Where are the mid range nVidia cards?

1.5 gb will be fine for most situations with that level of card but I can see a few instances where the vram will start to limit you with mods and AA even today. it does not take long for what seems like enough vram to all of a sudden bite you in the butt. many 8800gts 320mb, 8800gt 256mb, 4870 512mb, 5870 1gb and gtx460 768mb owners can attest to that. the higher ram versions of those cards were/are viable for gaming MUCH longer.
 
Shark974 said:
680, as well as 670 is a little light with 2GB. A $500/$400 card should include more (maybe why Nvidia fans got all excited about the 4GB edition, proving I'm right). Morseo with 680 than 670 which I'm ok with. 1.5GB is also pretty borderline imo for a hypothetical 660 imo. 560/Ti/570 simply not enough RAM imo. Wouldn't touch any of those.

Really Nvidia right along is screwing people by selling cards without enough RAM, through the last gen anyway. AMD had 2GB as the standard for 6950/6970 where it belonged.
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Well I got tired of waiting honestly and picked up an ASUS DCII 7850, which does have 2gb, all for under $250 (paid $215 from amazon).

Not saying that 2gb is necessary, but they could do it for cheap as well.
 
Shark974 said:
680, as well as 670 is a little light with 2GB. A $500/$400 card should include more (maybe why Nvidia fans got all excited about the 4GB edition, proving I'm right). Morseo with 680 than 670 which I'm ok with. 1.5GB is also pretty borderline imo for a hypothetical 660 imo. 560/Ti/570 simply not enough RAM imo. Wouldn't touch any of those.

Really Nvidia right along is screwing people by selling cards without enough RAM, through the last gen anyway. AMD had 2GB as the standard for 6950/6970 where it belonged.
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Agreed. Nvidia's last gen cards like GTX 560 Ti 1 GB are really VRAM limited for the latest games. I have a XFX HD 6950 2GB. I have played BF3 at Ultra 2 x MSAA settings. For just testing purposes in BF3 i ran with Ultra 4X MSAA. i could get avg fps 35 - 40 with lows of 25 fps in intensive firefights. But I ran the game at 2x MSAA because the extra fps was more worth than the improvements in image quality for me. I can bet the GTX 560 Ti will struggle to keep min fps above 20 with its 1 GB VRAM both at 2X and 4X MSAA. The 2 GB and lesser power consumption/heat was one of the reasons for me choosing the HD 6950 when compared to GTX 570.
If the GK104 based salvage product comes with 24 ROP and 1.5 GB GDDR5 its an option only till 1080p/1200p gaming. For anything higher the HD 7870 is better given they will fight it out at similar prices.
 
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Couple of things
- 560ti is fine with 1GB and unless you are building an SLI setup 2GB will be useless on that card. Why? Its simple. The GPU just isnt powerful enough to push the level of details required to fill up that buffer. Its pretty much the same with 6950 1 and 2 gig whether you admit it or not.

- .You said you were getting like 35 fps with ultra setup at 1080p+4msaa in BF3 with drops way below 30. We all agree its unplayable (its a complete joke for any FPS game) and on 1GB card it would be far worse. So you lowered MSAA at 2x, fine, you get more fps (which still isnt smooth but im not gonna pick on you here) and lose a bit of IQ. But you see, by doing that you just negated the advantage of 2GB card because 1GB one can run Ultra+2MSAA with the SAME performance. If you dont belive me take a look at any review out there! You can get better performance with 2GB card in extreme situations but it wont be enough to sustain a playable FPS!

- That is my point. You need a fast GPU to justify the high amount of vram on the card. Otherwise why not get a GT430 with 2GB and scream i've got a better card then the 560ti.

- Im not even going to mention other AA techniques that (are going to) lower both, gpu stress and vram usage without sacrificing image quality compared to MSAA..So pretty please, with sugar on top quit arguing about vram.
 
rainzor said:
Couple of things
- 560ti is fine with 1GB and unless you are building an SLI setup 2GB will be useless on that card. Why? Its simple. The GPU just isnt powerful enough to push the level of details required to fill up that buffer. Its pretty much the same with 6950 1 and 2 gig whether you admit it or not.

