R9 280x or GTX-770 4gb (same price)???

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bobn4burton

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So a couple weeks ago I tried to order the evga 770 4gb card from microcenter when they had a very quick sale for $319. Well, the order got cancelled and so I ended up just getting an Asus R9 280x for 309. I just got an email from Microcenter that said they got more in stock and were willing to sale me the 770 4gb card for the original order price of 319.

So the two cards are essentially the same price. Which would you guys choose? I'm pretty sure I could sale the 280x on ebay without too much of a loss...

I obviously care about performance...but even more so about stability. I run my PC 24x7 and need it to be stable. The last card I had (msi 560ti) caused me all kinds of grief with the wonderful black screen/driver has stopped responding but recovered problem...
 
Red colored Apples vs. Green colored Apples, we can go a whole day pitching for either Red or Green, in the end its all about the same.
 
If your 280x is working for you now I would just keep it versus losing money. You can always send that email to me so I can buy that MC 770 for $319 :)
 
I'd go with the EVGA. From what I've heard, EVGA is a pretty reliable company for RMA's and such. Hell of a lot better than ASUS. The card will probably also consume less energy and produce less heat, and you'll have Shadowplay and whatnot.

Most of the time the advantage of AMD is better price/performance, but in this case they're the same price.
 
Yeah, I had almost decided to just stick with the 280x. It seems to be working good so far (only had it installed about 6 days).

However, I have had it happen twice now where my monitor won't wake up from being in standby mode. The first time, I just thought the pc had frozen or something and ended up just resetting the pc. Then this morning it happened again, but I could hear some windows sounds when pressing certain keys and so I knew the pc wasn't frozen and I started to suspect the monitor just wasn't waking up... I pulled the power plug on the monitor and plugged it back in...nothing. I then disconnected the dvi cable from the video card and reconnected it and that fixed it. My screen was back and everything normal.

Anyone heard of any problem similar to this? I CAN'T live with another somewhat flaky video card again. I need whichever video card I go with to be SOLID...
 
Well... everything I see the 770 and the 280x are pretty much equal more or less.

I will say that, I love my 280x. I thought the whole fan thing on that cooler sounds gimmicky but I will admit it does a great job and is quiet while doing it. My total budget was around 600 for a video card a while back and I got a 780 which was over my budget, I ended up having to sell it to make my budget and bought this card. I would love to get another one and go xfire with em.

Sleep issue - Sometimes, I litterally try to bring it out of sleep and it won't come back. Here's the thing it still did it with the 780 though. I figured out it's actually not the computer in my case it's the monitor, I power the monitor off and on and it comes right back.
 
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Can go wrong with either or. The question really is then (if they are priced the same)

do you want Mantle or Physx? Thats the real question!
 
Multiple screens: AMD

single screen: Nvidia.

This is from experience.
 
On one hand, 770 4gb will have an extra 1gb of vram (and Physx).
On the other hand, 280x will get Mantle (although we don't know how much impact this will have).

I think, in the long term 280x will be the better choice. But if you're primary concerned with playing games currently available (aka without Mantle), 770 might be the better option.
 
I'd say go with the 4 gb card if you have to get a card right now, if not, then wait for the new cards to come out in Q2.
 
Given the option, I'd go with the 770....

(This coming from a guy who's been on the red team for 7+ years)

The driver issues that come with AMD just aren't worth it.

*I'm waiting for "after X-mas sales" to finally migrate back to Nvidia, once they throw out their ridiculous pricing structure atm....
 
horrorshow said:
Given the option, I'd go with the 770....

(This coming from a guy who's been on the red team for 7+ years)

The driver issues that come with AMD just aren't worth it.

*I'm waiting for "after X-mas sales" to finally migrate back to Nvidia, once they throw out their ridiculous pricing structure atm....
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If your having driver errors with that card in your sig its user error.Stop with the whole driver issue crap.nvidia is just as bad i had gtx 660 sli and came back to amd cause the drivers werre crap even when i disabled sli
 
Whats with all this BS about drivers? What cards are you people using? From 10 years ago? I am on BETA drivers on 290's and its just fine
 
horrorshow said:
Given the option, I'd go with the 770....

(This coming from a guy who's been on the red team for 7+ years)

The driver issues that come with AMD just aren't worth it.

*I'm waiting for "after X-mas sales" to finally migrate back to Nvidia, once they throw out their ridiculous pricing structure atm....
Click to expand...

