Well, the day is finally here…part two! Today is the day we can show you what this beast can do. But first, if you haven’t already, do go read our introduction to TITAN to get a grasp on how TITAN is used and overclocked.
Just because it’s so pretty (I mean, really, it’s a great looking GPU), here are a couple quick photos before we get to testing.
NVIDIA GeForce GTX TITAN
NVIDIA GeForce GTX TITAN
TITAN
Of course, like AMD, NVIDIA also supplies their own benchmarks graphed for our viewing pleasure. As we mentioned, the small form factor is a big deal with TITAN. It’s more powerful than a GTX 680 and quieter to boot.
TITAN: SFF Champion
The other graph we have for you is graphed relatively, not with actual FPS. They compared 3-way SLI TITANs with two GTX 690′s in quad-SLI. Not many games scale well with that fourth GPU and these results bear that out. As a side note, the GTX 690 does out perform TITAN in most cases when it comes to raw FPS. They freely admit that, hence a part of the reason TITAN is an alternative to the GTX 690 rather than a replacement.
Surround Gaming – SLI TITAN vs. GTX 690
So we’ve established that TITAN looks great and you’ve already seen the features it includes. Now you’ve seen a little bit of what you can expect from NVIDIA’s slides. It’s time to put this beast on a test bed and see what it can do.
Test Setup
Like all our GPU reviews, our test bed consists of an Ivy Bridge based system with an i7 3770K and RAM running at a reasonable DDR3-1866.
| CPU | i7 3770K @ 4.0 GHz |
| MB | ASUS Maximus V Extreme |
| RAM | G.Skill TridentX DDR3-2600 @ 1866MHz 9-9-9-24 |
| GPUs | ASUS GTX 670 DirectCU II TOP MSI GTX 680 Lightning HIS HD 7970 X Turbo * 2 x AMD HD 7970′s in CrossfireX** ASUS ARES II NVIDIA GTX TITAN |
| OS | Windows 7 Professional x64 |
*Note the HD 7970 X Turbo was the only GPU tested with AMD’s new driver with our GPU test setup. It is a HD 7970 with strong stock clocks, operating at 1180 MHz Boost and 1500 MHz on the memory.
**The HD 7970s in CrossfireX were a HIS HD 7970 X Turbo and a HIS HD 7970 IceQ X2 GHz Edition, both operating at 1180 MHz on the core and 1500 MHz on the memory, which is the stock clocks for the X Turbo.
Here’s that installed photo again with the nice green glow.
GTX TITAN Installed
Before we start in with the results, we’ll have a look at overclocking the TITAN.
Overclocking
Like all GTX 6xx parts before it, the TITAN has a six percent buffer on the power target. Immediately below that is the temp target slider (which is at 80° C at stock). In between is the prioritization selector. Note these are the overclocked settings. As you can see, the 24/7 stable overclock settled in at a solid +129 MHz on the GPU and a much more than expected + 450 MHz on the memory (actual as measured in GPUz is +225 MHz).
PrecisionX Overclocked
That overclock couldn’t come without a bit of voltage increase. I hinted at it before, but didn’t specify the extent you can overvolt TITAN. It’s not much. The stock voltage on this card is 1162 mV (1.162 V). It can be increased up to 38 mV for a final high limit of 1200 mV (1.2 V). It would be better if there were more voltage to play with of course, but if that would lead to a lot of dead GPUs (and I don’t know if it would), you can’t fault them for preventing that. There’s not a lot of voltage headroom, but some is absolutely better than none!
Voltage Control
We’re giving away a little bit of info about the performance by showing you these screenshots, but what’s an overclock without stability testing?
 3DMark 11 – 24/7 Overclock |
 3DMark Firestrike – 24/7 Overclock |
Yes, those numbers are real and with one GPU.
NVIDIA Boost 2.0
As mentioned in the initial article, the 876 MHz stock boost clock was quite conservative. When run for short periods and a moderate distance from the temp target (at stock that’s 80 °C), it was boosting to 1006 MHz consistently. If you adjusted the fan profile to keep it away from 80 °C, it would probably stay there indefinitely.
The stock fan profile favors silence, so the card lets itself get right to the 80 °C mark. You can see that almost half way through the Heaven line. I took note of the temperature when it dipped like that and it was 77 °C, which is the point where it starts to throttle frequency to maintain the temperature target.
Stock Boost in 3DMark 11 and Heaven
Now things get interesting. What you should first know is that I did adjust the fan profile to be more aggressive after overclocking. The GPU never topped 65 °C during this run, and the temp target was set at 90 °C.
Overclocked Boost Monitoring
The good part is that TITAN is capable of 1100 MHz numbers, pretty consistently. The bad news is that it doesn’t hold above it for very long. Temperature was not a problem here, so there are other factors at play with boost clock. While it behaved exactly as predicted at stock, things were a bit more unpredictable when overclocked.
Temperature and Power Consumption
As mentioned, the stock fan profile built into the TITAN BIOS favors silence over keeping temperatures low. It is designed to keep the card at 80 °C and that’s precisely what it does.
Temperature Comparison
Don’t take this graph as an indication of how well the TITAN’s cooler performs though. At its maximum stable overclock with its maximum voltage, the temperature didn’t break 65 °C.
As impressive as the cool temperatures the GPU runs is the cooler itself. Blower style coolers aren’t known for silence, but NVIDIA did a very good job on this cooler. As blower coolers go, this is the quietest one I’ve heard. Or not heard, as it were. The most audible sound is air. Just, air. It’s not as quiet as some large-fanned, heatpipe coolers we’ve reviewed, but for a blower, its acoustics are impressive.
