As a supplement to our Video Card Buyer's Guide, we present this ranking of many of the most popular graphics cards from the past five years. We rank them compared to a baseline "1x" speed level. Rather than list every card ever produced, we pick popular models that represented either a 33, 50, or 100 percent jump in performance from prior models. Note that we don't necessarily recommend all these cards - the purpose here is to give you a sense of the entire range of gaming cards available and their relative price to performance ratios compared to past products, so you get the maximum performance gain for your dollar!
7970
GTX 670
We'll be updating this ranking quarterly, along with our Video Card Buyer's Guide, as new video cards are released about every three months. For true generational jumps in performance (i.e., at least 50 percent for the same amount of money), you typically have to wait at least 18 months. All indications point to the next big thing, Nvidia's "Maxwell" architecture, hitting in Spring of 2014, while AMD is releasing a refresh in Fall of 2013.
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