Guess you havent used an Nvidia driver lately. Last 3 months has been pretty terrible from Nvidia.

It's like Nvidia hired AMD driver team, and AMD hired the Nvidia driver team.
 
I would go GTX 770 for nVidia exclusive features such as better AA modes and PhysX but that's just me.
 
KickAssCop said:
I would go GTX 770 for nVidia exclusive features such as better AA modes and PhysX but that's just me.
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TXAA is one of the worst AA's out there. FXAA is supported by everyone.

What exclusive features you speak of? Only thing I can think is Physx and thats about as useful as Mantle.
 
DASHlT said:
TXAA is one of the worst AA's out there. FXAA is supported by everyone.

What exclusive features you speak of? Only thing I can think is Physx and thats about as useful as Mantle.
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My list of features maybe different than yours but:
a) SGSSAA can be forced on a per game basis through nVinspector (+ many other AA options to balance performance with visual quality; flexibility)
b) Vsync and Adaptive Vsync when forced always works (had issues with 6900 and 7900 series not doing forced vsync for almost a year)
c) 3D Vision 2
d) TXAA works wonders in Batman AO (yes I know, only one game where it works correctly)
e) PhysX effects are truly wonderful to watch when they work (e.g., Batman games, Borderlands 2, also being introduced in Ass Creed IV BF)
f) SLi profiles released on day one or before games are actually launched (e.g., AFAIK - maybe wrong - CFX profile for Ass Creed IV BF still not released)

... off the top of my head.
 
KickAssCop said:
My list of features maybe different than yours but:
a) SGSSAA can be forced on a per game basis through nVinspector (+ many other AA options to balance performance with visual quality; flexibility)
b) Vsync and Adaptive Vsync when forced always works (had issues with 6900 and 7900 series not doing forced vsync for almost a year)
c) 3D Vision 2
d) TXAA works wonders in Batman AO (yes I know, only one game where it works correctly)
e) PhysX effects are truly wonderful to watch when they work (e.g., Batman games, Borderlands 2, also being introduced in Ass Creed IV BF)
f) SLi profiles released on day one or before games are actually launched (e.g., AFAIK - maybe wrong - CFX profile for Ass Creed IV BF still not released)

... off the top of my head.
Click to expand...

So basically you listed a total of what 3 things that are exclusive to Nvidia with the rest basically being pointless or meaningless for 99% of users? Ya, real good reason to go Nvidia there bud.
 
KickAssCop said:
My list of features maybe different than yours but:
a) SGSSAA can be forced on a per game basis through nVinspector (+ many other AA options to balance performance with visual quality; flexibility)
b) Vsync and Adaptive Vsync when forced always works (had issues with 6900 and 7900 series not doing forced vsync for almost a year)
c) 3D Vision 2
d) TXAA works wonders in Batman AO (yes I know, only one game where it works correctly)
e) PhysX effects are truly wonderful to watch when they work (e.g., Batman games, Borderlands 2, also being introduced in Ass Creed IV BF)
f) SLi profiles released on day one or before games are actually launched (e.g., AFAIK - maybe wrong - CFX profile for Ass Creed IV BF still not released)

... off the top of my head.
Click to expand...

a) AMD also has SSAA
b) Adaptive Vsync is 1 feature for sure
c) 3D is a gimmick for PC and even the TV makers are stopping production of 3D tvs. (AMD has 3D as well)
d) FXAA is way better then TXAA in Batman IMO.
e) Physx is a gimmick period. It is no better then Mantle.
f) Nvidia drivers the last 3 months have been terrible. It took them close to 3 weeks to get a working stable Bf4 driver.
 
