Looking to upgrade my Graphics Card

[The AmeriCanadian Gamer]

Hey everyone, I'm stuck, I need help.

So right now I have a Sapphire Radeon HD 7770 1GB -
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202011

I want to upgrade, but I don't know which card to upgrade to. Right now I'm looking at;

Radeon R9 270X 4GB ( I can't find much info on this card ) -
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202049

Radeon R9 270X 2GB ( This one has more info, and seems more trustworthy ) -
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814202077

EDIT: Just found the GTX 760, looks pretty good -
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130935

Also, I am wondering if it would be better to just buy a second 7770 and Crossfire them. Its a much cheaper option, but I'm not sure how its performance would compare to a single, higher-end card.

MAX BUDGET: $300.00 Canadian ( including tax/shipping )

A few other notes. I record my gameplay for youtube, so I need to be able to not only run the games well, but record them as well. I currently run BF4 on high ( I cap it at 30fps for recording purposes ), I can run pretty much everything out there, but its when I start recording that I have issues. My other parts are pretty good, so I don't think the issue lies with them. I also record at 1080p.

My other PC components;
RAM - 32 GB DDR3 1600
MOBO - ASRock Z77 Extreme4 (supports crossfire)
CPU - Intel Core i5-2500K 3.3GHz (quad core, sandy bridge)
PSU - Corsair 650 Watt

If there is a much better card that is somewhat over my budget, it would be possible for me to save a bit, but I want to upgrade soon. Any and all input/help is greatly appreciated. Thank you all for your time, I look forward to your responses.

 

[ShinyCharizard]

Definitely don't buy another 7770 for crossfire. That will cause you no end of headaches. The R9 270X 2GB is a good choice. You would only need the 4GB version if you were running at higher than 1080p resolution or running multiple monitors

 

[WouldYouKindly]

Definitely don't buy another 7770 for crossfire. That will cause you no end of headaches. The R9 270X 2GB is a good choice. You would only need the 4GB version if you were running at higher than 1080p resolution or running multiple monitors

I'd give the same recommendation. It's a good card for a good price and has one of the best power to cost ratios of cards currently out there. It's benchmark is about half of a Nvidia Titian(a ridiculously powerful, and in my opinion, overpriced card)for 20% of the cost. Nvidia has been more or less dominant in the top of the line and mid-high markets for a while, but AMDs new(Well, modified and improved) cards, I think, provide some very stiff competition.

In truth, any of these cards would serve you well, but I don't see any reason to spend more than you have to.

 

[Alexander Kirby]

Don't bother with crossfire, the drivers aren't very good and you'll end up with some stutter which doesn't look nice. The crossfire on the new cards (the ones with the new naming scheme a la R9 270X) is much better, but with the 7770 not so much.

The 760 you gave a link to uses that old EVGA cooler which I'm really not so much of a fan of (excuse the pun). It will be more noisy than the ones with the fans facing outwards, but depending on how good the airflow of your case is, may be better as the EVGA cooler will push the hot air straight outside of the back of your case and not into it for it to potentially get recirculated, but it isn't hard to stop that with decently placed case fans. The AMD Sapphire cards you have links to are pretty decent though, looks like they have a vapour chamber which is good. Sapphire don't do NVidea cards though, but my advice will be to get either an MSI GTX 760 or a Gigabyte GTX 760, they'll be a little more money but they'll offer much better cooling with less noise than that EVGA one. But by then it may be out of your budget. (By the way I always get jealous when I look at the prices you get over in the US).

When it comes to recording game footage then the graphics card isn't actually used to capture video, it'll be the processor's job (you have a decent one though, so it shouldn't be much of a problem). That said, NVidea are developing a new piece of software called ShadowPlay that will allow you to use the graphics card to do the recording, potnetially increasing capture performance, so if you want to be using that then you'll need an NVidea card like the 760 you showed.

When it comes to number of GB on the vram I'd say stick to the 2GB one, 4GB would be wasted on a mid end card like the R9 270X and only really comes in handy when 3D modelling. By the time games need more than 2GB you'll probably want to upgrade your whole graphics card. The extra GBs also make it more expensive, the only reason both the cards are the same price is because the 2GB one has a better cooler.

So overall my recommendation would be go for the 2GB R9 270X

 

[Mr.Savage]

Considering your budget, I would recommend the 760. Specifically this one:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127745

The dual fans should keep it cooler, and it comes a bit overclocked, which is nice. It's also cheaper than the EVGA, even without the the mail-in-rebate.

The 270X is also an excellent card, but the price difference between the two is so small, the 760 is definitely the better deal. You'll be getting about 18% more power (Probably more with this overclocked version, around 22%?) with the 760, compared to the 270X.

Essentially, the 760 will net you about 10-15 more Frame per Second over the 270X in most games.

Also, you'll now have access to Nvidia drivers, which are usually better than AMD's.