- .You said you were getting like 35 fps with ultra setup at 1080p+4msaa in BF3 with drops way below 30. We all agree its unplayable (its a complete joke for any FPS game) and on 1GB card it would be far worse. So you lowered MSAA at 2x, fine, you get more fps (which still isnt smooth but im not gonna pick on you here) and lose a bit of IQ. But you see, by doing that you just negated the advantage of 2GB card because 1GB one can run Ultra+2MSAA with the SAME performance. If you dont belive me take a look at any review out there! You can get better performance with 2GB card in extreme situations but it wont be enough to sustain a playable FPS!

- That is my point. You need a fast GPU to justify the high amount of vram on the card. Otherwise why not get a GT430 with 2GB and scream i've got a better card then the 560ti.

- Im not even going to mention other AA techniques that (are going to) lower both, gpu stress and vram usage without sacrificing image quality compared to MSAA..So pretty please, with sugar on top quit arguing about vram.
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AA is just one aspect. Texture sizes are a major concern with the latest games. I maxed out skyrim with the high res texture pack on my HD 6950 2GB. it was very smooth.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5625/...-7850-review-rounding-out-southern-islands/13

"What’s interesting to see is where the 1GB cards collapse due to the use of high resolution textures – the GTX 560 Ti collapses after just 1680, and the GTX 570 collapses beyond 1920. Going forward we expect more games to be like Skyrim, which will make additional VRAM all the more important."

I have used my card for 1.5 years and intend to use it for atleast another 1.5 years. For people who intend to use a graphics card for 2 -3 years buying a 1 GB card is a big mistake.
 
raghu78 said:
AA is just one aspect. Texture sizes are a major concern with the latest games. I maxed out skyrim with the high res texture pack on my HD 6950 2GB. it was very smooth.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5625/...-7850-review-rounding-out-southern-islands/13

"What’s interesting to see is where the 1GB cards collapse due to the use of high resolution textures – the GTX 560 Ti collapses after just 1680, and the GTX 570 collapses beyond 1920. Going forward we expect more games to be like Skyrim, which will make additional VRAM all the more important."
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First thing: I just got done helping my friend mod Skyrim and his 560Ti runs Skyrim at 1920x1200 at 60fps with the Bethesda texture pack + others. It runs exactly the same as my 2GB 6950 (maybe even a little smoother) even after you add ENB + SMAA. Which is interesting since Skyrim is hugely CPU bound and his CPU is a little less powerful than mine (i7-920 @ 3.5Ghz vs i7-870 @ 4.2Ghz).

Second thing: I would not expect more games to be like Skyrim in regards to VRAM usage for a while. Skyrim only needs the VRAM when you start adding the huge user-created texture packs. Oblivion was exactly the same and it's like 6 years old now but we've only seen a couple games since that make use of more than 1GB or so of VRAM at 1920x1200 even with AA.

I'd definitely want 2GB VRAM but I don't think that 1.5GB is going to hurt many gamers that would purchase a <$300 card for a while.
 
Well i don't know where Anand got his figures but i don't believe 'em one bit. Nor can i verify those numbers as i don't have Skyrim. But if you take a look at a few other reviews (namely [H], Bit-tech, TPU, Vortez, Tom's etc..) you'll see 1GB cards doing just fine at those settings.HERE Note that at the time of testing old Nvidia drivers were used for 560ti and according to NV they significantly improved performance in Skyrim with latest releases. So yeh..

GTX660 is aimed at 1080p market and 1.5GB is plenty for that res. GTX580 anyone?.Those looking for 660 SLI+Surround will be better of with 3GB versions though. And who knows, maybe the card ends up with 2GB of vram, nothing is final yet.
 
Do we have to turn every thread into a vram argument ...
 