DASHlT said:
a) AMD also has SSAA
b) Adaptive Vsync is 1 feature for sure
c) 3D is a gimmick for PC and even the TV makers are stopping production of 3D tvs. (AMD has 3D as well)
d) FXAA is way better then TXAA in Batman IMO.
e) Physx is a gimmick period. It is no better then Mantle.
f) Nvidia drivers the last 3 months have been terrible. It took them close to 3 weeks to get a working stable Bf4 driver.
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As I said, your list can be different than mine.
a) AMD SSAA was completely unusable on my 7970 at release and would cut fps in half. With SGSSAA I don't have that big of a performance hit
c) 3D vision is not a gimmick. I have been gaming in 3D for about 2 years now and when it works it is absolutely a blast to play. I have tried both AMD and nVidia 3D and find nVidia to be much better in this department
d) Can't argue here. As I said, for me only ONE game uses TXAA that is worth it and it is Batman AO. All other games, I have found better balance with 8x MSAA in game (if supported) and 8x SGSSAA through nVinspector (e.g., Ass Creed 4)
e) I tend to disagree. When it works, it is absolutely fantastic.
f) I haven't had issues with BF4 due to drivers. All issues can be traced back to the game. However, the recent driver did increase performance. However, you are correct that recent nVidia drivers had issues (e.g., 3D was broken in past 3 drivers)

Either way, you buy what you prefer. After 4 generations of AMD (since 4870) and 2 generations of nVidia (670/680/780) I tend to prefer nVidia on the same price range.

As for Mantle, if it works as advertised and there are games behind it, I may build a system to test it out :).
 
darkstarcow said:
So basically you listed a total of what 3 things that are exclusive to Nvidia with the rest basically being pointless or meaningless for 99% of users? Ya, real good reason to go Nvidia there bud.
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At same price point as per the OP, why cut short on the features when you can have everything that AMD is offering with the extra 3-4 features (depending on what you count) that you want to use?

I am sure the 2-3 fps difference between the two cards do not justify one over the other considering they trade blows in games.
 
KickAssCop said:
At same price point as per the OP, why cut short on the features when you can have everything that AMD is offering with the extra 3-4 features (depending on what you count) that you want to use?

I am sure the 2-3 fps difference between the two cards do not justify one over the other considering they trade blows in games.
Click to expand...

If someone isn't going to use a feature it is no longer a selling point. The two products should be compared by the features and benefits that impact the buyer.
 
DASHlT said:
a) AMD also has SSAA
b) Adaptive Vsync is 1 feature for sure
c) 3D is a gimmick for PC and even the TV makers are stopping production of 3D tvs. (AMD has 3D as well)
d) FXAA is way better then TXAA in Batman IMO.
e) Physx is a gimmick period. It is no better then Mantle.
f) Nvidia drivers the last 3 months have been terrible. It took them close to 3 weeks to get a working stable Bf4 driver.
Click to expand...
some effects in physx are not really a gimmick although it would not influence my decision too much. and radeon pro offers an adaptive vsync alternative. and yeah TXAA is still a texture blurring mess and I cant understand how they promote that garbage.
 
I agree with above - while I wouldn't make a purchase decision solely on phsyx, you can't ignore the fact that there are a lot of titles on the market, right now, that can take advantage of it. Conversely, Mantle will get a first title in December.

I am optimistic for Mantle and hope it does very well for AMD. But I would hesitate to call physx a "gimmick" because a lot of recently developed and very good games are using it - such as Batman: AO, Borderlands 2, Planetside 2, Witcher 3, among others. I can see it being a good value add, although I have never made a purchase decision solely on the weight of physx.
 
OP - I'm going to recommend you return the Radeon R9 for the GeForce GTX-770. Not for the whole AMD vs Nvidia BS, but based on the fact that you have an ASUS card versus EVGA. A while back we had a dude whose ASUS Radeon HD-7950 caught fire, and he had to fight tooth and nail to get them to honor their warranty. It was a mess. I can dig up a link if you want to wade through all of the crap. They eventually did honor their warranty, but it took a lot of community outrage and fighting to get them to do it.
 
DASHlT said:
c) 3D is a gimmick for PC and even the TV makers are stopping production of 3D tvs. (AMD has 3D as well)
Click to expand...

I just got a 27" lightboost 3d monitor and the Nvidia 3d vision 2.0 kit a few days ago and I can say that it is certainly not a gimmick. IMO, 3d vision is the single most dramatic thing you can do to make your game look better.
 
Johnked6 said:
I just got a 27" lightboost 3d monitor and the Nvidia 3d vision 2.0 kit a few days ago and I can say that it is certainly not a gimmick. IMO, 3d vision is the single most dramatic thing you can do to make your game look better.
Click to expand...

Welcome to the 1% of people who play in 3D.

Just Remember AMD has 3D as well. It's not just an Nvidia exclusive.
 
DASHlT said:
Welcome to the 1% of people who play in 3D.