TITAN was made to be powerful, but also to have a reasonable level of power consumption. While it does draw significantly more than the Matrix HD 7970 (which is clocked at 1100 MHz), it also out-performs it.
Power Consumption Comparison
Ok, enough about measuring the card, let’s put it to use!
Performance Results
All video cards we test are tested per our Video Card Testing Procedure. Long story short – benchmarks are run at their default settings and games are tested at 1080p with all settings turned to max.
Synthetic Benchmarks
3DMark03 has favored AMD throughout the current generation of AMD vs. NVIDIA, but the TITAN brings NVIDIA right back into contention when you overclock it, taking out the single 7970 in our lineup and getting close to the ARES II, though the higher clocked 7970 pair doesn’t waver.
3DMark03
In our only DirectX 10 test, TITAN shows its power. Vantage is strongly CPU dependent, but if you get a big enough disparity in graphics score, it can still show a solid difference. That’s precisely what it does here.
3DMark Vantage
TITAN looks good in 3DMark 11, taking out the HD 7970 by a fair margin and even makes a respectable showing when compared to the dual 7970 options.
3DMark 11
More of the same in Heaven. TITAN is tearing up the single GPU competition.
HWBot Heaven Extreme
Take note: these 3DMark Fire Strike comparison numbers are not from the hardware comparison list above. This is an independent graph from our testing for the 3DMark launch, so just take note what’s being compared.
3DMark Firestrike
Well, TITAN is certainly a benchmarking beast. Let’s see what happens when you game with it.
Game Testing
We’re off to a good start with AvP. It’s not leaps and bounds above the HD 7970, but does win out.
Aliens vs. Predator DirectX 11 Benchmark
Batman: AC is just the opposite. It didn’t scale all that well in CrossfireX, but absolutely takes advantage of TITAN’s powerful GPU. Overclocked, it actually beat the CFX 7970s in this game.
Batman: Arkham City
BF3 brings us back to reality a bit. Still quite healthy gains over the single HD 7970.
Battlefield 3
Civilization V certainly likes TITAN. Most modern GPUs (GTX 680 & HD 7970) don’t show much of a difference, but the processing capability of TITAN makes a huge difference in Civilization V.
Civilization V
Dirt 3 is another strong one, with TITAN performing much closer to the dual HD 7970 offerings than the other single-GPU cards.
Dirt 3
Metro 2033 was equally impressive. TITAN is definitely in a class of its own.
Metro 2033
While we don’t have a database of cards benched with Farcry 3 and Crysis 3, I’m sure you’re all anxious to know how it performs. Time was slim after our benching / gaming suite, but I popped off a few Fraps runs for you.
| Game | Settings | FPS |
| Farcry 3 | 1080p, 8x MSAA, Everything Maxxed | 65.3 |
| Farcry 3 | 5760×1080, 8x MSAA, Everything Maxxed | 25.0 |
| Farcry 3 | 5760×1080, 2x MSAA, Everything Maxxed | 37.6 |
| Crysis 3 | 1080p, 8x MSAA, Everything Maxxed | 37.1 |
| Crysis 3 | 1080p, FXAA, Evereything Maxxed | 68.0 |
| Crysis 3 | 5760×1080, 8x MSAA, Everything Maxxed | 14.0 |
| Crysis 3 | 5760×1080, 2x MSAA, Everything Maxxed | 20.7 |
| Crysis 3 | 5760×1080, FXAA, Everything Maxxed | 22.0 |
But can it play Crysis 3? Yes. Not with all the eye candy up across three monitors, but it can indeed play at what felt like a very smooth 37 FPS on 1080p with everything turned up as far as it would go. (Note the Crysis 3 results were taken very quickly and I have not fleshed out testing for that game yet; it was acquired about an hour before finishing this review and testing time was very slim.)
NVIDIA Surround Testing
TITAN shows its strength with one monitor. At 1080p, TITAN shows it can out-game any card on the  market right now and even get close to the dual GPU monster ARES II. What happens when you plug three monitors into it? Note the competition in this graph is a little different than that above. It was tested only with GPUs that have been in my hands. I’m the only one of our reviewers fortunate enough to have a tri-monitor setup for extreme resolution testing.
| ASUS GTX 670 DirectCU II TOP ASUS Matrix HD 7970 Platinum ASUS ARES II NVIDIA GTX TITAN |
Surround / Eyefinity Testing
The disparity isn’t quite as strong as with a lower resolutions. The ARES II’s dual GPUs really show their strength when it comes to multi-monitor testing. While TITAN is impressive in its own right, showing an obvious difference between itself and the highly clocked Matrix HD 7970, there just isn’t any substitute for having two powerful GPUs processing all those pixels.
Pushing the Limits
Now let’s push on the TITAN with a 4.9 GHz 3770K underneath it. Vantage & Heaven Xtreme were both the most difficult to pass, with no gain on the GPU above the +129 MHz 24/7 overclock. The memory did show it had some more life left in it, cranking up to +550 MHz for all the benchmarks you see here. Both of these are by far personal bests for these respective benches on a single GPU.
 3DMark Vantage – 46890 |
 HWbot Heaven – 3416.781 |
TITAN showed it had some extra MHz left for us in 3DMark 11 and 3DMark Fire Strike; 5 MHz to be precise, completing both of these at +144 MHz.
 3DMark 11 – 14623 |
 3DMark Firestrike – 10242 |
Four benchmarks, all with impressive results, which are all by far personal bests for single GPU benching.
Final Thoughts & Conclusion
Let’s get one thing out of the way first: the NVIDIA GeForce GTX TITAN is indeed the most powerful GPU in the world. As a single GPU card, it leaves all other single-GPU cards in the dust. It also benchmarks like crazy. I didn’t optimize anything for those runs you see. Everything but the overclocks were at default (i.e. detail settings, etc.), so even at those clocks, there are more points to be had. I’ve got a strong feeling that k|ngp|n will be putting an EPower board on some of these and making us all drool.