Trimlock said:
And shortly came out with a 1gb version not soon after the 512 due to the massive drop in performance when running crossfire. The memory wasn't AS cheap as say GDDR3 but they already released a card that bested the competition and for $200 cheaper. Even if it only came within 20% of the performance they could still make the card more expensive.

I say this while having a horrible memory of crossfiring the 2, then upgrading to the 1gb versions. Still a fun time with those cards as they gave a ton of people ultra performance for very little.
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I don't think that they had much of a choice on which memory to use. I don't think that anyone other than Qumonnda was making GDDR5 at the time. I don't know that higher density chips were even available.
 
I am still using my GTX 470 plays every game at 1080P and max details, in some games i may need drop down from 4x FSAA to 2x but that's it.
 
Looks like mid July for the 660/660Ti according to Fudzilla and a few other sites. Surprised to not see any box shots or other leaks by now, usually get those at least 2 weeks out.

Glad I bought a 670 on launch day!
 
grambo said:
Looks like mid July for the 660/660Ti according to Fudzilla and a few other sites. Surprised to not see any box shots or other leaks by now, usually get those at least 2 weeks out.

Glad I bought a 670 on launch day!
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definitely cant complain about the 670 its a beast fucking love the boost tech
 
BababooeyHTJ said:
I don't think that they had much of a choice on which memory to use. I don't think that anyone other than Qumonnda was making GDDR5 at the time. I don't know that higher density chips were even available.
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Well regardless they were in a hurry to release 1gb varrients shortly after release. They were in too much of a hurry to beat the 280 to plan effectively. Still a great product though.
 
my BF3 usage MAXED out at 720p gets around 1750MB memory usage.

If I choose to do a F@H GPU client, and run a Source engine game I get anywhere from 1.1GB-1.6GB usage...Did I mention this is @ a whopping 720p RESOLUTION yet? haha yeah also if I run emulated PS2 games and crank the internal resolution I can use up as much memory as I want.

AMD did it right with 3GB models. I need Nvidia cuz I love 3D movies on my Home Theater 720p projector. Gotta go Nvidia for that. So that also means MSI graphics cards is the only quality option imho.

Source game Team Fortress 2 picture running F@H simultaneously, because Source games use like 15-30 percent GPU MAX. I can get away with running both and it's still smooth gameplay on my end. That's a 99% GPU usage number as well in a Source game because of the F@H client in the background doin its scientific cancer and alzhemiers and who knows what else research for us. The upper left hand corner along with 1.2GB memory confirmation at that scene in tf2. If you don't run F@H u should guys, will save lives in the future and tons of gamers on planet so WHY NOT?!, guaranteed!

Nvidia is cheap as [F] and little greedy plain and simple.

s0x7ib.png
 
You can turn off Aero to save a chunk of VRAM if you feel squeezed at the limit.

[H] has tested BF3 at much higher resolutions without hitting a memory wall.

It bears remembering that, while the intentions of Folding@Home are noble and good, there is as yet no hard evidence that their calculations will ever result in tangible benefits.

Not sure what you were going for in your last statement.
 
Chimay said:
I'm guessing Nvidia doesn't see the sub $400 dollar market as a big deal for the 600 series. Is the 500 series still selling that well in the $300 dollar range?
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Hard to justify buying a 570/580 right now when the 7850/7850 are just as fast, use less watts (like around 100 less) and produce less heat.

But damnit I need a $300 nvidia card for my g/f b-day next month....HURRY UP NVIDIA....or AMD is getting my money
 
DASHlT said:
Hard to justify buying a 570/580 right now when the 7850/7850 are just as fast, use less watts (like around 100 less) and produce less heat.

But damnit I need a $300 nvidia card for my g/f b-day next month....HURRY UP NVIDIA....or AMD is getting my money
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A gf that wants a video card for her birthday.

Hold on to that one.
 
