r9 290 CF vs SINGLE NVIDIA 980

NEK4TE

Limp Gawd
Joined
Dec 13, 2014
Messages
150
Hello,

I have 2x r9 290 in my system atm.

Have a friend who wants to make a change with me - give him 2 x r9 290 for a single NVIDIA 980 (MSI GAMING)

Would this be a wise choice? Currently gaming @ 2K resolution, and probably gonna stick with it for couple more years.

Thanks
 
to be honest with you, so so.

mostly (lately) i play world of tanks, and it doesn't support crossfire at all, so, i have to push my primary card to get decent fps while playing @ max.

they run pretty hot as well, just, dont know what to do :)
 
Absolutely. Anything to dump the AMD cards, plus no more frame pacing issues or crossfire mess.
 
If you are itching for a change then go for it. You will lose performance in some games but you will have better performance in games that don't support multi GPU configurations.

Do you change your GPU a lot? Or just every few years? If you keep the GPU for a while then get the 980.

And I would ignore the previous poster. Known for his anti AMD ranting.
 
Thanks guys.

Is this card, good card?

http://www.msi.com/product/vga/GTX-980-GAMING-4G.html

usually i try to stick with the cards for at least 2-3 years, to be honest with you.

Yes that's a good 980.

I'd assume around a 40% increase in FPS vs. a single r290. Around a 15% decrease from R290 SLI if it's actually working (assuming 70% scaling).

I'd do the single card in a heart beat just to avoid multi-GPU, the stuttering and the like.

Do you play on 1080P? A 980 will let you play basically any game with at least 1.25 DSR and 2xMSAA which makes everything look beautiful.
 
I have a 2K monitor, and i am thinking about getting new Monitor soon.

2K (IPS) 144HZ GSYNC probably, looks like ASUS is realeasing it (not the TN one as i work from home, and i don't like TN\Colors).
 
980 is the way to go! Enjoy! (I have the same model MSI Gaming 970. great card.)
 
Sorry you said "2k" and I missed that. I would assume that's 1080p or 1200p... anyways it doesnt' change single best card > two decent.
 
to be honest with you, so so.

mostly (lately) i play world of tanks, and it doesn't support crossfire at all, so, i have to push my primary card to get decent fps while playing @ max.

they run pretty hot as well, just, dont know what to do :)

I'd do it in a heartbeat. No questions about it.
 
He's giving you a really good deal. A 980 cost upwards of $550 while two 290s can be had for around $340 used. If you end up not liking it you can put it back up on the market for around $500 and buy two new 290x with it.
 
Thanks guys.

I will talk more to him about this after work, and see if he still wants to do it.

Will let you know, for sure :)
 
Thanks guys.

I will talk more to him about this after work, and see if he still wants to do it.

Will let you know, for sure :)

There are just so many issues with multiple cards and scaling. It was true when SLI/Xfire was first introduced, and is still true now: A better single card will almost always give you better performance than multiple lesser cards.
 
as long as i can run world of tanks (2k) properly (and i am sure i would be, as i have no major issues doing it with single r9 290) and sometimes play bf4, cod, i am set :)
 
For BF4 at 1440p it would be a downgrade. But since you mostly play a game that does not support crossfire, I say go for it! Also leaves you room to add another 980 for SLI down the road.
 
Friend of mine doesn't have a receipt for this card, dude lost it! lol.

In case of RMA, how MSI is without a receipt? (Canada here).

Thanks
 
Friend of mine doesn't have a receipt for this card, dude lost it! lol.

In case of RMA, how MSI is without a receipt? (Canada here).

Thanks

I am pretty sure they are serial number based with their graphics cards, so you should be okay.
 
Perfect, thanks! This might happen tonight.

Great help\support guys, i appreciate it.
 
Okay, i just got it guys.

How does it look:

2015-01-14_21-06-18.png


2015-01-14_21-05-33.png


2015-01-14_21-06-59.png


Also, what i noticed is that "red" fan is spinning more then the "black" fan, until it reaches some higher temps.

Is this normal?

Thanks!
 
That was quick. 1500 sustained boost / 8k on the memory is great! A lot of thermal margin too. Go play something and let us know what you think!
 
Thanks for responding.

First game i tried was the game i play the most, World of Tanks, 2k Resolution, Max settings, FPS were jumping up to 120, lowest i saw was 85, much higher, smoother then a single r9 290.

I am hardly seeing right (black) fan spinning, trying to find more info about it.
It works, i tried it with MSI OC tool (not Afterburner) when you press the "freezing button" - it did spin full speed, but, i uninstalled it and installed Afterburner.

As said, i don't see a lot of "activity" on right\black fan.

Could somebody point me to any direction, showing this is how it is supposed to be, or not supposed to be, maybe it only starts spinning if there is a lot of heat - but, this card is a lot cooler then AMD.

Thanks!
 
Nevermind, figured it out.

Downloaded this software, tested it @ 100%.
Temp went down to 22C lol.