But…  There’s always a but, isn’t there? This card is a cool grand. One. Thousand. Dollars. It is not what anyone with any bit of sense would call a good deal. As you can see in our testing above, two HD 7970s do a good job of beating it in most situations. Assuming the games you play scale decently with Crossfire HD 7970s  (for around $800, mid-range), you’ll save a good chunk of money by going that route. Or you could spend the same amount on a GTX 690 or two GTX 680′s and have better performance.
NVIDIA isn’t claiming the TITAN will beat those combinations in raw performance. However, two GPUs (or a single GPU on one PCB, the much more expensive ARES II notwithstanding) aren’t always what one would consider silent. They also draw a whole other GPU’s worth of additional power. The TITAN is very quiet. It is also extremely efficient relative to the power it puts out. The TITAN, in this reviewer’s humble opinion, is a very good, $800 GPU. It just has a $200 premium tacked on for being the most powerful GPU in the world.
Let’s not forget the double precision computing performance, the most powerful yet in a consumer part. Not only is this the strongest GPU for gaming, it’s also the least expensive GPU with powerful double precision computing capabilities. It’s not a full on Tesla powerhouse with ECC and some other more specialized features. Enabling DP also drops the frequency to stay within the TDP. There probably aren’t a whole lot of people that will take advantage of this feature, but it may just broaden the market for those that will, with a more reasonably priced option, relatively speaking.
While TITAN’s price may give plenty of people pause, NVIDIA certainly thinks it will sell at a kilobuck. Without a doubt, TITAN does live up to the billing as the world’s most powerful GPU. It runs cool, quiet and efficiently to boot and even overclocks well. For those reasons, it is worthy of being Overclockers Approved.
-Â Jeremy Vaughan (hokiealumnus)
Tags: benchmarks, geforce, gpu, graphics card, gtx, nvidia, results, review, titan
02-21-13 02:25 PM
02-21-13 02:28 PM
What a MONSTER. That said, I think you nailed it in the conclusion... but I will be more blunt (IMO of course). Its a ripoff at that price. Premium or not. This card at 1920x1200 or less is silly, but 2560x1440/1600 I think this thing is a win for those that dont want dual cards when it hits $800. Above that, multi monitor, I would personally rather have 2 680's/7970's than this... if I had to pay for it!
02-21-13 02:28 PM
in some cases almost as strong as 7970x2
making the price justified.
02-21-13 02:37 PM
But because of the price point, IMO, I would much rather own 2 X 7970's if I had a multi monitor setup or just needed the resolution bump. I just cant justify that price. Just my opinion. It is definitely a powerful single gpu solution, though!
02-21-13 02:40 PM
02-21-13 02:41 PM
the TITAN can 3-way SLI, which basically will blow those records completely out of the water. awesome.
allow me to give an alternative view.
Yes, if you have $1000 bucks, buying GTX 690, might be better.
but with the Titan, you are also paying for the potential 3-way SLI set up, which the GTX 690 is limited at quad.
for $3000 bucks, you are buying 'unparallel' performance.
and a $3000 bucks investment in GTX 690, will not give you more than quad-sli from the $2000 set up...
so I believe it for the price.
02-21-13 02:42 PM
02-21-13 02:42 PM
02-21-13 02:44 PM
Side note: Civ V & Metro 2033 graphs were mis-labeled, though the results were correct (that's what I get for working with a cluttered spreadsheet). That has been corrected.
02-21-13 02:48 PM
Im happy to see my dual 7970s will hold thier own against one of these badboys.
02-21-13 02:55 PM
1. 'Limited' at quad... more is a limit?
2. You cant use 3 690's in the first place in SLI, so you are actually comparing quad SLI at $2k vs Tri SLI at $3k+. I would imagine the Titan would win there, but by 50% more to match the price? No? Than still waaay too expensive.
I see your point, and you are right for the 20 people that would do that.
02-21-13 02:59 PM
02-21-13 03:02 PM
I have to agree with EarthDog that the card is a ripoff at the price it currently sits. If it had come in around $750-800 I would actually think about buying one (assuming my wife wouldn't kill me for doing so), but the thought of spending $1000 on a GPU alone that doesn't outperform options that can cost up to $200 less just doesn't have much of a value proposition for me.
Now to see how it does on cold... which I'm sure would require some hard mods, unlike the nice aftermarket solutions like the Lightning/Matrix/Classified
02-21-13 03:06 PM
that's what I mean.
and yes, limited market for sure.
especially since a little worse than GTX 690.
I think I will be one of the 20 !! I am drooling already.
I think my next build's name will be ' Titanium '
02-21-13 03:10 PM
02-21-13 03:11 PM
...and like I said, it's an $800 card with a $200 'FASTEST GPU IN THE WORLD!' premium tacked on top.
02-21-13 03:17 PM
It has its market. Its small. Very VERY small. Its 10 kinds of awesome wrapped up in one very expensive package. If I had the money at $800 I would consider it for my setup. At $1k though, LOLNO.
02-21-13 03:55 PM
02-21-13 04:08 PM
02-21-13 04:08 PM
Don't forget you can get two 7970s on one PCB for $800, too.
It's impressive single die performance, but woefully overpriced for the actual performance IMO.
02-21-13 04:16 PM
His PrecisionX's power target goes up to 113%.
02-21-13 04:21 PM
Plus you can take a soldering iron to the card and "adjust" the power target if you want.
I'll give you a walkthrough if you want to chase him!