The only disadvantage the 760 has is it'll use about 100 more watts when under load (the OC version, anyway. if you underclock it to normal speeds it'll use only 50w more).

 

[Alexander Kirby]

...the 760 is definitely the better deal. You'll be getting about 18% more power (Probably more with this overclocked version, around 22%?) with the 760, compared to the 270X. Essentially, the 760 will net you about 10-15 more Frame per Second over the 270X in most games.

I'd like to say that this performance difference is a little exaggerated, and in fact the R9 270X beats the GTX 760 in a few games. However that Zotac 760 is actually a rather good deal, so just forget about the EVGA one.

To expand on the point made above you will have to bare in mind the greater power consumption that both the cards will have over your 7770 (especcially the GTX 760), how many Watts is your power supply rated to produce? About 500 W is probably the minimum you'll want for the kit you've stated above plus one of these cards.

 

[Mr.Savage]

I'd like to say that this performance difference is a little exaggerated, and in fact the R9 270X beats the GTX 760 in a few games. However that Zotac 760 is actually a rather good deal, so just forget about the EVGA one.

Hmm...Looking it up a bit more, I'd actually have to agree with that.

It's definitely game dependent, from what I've seen the 760 is usually better. When the 270X does come out on top, it's only by about 3 to 5 FPS, where as when the 760 varies seems to offer about 5-20 more FPS, depending the game.

In other words, the 760 can be quite a bit better than the 270X, whereas the 270X can be on par, or only slightly better than the 760, depending on the game. And that's probably mostly due to just drivers.

 

[The AmeriCanadian Gamer]

Thank you for the feedback everyone! This is really helpful.

To expand on the point made above you will have to bare in mind the greater power consumption that both the cards will have over your 7770 (especcially the GTX 760), how many Watts is your power supply rated to produce? About 500 W is probably the minimum you'll want for the kit you've stated above plus one of these cards.

My power supply is a 650 Watt with 54 Amps on the 12 volt rail.

I'm starting to think the 760 would be better because of Shadowplay. Currently I use FRAPS (which works well, but it would be nice to run games at a higher setting while recording).

Edit: Any words on how well shadowplay works? From what I've found so far the reports aren't good

 

[Mr.Savage]

Thank you for the feedback everyone! This is really helpful.

I'm starting to think the 760 would be better because of Shadowplay. Currently I use FRAPS (which works well, but it would be nice to run games at a higher setting while recording).

Edit: Any words on how well shadowplay works? From what I've found so far the reports aren't good

Shadowplay seems pretty good from what I've read, but it doesn't appear to be able to record a microphone whilst recording. If you need to speak whilst recording gameplay (Let's plays?) You'd have to use something like Audacity and then edit in the voice track later.

If you don't need to record mic, it's pretty damn awesome. And it's free.

However, If you don't want to mess around with audio tracks, I'd recommend switching from FRAPS (Which is a huge resource hog) to Dxtory, Bandicam, or Mirillis Action!.

Dxtory is as light as Shadowplay (Barely any FPS Drop), but creates huge files, and needs a fast HDD to do 1080p. It can also look quite complex to use for some people.

Bandicam compresses it's video as it records, making very small files, and still uses less resources than FRAPS.

Mirillis Action! Is like a less complicated Dxtory, and is somewhere between FRAPS and Dxtory as far as resource usage, a little bit more than Bandicam. It creates medium sized files.

I'd experiment with the trial versions to see which you like best

 

[The AmeriCanadian Gamer]

snip

I do record my voice with Audacity while I play, then sync them after, so recording voice isn't an issue. I have heard good things about Dxtory though, I'll look into it, especially if its less of a resource hog. I do record to a separate 1TB drive, so file compression won't matter at all.

I didn't realize the recording was so CPU heavy, I figured it would rely more on the GPU. Maybe the problems I've been having all along are with FRAPS. I still want a new GPU tho

 

[Alexander Kirby]

Woah, Mr. Savages link to a Zotac 760 has magically transmuted into one for an MSI 760, even better; MSI's cooler is amongst the best out there [source: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/geforce-gtx-760-review-gk104,review-32717-6.html ] (I've got the MSI 770) and for the same price as the R9 270X that's a pretty tempting offer!

The drivers on NVidea cards are usually better, but at the end of the day have a read up on the features that each card offers and see what piques your interest. (I'd probably wait until more is known about ShadowPlay before jumping into it).

I didn't realize the recording was so CPU heavy, I figured it would rely more on the GPU. Maybe the problems I've been having all along are with FRAPS. I still want a new GPU tho

Yeah, if you can run games fine until you start recording it may be more to do with your processor. It's a fairly decent one (one of my friends has the not-K version) and is OK recording decently at 1080/25p but unfortunately I don't have any experience with BF4 so I can't tell you if it's more CPU intensive than other games (which would explain any difficulty recording) so do have a look at alternatives to Fraps. If you want to try a free one and see if it makes a difference take a look at Xfire (if it still exists; havn't used it in ages).