Sn0_Man said:
A $300 video card for her birthday. This could get expensive fast... :D
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LOL She already has an I7 950 clocked at 4.4ghz in a lian-li V351 :)

She is using one of my 480 gtx's and I want the bastard back! so a new card is a good excuse
 
DASHlT said:
LOL She already has an I7 950 clocked at 4.4ghz in a lian-li V351 :)

She is using one of my 480 gtx's and I want the bastard back! so a new card is a good excuse
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All that power for facebook games... :p
 
1344 core, 192 bit would be maybe 81% of 680 (slightly ahead 580)
1152 core, 192 bit would be maybe 75% of 680 (between 570 and 580)

Looks like these are being designed to be slightly better than AMD 7870 and 7850.

If GK106 is 1152 cores, then there will be a large gap between GK106 and GK107. AMD has a fairly large gap between the 7850 and 7770, but this would be an even larger gap.
 
bleagh said:
1344 core, 192 bit would be maybe 81% of 680 (slightly ahead 580)
1152 core, 192 bit would be maybe 75% of 680 (between 570 and 580)

Looks like these are being designed to be slightly better than AMD 7870 and 7850.

If GK106 is 1152 cores, then there will be a large gap between GK106 and GK107. AMD has a fairly large gap between the 7850 and 7770, but this would be an even larger gap.
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Price performance on a core that big is going to be interesting... I don't think mvidia beats the 7850 but they beat the 7870.
 
bleagh said:
1344 core, 192 bit would be maybe 81% of 680 (slightly ahead 580)
1152 core, 192 bit would be maybe 75% of 680 (between 570 and 580)

Looks like these are being designed to be slightly better than AMD 7870 and 7850.

If GK106 is 1152 cores, then there will be a large gap between GK106 and GK107. AMD has a fairly large gap between the 7850 and 7770, but this would be an even larger gap.
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They could just do a GK106 salvage SKU, EG the 960 SP part videocardz shows.

Heck that 960 SP part could actually be a pretty big winner if the price is true. If the 680's 1536 SP's is competing with the 7970's 2048, then 960 should compete with a 1200 sp AMD or something, which is the 7850-7870. All for $120-$160 according to that chart, even a 2GB version which alleviates my main concern lack of RAM. Yeah, seems too good to be true.

7850 prices are falling, I even saw a 2GB one on newegg for $210 after rebate I think. So I guess it's not completely crazy. If 7850 and 650Ti end up as low as $160 after some more price settling, then wow, that's pretty amazing. A 7850 fully overclocked could probably challenge a 580 (I know 7870 overclocked does). To get 580 performance (that cost $550 a few months ago) for $160 would be crazy.
 
Shark974 said:
If the 680's 1536 SP's is competing with the 7970's 2048, then 960 should compete with a 1200 sp AMD or something, which is the 7850-7870.
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Doesn't quite work like that. The 7970 has like 60% more cores than the 7870, and like 70% more RAM bandwidth, but it only performs like 20% better. That maks the 7970 a bit of a dog for what it has (same is true with the 7950 to a lessor degree).

Even so, a 960 core could maybe be close to the 7850.

But this is all still just speculation. The GK106 could still end up being 768 cores.
 
bleagh said:
Doesn't quite work like that. The 7970 has like 60% more cores than the 7870, and like 70% more RAM bandwidth, but it only performs like 20% better. That maks the 7970 a bit of a dog for what it has (same is true with the 7950 to a lessor degree).

Even so, a 960 core could maybe be close to the 7850.

But this is all still just speculation. The GK106 could still end up being 768 cores.
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Pitcairn and Tahiti cores are not the same, it is not a dog. Also where does the 7870 get so close to the 7980?
 
I am currently running a 460 GTX. I am thinking of picking up Guild Wars 2. Any suggestions on a mid-range upgrade around $200?

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003VWW2KK/ref=wms_ohs_product This is the 460 I am running. I only game at 1920x1080.

The rig itself is low end, i5-661, but I am thinking of a new build come Windows 8.
 
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What's amazing is that the gtx 570 has held it's value surprisingly well over a 2 year period. If it (570's price) doesn't drop soon, the "$300" nvidia card may actually cost ~$350.
 
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