02-21-13 04:21 PM
02-21-13 04:33 PM
02-21-13 04:41 PM
02-21-13 04:48 PM
<re-insert 'Mother Of God' picture>
I wonder what sort of safety net scores he has behind those.
02-21-13 04:55 PM
02-21-13 05:27 PM
02-21-13 05:31 PM
02-21-13 05:33 PM
Its sometimes surprising how a supposed good aftermarket cooler dont do its job correctly.
02-21-13 05:41 PM
Did I misunderstand you (I really need that caffeine!)?
02-21-13 05:48 PM
i think he meant just other things in general, talking more about the thermal images showing stuff on other stuff that is surprisingly not good stuff
02-21-13 05:56 PM
Look these 580's shot. The Gainward phantom, gigabyte SOC and Zotac Amp2 all have aftermarked dual or triple fan cooling but the VRMs end up way to hot under intensive load.
Enough off topic, back to the epicness of the titan, i want more surround reviews of the card ! ! !
02-21-13 06:12 PM
02-21-13 06:12 PM
02-21-13 06:14 PM
02-21-13 06:19 PM
Being serious, probably a thermal imaging camera.
02-21-13 06:21 PM
The titan review with thermal shot
http://www.hardware.fr/articles/887-...peratures.html
Sometimes they do a roundup with similar cards.
7970/50 round up
http://www.hardware.fr/articles/853-...raphiques.html
This is what they use, a Fluke Ti25.
02-21-13 06:27 PM
I was just hoping for a specific model to see how much something like that costs.
EDIT: Thanks for the edit with the Ti25! Looks like expensive stuff
02-21-13 06:30 PM
02-21-13 06:31 PM
02-21-13 06:32 PM
02-21-13 06:35 PM
I am impressed by this card, but I do agree this is overpriced at 1k but it can't be called anything less than the best.
02-21-13 06:41 PM
3DMark Vantage - 46890
HWBot Heaven Xtreme - 3416.78
3DMark 11 - 14623
3DMark Fire Strike - 10242
02-21-13 06:44 PM
02-21-13 07:29 PM
02-21-13 07:39 PM
Made a quick run with Crysis 3 1080p, switching 8x MSAA to FXAA (with everything else maxxed out) and went from 37 FPS to 68 FPS. Truth be told, I'm not a serious gamer and couldn't much tell the difference.
Now, when running 5760x1080, making that same single change did not make that kind of difference. Maybe 2FPS.
EDIT - Pre-order on Newegg: ASUS - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814121724 . EVGA isn't up on the egg yet. You used to be able to pre-order on EVGA's site, but it looks like they're out of pre-orders.
02-21-13 08:13 PM
Can you try running F@H on it? Doubt it will work, but I'd love some ppd numbers if it did.
02-21-13 08:15 PM
hardly seems right.
so i agree titan is overpriced. by about 400-500$ imho.
hopefully AMD will come out with a 8xxx series card that shows the price and performance margins were looking for.
even so i still would most likely not upgrade.
card looks nice tho
i should add im talking about hokies oc'ed runs not stock runs . stock runs im surpassing it still.
02-21-13 10:12 PM
Well, 690 GTX is still a bit ahead but just because its a double GPU with much higher TDP. But lets say the Titan is using same TDP, it would totaly outpace the 690 GTX. So whats the taste of this action? The taste simply is... that we dont get the full potential. Thats simply fact and not a myth, the rest of the story is up to everyones own interpretation.
02-21-13 10:17 PM
02-21-13 10:24 PM
NOt sure what your second paragraph means though.. tasting GPUs...
02-21-13 10:41 PM
02-22-13 02:31 AM
I am not a rich kid.
but for the best single GPU, I don't think it is too bad.
you are talking about a Single GPU that can perform 'near X-fire 7970, that's amazing.
while for the same buck, you can buy a GTX 690 for better performance, but if I have that money now, I will buy a Titan. then maybe a year down the road, when I have more money, and games start to demand more, I get another and put them in SLI. 4-way scaling isn't anywhere near double of 2-way, but SLI is nearly double of single GPU.
so in that sense, I believe 2 x TITAN will be better than 2 x GTX 690
02-22-13 08:54 AM
Everyone is criticizing this card, but only looking at it in the context of gaming. While it's still a huge price, if you only look at it from that perspective, it's unfair to compare it to anything else regardless of the fact that it's still a single GPU card and, as such, does still beat every other single. As I've said elsewhere, it's essentially a Tesla card for the masses (so to speak).
02-22-13 10:16 AM
mostly AMD fan boys critizing only I think.
if AMD issued a card called IMMORTAL when these stats, the opposite will be true. lol.
02-22-13 12:07 PM
02-22-13 12:57 PM
How long before there are partner versions of the card with extra bling going for $1250-1500?? Any notes from vendors on that ?
02-22-13 01:26 PM
02-22-13 01:32 PM
NVIDIA never said outright that no one was allowed to modify TITAN. However, if you had to spend R&D money on making a custom PCB and HSF on a $1,000 card with already small market share, made even smaller by the fact that you would have to increase the price, when it's already out-performed by others in its segment....would you?
02-22-13 01:45 PM
EDIT:Link02-22-13 01:53 PM
http://us.ncix.com/search/?categoryid=0&q=Titan
02-22-13 01:57 PM
Be that as it may, I'm just stating what the press was told by NVIDIA. There certainly wouldn't be anything wrong with others bringing it to market from a consumer standpoint, but I doubt EVGA & ASUS would be very happy after being told they had this market.
02-22-13 01:59 PM
anyways, on the canadian part of the site it shows up in the search.
123673
I was just curious as to if maybe EVGA and ASUS are only launch partners but other companies will release versions of TITAN later?
