R9 390 vs GTX 970 (or anything else under $300)


CamEngineering
 Share

Recommended Posts

R9 390 vs GTX 970 (or anything else under $300)

Please give your thoughts on this comparison.

Please rate the importance of speed (970 +/- 22% faster, according to some) and memory size (390 has +/- 100%!! more memory), and any other relevant characteristic as they pertain to Chief.

Note, I am primarily concerned about in-model performance; I'm fine with running raytraces overnight or while at my day job as needed.

Last note: the older GTX 960 still tests to be faster than 970 (which is odd in itself); if you consider speed to be of #1 importance, would you get the 960 instead?... Btw, I'm leaning towards the R9 390.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Get the best one you can, you'll need it ,if not later. The more video memory the better. I would stick with NVidia, but that's just me.

"Get the best one"... this is the reason for my post to begin with; I need advice on which card is indeed "the best one" (under $300).

And yes, I'd like to somewhat future-proof the upgrade; if even possible at that price range.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Get the best you can afford as I did 2 years ago and have not run into any issues running 3 24" 1080x1920 screens with my R9 270. About the only thing that slows me down is a nasty big PDF.  Also please remember that Ray tracing uses the CPU so it is also important to get a good one of those as it runs at 100% capacity.  Wishing I had one like Perry's right now. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I would go with the R9. It's a newer card (2 years?) and it has double the memory which will definitely help in the long run. 

Personally speaking, I have always preferred Nvidia over Ati/AMD due to Nvidia having better driver support. However, if I had to choose between the two in your scenario, I would go with the R9. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks guys.

Ultimately I wasn't happy with the +/- 1.0GHz speed of the R9 390, and I also wasn't happy with the gtx970 only being 4GB (and somewhat old).

So I went with the 1.6 GHz version of the 8GB gtx 1070. It is rated a notch above the 980ti. BTW, you'll be lucky to get a 1070 now for under $450 after applicable taxes/shipping/insurance.

And I got the 4.0 GHz i7-690 and some DDR4-3000 RAM.

With this combo, if X8 doesn't run a lot better (or perfect for that matter), then I give up.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It would have been nice to know if he wanted anything else, I thought it was narrowed down to 2. The 1070 is the way to go unless you want better --1080

Yeah - he also noted a budget and went 50% over it. That being said, it was smart of him to do so as the 1070 is a phenomenal card for the price.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
 Share