Looking for a 7850 or 7970

[kellymcq]

As it says in the title, I am looking for either of those two cards. I was looking at http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicat...ffiliateID=TnL5HPStwNw-.WrlKzyb9k1orYvG1JUj4A
But it would appear to be a non reference PCB. This is a problem because I am also putting in a water cooling system into this rig. This is my first build although I am very familiar with the process. I don't know much about a WC system.
Specs are going to be
Mobo GA-970A-DS3
Processor AMD 8350
PSU Corsair 850 Bronze
Ram Patriot Viper 1866 8gig X2
HDD Insert random HDD here.

I was going to post the components of my WC loop over on the WC board to check and make sure everything is OK. If anyone sees any bottlenecking issues, or any issues in general, let me know. Thanks for your help!

 

[pwnmachine]

How much did you want to spend since the price difference between the two is nearly double...

 

[Boulard83]

yeah.... 2 REALLY different cards. What you need them for ? gaming ? resolution ?

 

[Mandrake4565]

Not related to the GPU but if you're going H2O to try and achieve high overclocks with that mother board/ cpu set up you are probably going to be disappointed. That motherboard is most likely not going to be able to handle that cpu overclocked.

 

[Ajay57]

Hey MD More like a slow agonizing death or a quick pop!

 

[pwnmachine]

IIRC the "Double D" versions of the XFX cards are all reference boards.

 

[Boulard83]

IIRC the "Double D" versions of the XFX cards are all reference boards.

IIRC you're correct.

 

[pwnmachine]

Not related to the GPU but if you're going H2O to try and achieve high overclocks with that mother board/ cpu set up you are probably going to be disappointed. That motherboard is most likely not going to be able to handle that cpu overclocked.

+1, if you want to see anything worthwhile using watercooling, I would suggest a different board.

 

[Ajay57]

Sorry guys i know this thread is about GPU Cards, but someone really ought to mention what me and MD said! A 4+1 Power phases aint going to cut it and if the OP starts to OC he could face a real problem. Let alone the extra power draw of his new card as well don't you think? I would hate to see something go wrong and we never pointed it out! AJ.

 

[Mandrake4565]

Sorry guys i know this thread is about GPU Cards, but someone really ought to mention what me and MD said! A 4+1 Power phases aint going to cut it and if the OP starts to OC he could face a real problem. Let alone the extra power draw of his new card as well don't you think? I would hate to see something go wrong and we never pointed it out! AJ.

Indeed!

 

[Ajay57]

+1 MD Way to go!!!

 

[EarthDog]

+1 Ajay..(or more accurately the two that pointed it out prior and you!). That is a good point. But to address something you mentioned:

A 4+1 Power phases aint going to cut it and if the OP starts to OC he could face a real problem. Let alone the extra power draw of his new card as well don't you think?

As it reads, and perhaps something was lost in the english to english translation...I dont know. What was said there was alluding to the mobo having to do with GPU and its power. The motherboard and its power phases has nothing to do with the GPU and its power consumption. A PCIe slot gives 75W and that wont change on a budget board vs high end or 4+1 vs 8+2 setups. Those power phases are CPU and memory, not for the PCIe slot(s).

 

[Ajay57]

That's why i began by saying this is a GPU question, but had to mention like MD his motherboard. Thanks ED.



OK Point taken point made, no problem!

 

[EarthDog]

Not sure you understood (as how you started has nothing to do with what I said). I edited my post while you were replying.

 

[Knufire]

VRMS and power phases on a motherboard only supply power to the CPU. The GPU has it's own VRMs and power phases on the GPUs board.

I think #2 is asking the same question?

 

[kellymcq]

What kind of board should I be looking at? I didn't want to spend that much on a board but since that one is no good I could put around 150 towards a better one and I will only be gaming on one monitor at 1080 and I wanted to spend about 250 on a gpu but everything I see talks about how the 7970 is the best bang for the buck

 

[Knufire]

You might just want to post a thread in General Hardware so we can give advice on all your parts, since it seems like this is where this thread is moving anyway.

 

[Mandrake4565]

Kelly, If you are only gaming on 1 monitor a 7970 in most cases will be overkill. You would probably be fine with just a 2gb 7850. The Ultra Durable version of the motherboard you choose would be the cheapest one I would consider running that cpu on.