02-22-13 02:03 PM
02-22-13 02:10 PM
I also view Canada as part of NA. Maybe the guys at Nvidia didn't do so well at geography
02-22-13 02:12 PM
02-22-13 02:16 PM
02-22-13 02:17 PM
It's not a bad thought though and I could be wrong of course.
02-22-13 04:24 PM
02-22-13 04:52 PM
I think the Titan is meant to be more of a "gun show" than a money maker...
02-22-13 06:41 PM
02-22-13 07:05 PM
02-22-13 07:08 PM
02-22-13 07:08 PM
02-22-13 08:48 PM
02-25-13 11:12 AM
http://tweakers.net/pricewatch/32792...gtx-titan.html
For a cool 1000 Euro though
Hopefully the price will drop somewhat in the coming months, but I'm not holding my breath. 800 Would have been a better price point.
02-25-13 02:40 PM
02-25-13 02:56 PM
02-25-13 02:58 PM
02-25-13 03:51 PM
02-25-13 07:52 PM
02-25-13 07:53 PM
02-25-13 08:00 PM
That's pretty cool.
03-01-13 11:13 AM
4 x Titan: Here
03-01-13 01:33 PM
EDIT - I love how people at some forums just ignore facts and go off just because they're...well, they're just not nice people. Like this guy, who calls the person buying them greedy and lambasts him for buying four of only 10,000 made. Not only is that a jerk thing to say, it's patently false. He would have seen there is no artificial limitation if he had managed to read just one review of the many out there. But why let the facts get in the way of a good troll?
03-01-13 07:28 PM
Nvidia gives green light for customized GeForce GTX Titan - SWEClockers
03-01-13 08:14 PM
03-01-13 08:20 PM
03-01-13 10:20 PM
03-01-13 10:25 PM
03-01-13 10:31 PM
03-04-13 01:12 AM
they have no reason to make it any cheaper, cause there's basically no single GPU competition out there for it. You want the max 3-way SLI? well, there's no AMD combination that will give you anything close.
as such, the Titan WILL have a market, and since this market 'isn't very large', to keep it profitable, the price of the Titan will need to sit around the $1000 mark. and as long as it does, it will be a profitable stream for Nvidia until AMD comes with an Answer to hurt the line.
but judging on AMD choosing to not fight Intel on the E-series of chips, I feel they will likely also choose not to fight Nvidia on the Euthausist line either. AMD will be happy doing they 'mid-range' business... and this strategy, is what voodoo, inno, and other GPU makers choose, until eventually they were just eaten by the market.
AMD needs a Titan answer to survive.
and I sure hope they do come with one.
03-04-13 02:03 AM
If AMD releases a $1000 gpu that would force both companies to drop prices on the cards and next thing you know they would be $600 due to price competitions. The Titan is only a threat to benching and to people who want to run with the most extreme rigs.
03-04-13 02:56 AM
03-04-13 05:07 AM
03-04-13 05:30 AM
So, depending on the intended application of the Titan, it could be considered a steal at only $1000.
03-04-13 07:25 AM
03-04-13 08:41 AM
yes, price efficency 7970 is higher, but then if price efficiency should be taken into calculation, then the lower end, GTX 560 etc will be even more efficient.
my point was, most companies see themselves decline from the point they fail to compete for the throne. and I am worried that be the case for AMD.
03-04-13 03:27 PM
03-04-13 05:43 PM
well. on the brighter side, technology eventually gets cheaper for everyone to get some.
03-08-13 05:56 AM
03-09-13 01:32 PM
The Way It's Mean to be Played - Nvidia..
03-09-13 02:33 PM
03-09-13 02:52 PM
03-09-13 02:53 PM
03-09-13 03:00 PM
he was stating that in most circumstances there was money leftover from the purchase (and future sale of) of the GTX570 (likely for $350-400 when they were new) adding increased cost to upgrading.
03-09-13 05:06 PM
03-09-13 05:25 PM
03-14-13 02:01 PM
03-14-13 08:25 PM
03-14-13 08:31 PM
http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/forum...ossfire-5.html
03-14-13 08:56 PM
I guess if your a GPU maker and you bring out a great product then you can slap whatever price tag you want on it, but it certainly limits the buyers...for me and my 2cents, this aint a buy for me if it's over $1k the price tag should be lower and probably will be lower in 6 months when another GPU will come out to out perform Titan and there will be another.
03-14-13 09:06 PM
I'm in the process of looking all around to fin a better GPU setup for my 3 screen... 7970's seems to be the best buy currently but not yet enough to convince me. I read too much reviews where they speak about stuttering issue and 4gb 680's are overpriced ... Well i'll stick with this 670 untill more news about 7xx/hd8xxx.....
Sim City and BF3 run great on this single 670. I only need to turn off MSAA.
03-15-13 12:22 AM
03-15-13 04:29 PM
03-15-13 05:33 PM
We all wish the top end stuff were less expensive. Maybe (big maybe) AMD will soon release a card a la the 4xxx series that reshapes nVidia's thinking on pricing. nVidia is in a really good position right now though. They've taken what they've learned from their adventures in the mobile space and applied it to their desktop parts, and vice versa. They currently have the crowns for raw performance, performance/watt, and total watts for their cards. That's a tough combination to beat, and as a company they're going to try to make as much money from that position as they can. They'd be somewhat foolish not to. The trick is to not repeat the GTX280 fiasco by flat out alienating your customers with huge price drops after they've bought in.
I don't think AMD has any surprises up their sleeve near term though. We'll see what happens.
03-15-13 05:34 PM
03-15-13 05:45 PM
AMD/nVidia don't release sales numbers, do they? I wonder who has actually sold more GPUs in each performance segment this time around. The products are closely matched, so which a person buys seems largely tied to personal priorities and brand loyalty.
