or the logs afterward).

The GTX460 is still a pretty beefy card (up to par with the GTX675m in my laptop) and shouldn't have issues with something like WoT. What you're describing really doesn't sound like a GPU issue to me; more of a CPU issue.

One very basic rule of thumb when it comes to overall system performance in games is that the GPU will dictate your maximum framerates while the CPU will dictate your minimum framerates. An application would be: Fast CPU, slow GPU, smooth and steady low framerates (within reason); fast GPU, slow CPU, choppy framerates with high peaks.

Typically you'd like to balance the two out for whatever task you're working on, but if you're looking for smooth performance (and not just high benchmark numbers) having a little extra CPU for a task is almost always better.

That being said, go look behind the scenes when you get a chance. See if there isn't something else holding your setup back. Nothing sucks more than getting taken out because your frames dropped when you needed the performance the most!
 
Core 0 is running 90-100%, but the other 3 are maybe 20-30% tops. I was surprised to see that the max VRAM was 687, so I guess that's not the issue after all?
 
MrC4 said:
I am not sure this is an accurate statement. Here is a direct comparison between the 460 and the 6950 over various games and resolutions.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/293?vs=313
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They're definitely different, you're right- but put them both between a GT640 and a GTX690 and they start looking real close together. Point being, the HD6950 is faster, but not enough to warrant spending the money to upgrade. If the GPU is indeed too slow, the OP would be better off turning settings down and waiting until he could afford something faster.
 
Space_Coyote said:
Core 0 is running 90-100%, but the other 3 are maybe 20-30% tops. I was surprised to see that the max VRAM was 687, so I guess that's not the issue after all?
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That's decent multi-threading for a game that doesn't have some kind of crazy physics or other intensive parallel task; but if the main thread is topping off the first core, you might just be running out of CPU.

I have one of those Q9550s, and I long gave up trying to get more than 3.4GHz out of it, but really, that's worth a shot- trying to get a few hundred MHz out of the CPU. You definitely have a better board than I do :).
 
I just wanted to update that I discovered why my 460 wasn't performing up to its capability. I just put in the new Seasonic X650 that I bought in preparation for upgrading my GPU, and the performance on the existing card is tons better.

Even though it was a good PSU at the time, I guess the old Hiper was starving it of power. It only had 1 true 6-pin plug after all, and the other one I had rigged two of the molex together. I'm thinking now I can wait until next year to upgrade my card and get something even better.
 
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