Just Remember AMD has 3D as well. It's not just an Nvidia exclusive.
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Have you tried 3D on AMD vs. nVidia that you keep recommending AMD?

My experience says completely otherwise so much so that I sold off my Samsung SA700D monitor due to the issues with AMD 3D and extremely poor support in games. Top it off the games suffered from a very high amount of ghosting that happens on nVidia only when there is no real profile. But the amount of control I have in nVidia is a completely different experience.

AMD 3D is a joke compared to what nVidia offers (imo). Not sure what your experience was.
 
KickAssCop said:
Have you tried 3D on AMD vs. nVidia that you keep recommending AMD?

My experience says completely otherwise so much so that I sold off my Samsung SA700D monitor due to the issues with AMD 3D and extremely poor support in games. Top it off the games suffered from a very high amount of ghosting that happens on nVidia only when there is no real profile. But the amount of control I have in nVidia is a completely different experience.

AMD 3D is a joke compared to what nVidia offers (imo). Not sure what your experience was.
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I wouldnt recommend either company for 3D. I am just stating 3D gaming isnt exclusive to Nvidia.

I have used Nvidia 3D before when I had a 120hz monitor. I wasn't all that like people said.

Hey I aint knocking any 1 company over the other. But saying that Nvidia is better then AMD because of 3D gaming when AMD has it as well, well then isnt an exclusive feature. No matter how badly it might runs.

If you go threw the thread. I never really recommend any company over the other. Specially since the 770 4gb was the same price as the 280x.....It's a draw.

just my 0.02c.
 
Don't know what your experience was that you wouldn't recommend nVidia for 3D but here is mine and it worked very well especially this year:

a) Crysis 3 worked out of the box (I know it is technically not proper 3D but whatever)
b) BF3 worked very well
c) Tomb Raider was phenomenal in 3D
d) Batman Arkham City was fantastic
e) Metro Last Light with 3D was absolutely great (needed to turn off some effects but still worth it)
f) Starcraft 2 was very good
g) Diablo 3 worked well
h) Remember Me was a completely different game once 3D was calibrated

Just off the top of my head. I see you using words that don't entirely make sense such as gimmick for 3D because 3D is very real. Just like PhysX, TXAA, Adaptive Vsync etc. They may not be exclusive but still they offer more bang for buck if you want to enjoy gaming.
 
KickAssCop said:
Don't know what your experience was that you wouldn't recommend nVidia for 3D but here is mine and it worked very well especially this year:

a) Crysis 3 worked out of the box (I know it is technically not proper 3D but whatever)
b) BF3 worked very well
c) Tomb Raider was phenomenal in 3D
d) Batman Arkham City was fantastic
e) Metro Last Light with 3D was absolutely great (needed to turn off some effects but still worth it)
f) Starcraft 2 was very good
g) Diablo 3 worked well
h) Remember Me was a completely different game once 3D was calibrated

Just off the top of my head. I see you using words that don't entirely make sense such as gimmick for 3D because 3D is very real. Just like PhysX, TXAA, Adaptive Vsync etc. They may not be exclusive but still they offer more bang for buck if you want to enjoy gaming.
Click to expand...

So 3D. Add in the price of the monitor and glasses (around $400-500) to just to use 3D. Even a 770 4gb doesnt have enough power to run 3D with decent framerates.

So 3D is a gimmick. Because you would have to have more funds when just buying a video card to even get it going properly.

With Physx and TXAA and Adaptive Vsync, You dont have to pay a penny more for them.

With 3D you have to open up your wallet. I mean its like saying to get a 660 GTX to play 3D....seriously?

Anyway man everyone have opinions, and I respect yours.
 
Gotta love how the "What card should I buy" topics always turn in to turd tossing fanboy discussions.
 
jbltecnicspro said:
OP - I'm going to recommend you return the Radeon R9 for the GeForce GTX-770. Not for the whole AMD vs Nvidia BS, but based on the fact that you have an ASUS card versus EVGA. A while back we had a dude whose ASUS Radeon HD-7950 caught fire, and he had to fight tooth and nail to get them to honor their warranty. It was a mess. I can dig up a link if you want to wade through all of the crap. They eventually did honor their warranty, but it took a lot of community outrage and fighting to get them to do it.
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That's exactly what I said on the first page. I'm not sure why this is a crap flinging fest between two sides; the two cards are practically equivalent in performance. It's really just EVGA vs ASUS. I'd go with EVGA.