03-15-13 05:47 PM
That said, the 680 is still $100 more than the 7970. Its power savings wont make up for that $100 difference. 7970 is a no brainer in this context.
03-15-13 06:02 PM
Well, ok, 670. I've never been one to pay the premium for the top of the range cards.
03-15-13 06:08 PM
Plus you won't have to worry about quality issues =P
03-15-13 06:15 PM
03-15-13 06:20 PM
The difference is 20W between the cards.. 50W at most (Ghz edition is 250W, regular is 220W). 50W difference isnt much in a bedroom (assuming its larger than a jail cell of course). Meh.. anyhoo...
03-15-13 07:01 PM
http://www.overclockers.com/forums/s...d.php?t=728378
lolololo
03-15-13 07:03 PM
03-15-13 07:17 PM
Telling people that core brand has more than another is at best misinformation, especially when you're talking non-reference boards that don't have much at all to do with the actual chip itself.
Some people are happy to spread such misinformation, others are happy to make even more of it up and then spread it to fulfill their brand loyalty requirement for the day.
Personally I try to deal in reality only, and in reality the only quality difference between AMD and Nvidia that I have managed to find is that Nvidia's power sections are woefully undersized, while AMDs are decently chunky.
Everything else is roughly equal on reference cards.
A card made by Sapphire is Sapphire's problem, not AMD's. Similarly a card made by EVGA (we're talking actually made here, not reference from Foxconn with a sticker) is EVGA's problem, not Nvidia's.
03-15-13 07:30 PM
Culbrelai, your seemingly constant need to validate your purchase of a GTX 670 as well as consistently disparaging AMD's GPUs is becoming quite tiresome. This isn't the first time I've seen it in a thread to which I've been subscribed. Get a grip man. You purchased a good card, so be happy in your decision. Quit disparaging others' choices.
03-15-13 07:42 PM
I merely presented an alternative opinion. People can buy whatever they want, but I just want them to know what they're getting...
03-15-13 07:46 PM
Do you think someone should be posting all the Nvidia horror stories? Do you think that's actually helpful?
03-15-13 07:47 PM
03-15-13 07:55 PM
Point out nVidia flaws all you want, lol. It is helpful because it shows what other's have had to deal with?
That was more sarcasm than anything, to Earthdog's double emoticon above.
03-16-13 03:10 AM
What do you have to say about:
http://www.overclock.net/t/1265387/gtx-670-problems
http://www.overclock.net/t/1346268/gtx-670-problems
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/...graphics-cards
interesting wording:
I'm honestly getting tired of you bashing AMD's graphics cards because you had a singular problem with one card (which I can't find a thread on here, so no one here had helped you try to fix it)
That isn't to say that one company is far superior to the other, I've always gone for the best bang for the buck (or now whichever will get me the most benchmark points) which has taken me back and forth between the two. Each has had their own quirks and driver issues requiring cleaning and reinstalling, especially when going dual-card (with both brands), but I was able to get it fixed in a day on each side.
03-16-13 03:44 AM
The top one was because he had two different monitors with two different resolutions...
The middle appears to be bad luck, you can't catch everything.
The third, and one you quoted... units didn't go through nVidia's quality testing...
I've never even seen a mention of the existence of quality control for AMD...
Once again, I'm hardly bashing them. Where did I bash them?
I pointed out that a 670 is better price performance than a 7970...
Pointed out a problem someone was having with a 7970...
That's about all...
At no point did I say you shouldn't buy a 7970 over a 670.
Do your own research and find out, or better yet buy your own cards and see what happens, it's your dollar, not mine. I'm just giving you my experiences. Laptop's GTX 580m is flawless, so is this 670.
So I naturally push people to the vendor whom I've had better experiences with, so they can have nice experiences, because I am a nice person =P
03-16-13 04:10 AM
Nvidia does no quality control on cards not sold under their brand. Foxconn does QC on all the reference cards, the individual companies do it on the non-reference and the reference cards they actually produce. That goes for AMD, too.
Nvidia themselves don't build any of the cards, just the core.
Not sure I see a $350 GTX670 vs a $360 7970 that kills it as the best price/performance.
03-16-13 04:51 AM
03-18-13 12:52 AM
but I am but 1 in a million worth of statistics.
back then my problem was with catalyst 11, which was terribly undated for games I play, we wrote on AMD forums, called the reps, which all promised us 'swift' action, it took them so long, I quitted some games before they patched it. My Nvidia experience near opposite, game almost always patched before I even need to realize it.
I know Catalyst 12 is supposed to be awesome.
but too late, I am not giving AMD another chance myself. I had enough of their BS.
I know people might have similar experience with other companies, but obviously I will allow my own experience to guide me.
and anybody that tells me otherwise, I will suppose they are working for AMD as salesman. (welcome to the Internet !)
so.. Nvidia FTW !
03-18-13 03:51 AM
My ATI 5770 studdered on multiple games, their "CCC" was much harder to use than nVidia's program that does the same thing...
Just generally of lower quality, but I've learned my lesson.
No? Maybe you need glasses
http://www.superbiiz.com/detail.php?name=PNY-GTX670
$338
http://www.superbiiz.com/detail.php?name=PC-797_3V3
$380
Regardless, people here are constantly saying you shouldn't go with the most expensive card, because futureproofing ends up costing you more, and you should upgrade often with lower end cards to get the best experience/bangbuck all of that. (and the 7970 is, in AMD's line, with the exception of that only-1,000-made ASUS ROG)
It truly shows AMD bias when you only mention this when people lust for a 680, 690, or a Titan, but not a 7970.
Sure, there is a price difference between those cards (a 7970, 690, and Titan) but the premise is the same. You're telling people that trying to futureproof is bad, yet you recommend the endgame AMD card? And call me biased? LMAO.