2015-01-14_21-53-45.png


Thanks guys!
 
I read a custom fan curve can fix the fan nonsense.

Max temp (default) is generally 80C and the card supposively doesn't even start the fans until 60C. It could just not be getting enough power (hot enough) for the one fan.

Edit: never mind, you're a quick one
 
haha, thanks a lot man for helping, really appreciate it.

Idle temps are around 25-28C, so, thats probably why it did not spin in hybrid mode, so, all good.

ASIC on this card is over 75% as well.

Not bad, so far, i am happy with this switch.
 
the 980 is an excellent card. I am so happy I dumped my sli setup for a single 980
 
I will be honest with you, i can't say i don't like it, and i am not happy i did this, its still 2 new for me, i will need more tests :)

I always been AMD guy :)

So far, its great experience.

Hopefully, FreeSYNC will be supported by NVIDIA as well, as i am thinking about getting: ASUS MG279Q 2560 x 1440 Gamer 120Hz IPS 5ms GTG once its released.
 
Friend of mine doesn't have a receipt for this card, dude lost it! lol.

In case of RMA, how MSI is without a receipt? (Canada here).

Thanks

I am pretty sure they are serial number based with their graphics cards, so you should be okay.

Yeah - they've never asked me for a receipt and I've done RMAs with them for graphics cards and motherboards, recently. Still - a good thing to have...but you'll survive without it. Can he check his CC statements or if he bought it online - Amazon/NewEgg/etc. - that's all there for him to grab.
 
I will be honest with you, i can't say i don't like it, and i am not happy i did this, its still 2 new for me, i will need more tests :)

I always been AMD guy :)

So far, its great experience.

Hopefully, FreeSYNC will be supported by NVIDIA as well, as i am thinking about getting: ASUS MG279Q 2560 x 1440 Gamer 120Hz IPS 5ms GTG once its released.

It's a great card. Most of the high end cards are great cards :)

But, you are out of luck with Freesync, Nvidia might support it down the line, but their current cards won't be able to. I would suggest you save up and get the Gsync IPS that's coming in March.
 
Is it going to be 2k monitor ?

i did not like 4k, tried few, really would like to stick to 2k ips gsync( probably then )
 
Yes that's a good 980.

I'd assume around a 40% increase in FPS vs. a single r290. Around a 15% decrease from R290 SLI if it's actually working (assuming 70% scaling).

I'd do the single card in a heart beat just to avoid multi-GPU, the stuttering and the like.


This is why forums matter. There is so much ignorance out there, it's hilarious. First, a 980 is only about 28% faster than a 780 at stock speeds according to Sweclocker's performance index(combining many different games into a composite).
And a 290 is at parity with a 780.

So forget the 40% increase.

Absolutely. Anything to dump the AMD cards, plus no more frame pacing issues or crossfire mess.


Second, I got two 290s in Crossfire and I have essentially no frame-pacing issues. I play a wide range of games, some as old as 10 years and some very new, like Dragon Age: Inquisition.

Some games like Sleeping Dogs have poor Crossfire/SLI support, World of Tanks seems like a similar game. OP, I think the fact that you play a single game so much, a game that doesn't have good Crossfire support, has colored your views a lot. But if you are indeed gaming a single title that much, going for the fastest single GPU makes more sense, so you made the right choice. But let's just clear up the general misinformation about so-called "frame pacing issues" which were fixed a long time ago(AMD's Crossfire drivers are now better than SLI for Nvidia, especially at 4K) or the fact that two R9-290s are far ahead(30+ percent) of a single 980 in most popular games, such as BF4.

I base this on this chart:

http://www.sweclockers.com/recension/19332-nvidia-geforce-gtx-980-och-gtx-970/19#pagehead

I'm taking Dayaks' 70% scaling as a given, even though many of the games I'm playing are seeing at least 80% scaling.

All of this being said, I still think OP made the right choice. Some people play a lot of different games, like me, other people focus on just a few or even just one. And if that game has poor multi-GPU support, that's a done deal.
 
Thanks for that info, and i get the point, i am sure others will too.

I think i made a right choice as well, as its WoT mostly, 99% of the time ;) and aaaaaaaaaa much, much better performance with 980 over r9 290 , that what matters to me at the moment :)

Thanks man.
 
I will be honest with you, i can't say i don't like it, and i am not happy i did this, its still 2 new for me, i will need more tests :)

I always been AMD guy :)

So far, its great experience.

Hopefully, FreeSYNC will be supported by NVIDIA as well, as i am thinking about getting: ASUS MG279Q 2560 x 1440 Gamer 120Hz IPS 5ms GTG once its released.

No worries. By the time freesync is mainstream your 980 will be ancient.
 
Yea, i see.

What i am thinking since last night is that probably i shouldn't even bother with G-SYNC (with AMD i was looking @ FreeSYNC) Monitors.

Probably, i should just get a 2K 27"-32" Monitor, and enjoy it, like majority of people of there. :)
 
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