I'm surprised no one's mentioned Shadowplay, though. I would personally consider it if one were to stream a lot. Shadowplay's the entire reason I recommended some guy get the 770 over the 280x on another forum, because he tended to stream to Twitch a lot and Nvidia is in the process of getting that part working. But it's a minor consideration if that's not your thing.
 
JLangevin said:
Gotta love how the "What card should I buy" topics always turn in to turd tossing fanboy discussions.
Click to expand...

I don't see the fanboy discussion you're referring to - the discussion seems pretty civil as far as I can tell. I see mainly feature comparisons between the two cards which are valid points. I think NV is worth the $ for the features such as shadow play, adaptive vsync, and nvidia inspector, while others may not care. That's completely fine. I was an AMD/ATI guy for quite a few years and personally, I have come to really enjoy the additional polish and features that Nvidia has. Hopefully AMD can match that at some point in the future, but for the time being I do think that those features are worth considering for a purchase.
 
jbltecnicspro said:
OP - I'm going to recommend you return the Radeon R9 for the GeForce GTX-770. Not for the whole AMD vs Nvidia BS, but based on the fact that you have an ASUS card versus EVGA. A while back we had a dude whose ASUS Radeon HD-7950 caught fire, and he had to fight tooth and nail to get them to honor their warranty. It was a mess. I can dig up a link if you want to wade through all of the crap. They eventually did honor their warranty, but it took a lot of community outrage and fighting to get them to do it.
Click to expand...

THIS is what I thought of when I read OP.

Here's the referenced thread. I refuse to buy any more Asus products not only because of that thread, but just because I've had horrible experiences myself and have read enough horror stories about Asus CS in general on here and other customer reviews on Amazon/Newegg.

Buy anything besides Asus. They make decent hardware, but you're basically screwed should something legitimately go wrong with it.
 
Yup forgot about Shadowplay. I don't use it much since I have very low upload speeds (about 512 KB/s lol).

Also if you are calling me a fanboy, you should look at my post history and/or card ownership history. Anyone who mentions brand preference seems to be called a fanboy around here. :rolleyes:
 
Yeah, those so quick to toss out "fanboy" accusations are pretty annoying. I've owned 3 generations of AMD GPUs including 7970s so that statement is quite confusing to me - I enjoyed my prior AMD cards but I just do not like the quiet fan speed throttling of the 290. I also think that Nvidia spends more time polishing and putting quality into their products, after having used several Kepler GPUs. That's just my preference, if buying 6 AMD cards in 3 years makes me a "fanboy", what the hell ever. I will say i'm a fanboy of better products, right now I feel that NV has that. But if AMD can change things up with aftermarket 290 cards, or a revised reference 290 card, hey that's great. My opinion is ALWAYS subject to change depending on what happens on the market.
 
xoleras said:
Yeah, those so quick to toss out "fanboy" accusations are pretty annoying. I've owned 3 generations of AMD GPUs including 7970s so that statement is quite confusing to me - I enjoyed my prior AMD cards but I just do not like the quiet fan speed throttling of the 290. I also think that Nvidia spends more time polishing and putting quality into their products, after having used several Kepler GPUs. That's just my preference, if buying 6 AMD cards in 3 years makes me a "fanboy", what the hell ever. I will say i'm a fanboy of better products, right now I feel that NV has that. But if AMD can change things up with aftermarket 290 cards, or a revised reference 290 card, hey that's great. My opinion is ALWAYS subject to change depending on what happens on the market.
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Whoa... Hold on there. You were already in a thread that was closed due to it turning into a slugfest, in which you were very vocal about not liking the fans. Now, I'm not trying to blame you, because there was ridiculousness everywhere on that thread. You then make this comment:

"Same here, nvidia is just higher quality all around and worth the few additional bucks."

Statements like these are pretty general, and since we're talking about two cards that are the same price that the OP is deciding between, it kind of does look like fanboysim (for a lack of a better word).

darkstarcrow's rebuttal to KickAssCop's reasons for preferring team green this go round doesn't help things either.

Point I'm trying to make is that given your very recent posting history, I don't think it's unreasonable for someone to read your remarks and think "fanboy." Now, if you're not intending to communicate that and yet still find those responses, then perhaps you should reread what you post before you post it to see if you're unintentionally coming across as a "fanboy."
 
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