So I say get a 670... and if you don't like it... too bad? Not everyone likes everyone elses' opinions.
03-18-13 04:53 AM
How about Skyrim, in which you end up with actors floating in infinite Z level loops and not moving in X/Y due to Nvidia (and only nvidia) issues?
There're examples for everything.
Ahh yes insults! Always an excellent plan to get your point across. Also a clear indicator that a person knows what they're talking about, right? Except... if they did they wouldn't have to resort to insults.
Oh well.
Sadly (for me, anyway) the $360 7970 seems to have vanished, it was a reference card of some sort or another and was on Newegg for months.
Given those prices, and the most recent combined chart I've seen, I still say it. The 7970 runs roughly 10% faster than 670, for 12% more cost, but has 3GB of RAM for SLI/CFX use. I'll take that, thank you very much. Single card? 670's not a bad choice if you aren't playing a game that uses >2GB.
The 7970 isn't the most expensive card, that'd be a Titan. Or a 690, or a 680 (that the 7970 beats, for less money...)
You don't post anti-nvidia stuff in nvidia lust threads now do you?
Some of us like to steer people towards the best solution to the person's situation.
Other people like to steer people towards their own favorite company.
There are situations where I recommend Nvidia. There are situations where I recommend AMD.
The price difference is key, that's like directly comparing the best team in AAA ball with the best team in the major leagues. The top AAA team is the best AAA has! Root for them! Except wait, they're going to get crushed.
I, personally, use price rather heavily when thinking about price/performance. Suggesting that people do otherwise seems... Inconceivable.
I say, get a 7970, for these specific, thought out, tested, well proven reasons. Nobody is asking you to like that the 7970 makes more sense to more people, but at some point you have to realize that maybe, just maybe, the overall opinion of knowledgeable people around here doesn't put brand loyalty first. Nor do I go out of my way to chase down anybody saying anything positive about companies in other sections and mock said company.
Then again, I'm a realist. When Nvidia was clearly better (GTX580 vs 5870/6970, bye bye 6970) I recommended them. Not the 570 of course, as it had blammo issues. Now that AMD rules the price/performance roost in most areas I recommend them.
What I don't do is insult people who dislike my opinion (or accuse them of being salesmen for the opposing company), that serves no point other than to undermine the facts.
03-18-13 07:25 AM
however, I too, prefer GTX 670, is it a little bit more expensive on Price:Performance? yes maybe. But the experience I have with Nvidia makes it more than worth that gap. I think the area you are in global makes a different too with local support, I am in the South East Asia, and AMD support here is just TERRIBLE, AMD support ALWAYS tells you to go back to the reference card vendor here in an indian accent that I fail to understand fully. Whereby nvidia, reference card or not, gives me logical advices that I can follow...
So what I am saying is..
AMD card is cheaper for a reason.
cheap card, cheap service. Maybe computer Gurus like you don't need custy service, and I envy you on that. But folks like me needs it. Sorry I suck so bad. lol.
and nvidia is just better for gaming.
I am told AMD card bench better, which I believe.
but who really cares about performance difference which I cannot tell?
03-18-13 10:53 AM
03-18-13 12:30 PM
...is your biggest problem here. I don't care if you shout from the rooftops how good your GTX 670 is. That's not why I said something to you. It's your attitude and posting style that is tiresome. Your constant jabs (i.e. "maybe you need glasses") are why your posts are meeting such resistance. It's not that you like NVIDIA or the GTX 670, but the way you say it.
03-18-13 12:59 PM
03-18-13 01:03 PM
.
that you couldn't see.
Although now I realize it might've been taken as an insult because I have 20/20 vision and couldn't find a $360 7970 either...
I would expect people here of all places to research, and not just go buying off of what some guy said (me, or you, or anyone else here). This isn't QVC lol.
Sigh.
Unfortunate I think baseball is the most boring thing on earth, otherwise I might've got your analogy... :L
I'm not 'going out of my way'. I stopped posting in that 8xxx series thread in the AMD section a long time ago because I was ruffling too many fanboys feathers, rofl. Bar that, this is nVidia land and I feel a less hostile (although still hostile, considering this whole argument was started by me merely implying that nVidia has better quality products)
atmosphere. I haven't posted much of anything else about to do with AMD...
Once again, I don't find concerns of occular health to be an insult, sorry if you feel that way.
Yup. You get what you pay for.
I always laugh when people whine about how their no brand cereal tastes like dog food, lmfao.
Constant? If you find mild snarkyness to be an 'insult' sorry lol I guess it's just my personality that is meeting resistance. :*(
03-18-13 01:22 PM
If you have anything to say about Titan, please feel free to post.
If you want to talk about 7970 vs 670 in the context of anything regarding Culbrelai, do it elsewhere. Our nifty little "ban from thread" button will come in handy if that particular conversation continues.
03-18-13 02:29 PM
Sadly, not for non-ref PCBs so we (overclockers) are stuck with the meh power section.
03-18-13 02:43 PM
So I definitely agree, it's a shame they don't have a better power section, 'cause the GPUs on these cards are monsters.
03-18-13 02:55 PM
03-18-13 05:24 PM
I'm using a Korean 27" and my GTX580 is growing long in the tooth. The additional headache that I've just run into is that I got a new TV and want to connect it to my computer which already has two monitors. A pleasant surprise- single GTX5xx's can't run any more than 2 displays period, so either I need to get another GTX580, or I need to upgrade. I'm also toying with the idea of getting two more 27 inchers and doing the 3 monitor surround thing.
I don't like SLi, and I don't feel like spending money on something as dated as a 580, so it'll have to be something new. GTX680 is okay, but it likely won't give the bump in performance that I'm looking for.
Looks like GTX670 SLi is a popular choice for high res setups, but it's not particularly cheap in itself, only a couple hundred bucks cheaper than a single Titan really, and even two of them together will have less vram than a single Titan. Plus, watercooling is a must for me, and once I add in the price of another waterblock, it'll likely end up being a wash. Did I mention that I don't like SLi?
Titan seems to be everything I want. Huge amount of vram, huge enough power from a single GPU that I won't feel obligated to add a second. Though, even for someone like me who is no stranger to the priciest of pricey computer hardware, a grand on a single GPU does make me do a double take.
What I really would like to do is just get one and forget about it for the next 3 years or so. It's what I did with GTX580 and Gulftown, which I'm still running. Titan/Haswell should be a major enough upgrade that I won't have to worry about messing with it for a long time to come. That makes the price easier to swallow as well.
03-18-13 05:30 PM
Though, in 3 years, the 7970 will be long in the tooth I fear...
I got a 690 in a lucky happenstance (traded my 680 + CX430 PSU for it and built this guy's PC). I dont like it only because of the 2GB limit.
I think a 7990 is in order here personally... though then again, you dont like SLI and Im assuming CFx either?
Titan for you, in that case, IMO. BUt I would rock 7990... Its what Im going to try to do personally.
03-18-13 06:10 PM
I think the 7970 is best bang-for-buck, trading blows for out-of-the-box performance, but once you overclock it, the NVIDIA lineup is left in the dust since they have no appreciable voltage control for additional overclocking headroom. So if you're looking to spend less than $400, 7970. Like ED said though, it will be long in the tooth three years from now, especially considering it's over a year old already.
If you don't necessarily care about budget and just want the best single GPU there is, Titan for sure.
Both will require image quality and MSAA compromises with three monitors, obviously 7970 more so than Titan. That's just a LOT of pixels for one GPU to handle, regardless of which one you're talking about.
--------------
Speaking of, a little update for you guys - I've arrived at the perfectly playable Crysis 3 settings for triple monitors on Titan:
FXAA, "High" detail settings, "Medium" motion blur and 4x AF. That nets a happily playable, no slow-down 48FPS.
03-18-13 06:17 PM
03-18-13 06:34 PM
2496 vs 2688 CUDA cores
320bit vs 384bit memory bus
5GB vs 6GB vRAM
03-18-13 06:39 PM
03-18-13 06:59 PM
03-18-13 07:24 PM
680 and Titan have a justifiably large gap in price. Titan is more comparable to 690, and personally, from what I'm reading, I would likely prefer a Titan to a 690 as well.
03-19-13 02:21 AM
cause I heard that card can get quite hot !!!
03-19-13 02:33 AM
If you read the review in the OP you'll find 77°c-80°c, that's not bad.
03-19-13 02:41 AM
03-19-13 04:09 AM
now that 20+ hrs of bios modding/testing to learn how this buggy bios works...and throttling resolved (thanks to naennons supplying bios that everyone can edit to their needs)....im able to test different volts and see if I can have 1200 core at lower vcore. Or if I will do 24/7 at 1150....havent even touched mem yet, burned out on bios flashing/testing.
nvidia is supposedly working on a fix...but what a pita it has been. Mine on stock SC bios, despite on EK wb/backplate with gpu temps never above 35C, throttled so badly on any benchmark like fire strike, it was going near stock. On very light 20% load, it was up near 1200mhz...at stock...screwy... now way was I exceeding the bios specified power limits on my stock bios, they were just being ignored. In fact my stock bios specifies core boost of 1254 limit...not that my gpu gave a flip about anything else my bios specified either, until flashing to naennons, at least the card follows the set power limits with his.
I just wanted a single gpu for my 27 inch monitor, no sli.....I like the card, well now that mine is an ok ocer and no longer throttling, but these bioses are still immature, and still dealing with bugs...like have to use precision X (software) to tell the card to follow the bios
ended up with 2 possible solutions, but to avoid long post, im opt33 here
Based on Hokie's review, he got a much better gpu throttling wise than mine, as did many reviewers, as did some others win the throttling/leaky gpu lottery.... though many got the throttling disease like mine...or very leaky ones like mine. Looking at Hokie's review, his stock fire strike run was 8754. That is about where my stock run was, and my OCed one was barely higher...because mine throttled horribly down to near stock with normal benchmarks like fire strike...for which this gpu should not throttle. Granted if exceeding 300W hard limit, like running furmark, all cards would throttle to stock, but normal gaming far cry 3, my card throttled horribly.
Bottom line, if buying a titan, either win the lottery for throttling, wait for nividia to fix/improve the problem as they said they would, or play mod/flash the bios.
here is my pic with non-throttling bios in fire strike, 3dmark11 (attached precision graph showing steady 1228 core under load), so with less buggy bios, can hold rock steady 1228 core, +280mhz, 1.2vcore, and since card has a hard limit of 300W, im not above it. Using exact same power limits as my original bios specified (though my bios was ignored b/c bugged) except with naennons working bios, I would not throttle until 1150, but I raised the soft power limits only 30W from my stock bios (from 250 to 280) and now not throttling even at 1228.
125260
125262
125332
03-19-13 09:58 PM
That,the high temps and price, kinda puts me off on this card, maybe future cards will look at these issues and have them running better.
03-19-13 11:42 PM
03-22-13 12:43 PM
03-22-13 01:37 PM
03-23-13 01:42 PM
the bios they have listed there, get an error message in keplar bios tweaker 1.25 while opening it, will make me stay away from that one, and it is mostly not readable...except the power limits increase..and there are tons of edits on bioses that dont give errors for that.