[Duncan]

I don't believe that I'll lose too much sleep only having Asus Strix OC 980ti 2xSLI compared to those jumping on the 1080...

As a general rule these days, how many generations do you guys leave it before jumping on the next best thing? - I'm thinking that I might ride this out until a '1280'... how long do you leave it?

 

[Zojokkeli]

I don't think there's a reason to upgrade 980Ti just yet, maybe when the big pascal comes and if you're interested in 4k.
 
However, I'll upgrade my 980 STRIX to a 1080 as soon as the availability gets better and the prices have come down to the promised levels.

 

[vantt1]

As a general rule these days, how many generations do you guys leave it before jumping on the next best thing? - I'm thinking that I might ride this out until a '1280'... how long do you leave it?

Whenever I feel like it. My last upgrade was a three generation jump (Radeon HD 5770 to the R7 370, that's three, right?), but there's a high likelihood that my next upgrade's gonna be a one generation jump (to the RX 480).

 

[Tangster]

I don't believe that I'll lose too much sleep only having Asus Strix OC 980ti 2xSLI compared to those jumping on the 1080...

As a general rule these days, how many generations do you guys leave it before jumping on the next best thing? - I'm thinking that I might ride this out until a '1280'... how long do you leave it?

Until you feel the card you currently own isn't good enough for the games you play at the resolution you play?

 

[seanwee]

Until you feel the card you currently own isn't good enough for the games you play at the resolution you play?

That would be me

 

[seanwee]

http://wccftech.com/amd-rx-480-gaming-benchmarks-leaked/

 

[NamelessPFG]

I don't believe that I'll lose too much sleep only having Asus Strix OC 980ti 2xSLI compared to those jumping on the 1080...

As a general rule these days, how many generations do you guys leave it before jumping on the next best thing? - I'm thinking that I might ride this out until a '1280'... how long do you leave it?

 
I upgrade when it's financially practical to do so. Changing graphics cards like underwear as some can afford to do (980 Ti/Titan X -> 1080 -> 1080 Ti/equivalent Titan, for instance) is just not an option for me.
 
That means I skip several generations in the process. Last time, with my Q6600 box, it was the 8800 GT -> GTX 480 -> emergency GTX 760 purchase because I stupidly killed my 480 pushing too many volts through it and stressing simply because I strapped a waterblock to the thing.
 
More recently, I set aside the GTX 760 in favor of a GTX 980 that I nabbed for $315 shipped, brand new and sealed, way back in November 2015 or so. I knew Pascal was coming and it was gonna be big, but at that price, I just couldn't pass it up since I wanted to be ready for my Rift the moment I got it.
 
Besides, with NVIDIA finally dropping the RAMDAC on their Pascal cards, it would've necessitated either a new G-SYNC monitor that I can't afford, trying to game on a 13.3" 1080p screen that I meant more for doodling, virtual cockpit interactions and generally being a secondary, supplemental monitor, or hunting down a DisplayPort to VGA adapter with a RAMDAC worthy of a top-tier FD Trinitron CRT. (Spoiler: those adapters don't currently exist and most likely will not exist until the HDFury 5 becomes a thing.)
 
Right now, I haven't been left wanting by the GTX 980's performance in VR games, and I'm sure asynchronous timewarp helps a lot with any frame drops. Besides, the things that could really use an upgrade (DCS World, FlyInside FSX) simply will not perform at a constant 90 FPS on any existing hardware - they're held back by current CPUs and old engines that use them very inefficiently far more than the GPU, with async timewarp being the main thing that keeps them from becoming a juddering, nauseating mess.
 
If it does start holding me back in VR games, chances are Volta will be out by then and make Pascal look like weak sauce by comparison.
 

I also have a core2 quad desktop collecting dust in the corner. To be more specific , its a Core2 quad Q9550 overclocked to 4GHz on air. Even so its slower than my current i5-4460.

 
I had to go for custom water just to keep my Q6600 from cooking itself at 3.6 GHz with the required 1.45V.
 
Even then, it won't touch an i5-2500K or i7-4770K at stock, and that's before factoring in how I have my 4770K pushed to 4.6 GHz (also with the help of custom water, but hindered by the fact that I haven't delidded it yet). Between that and the old P35 board only supporting PCIe 1.1, it's proving to be quite a bottleneck for modern games since it held even the GTX 480 back, and now it's packing a GTX 760.
 
Still, for a nearly nine-year-old system at its core, it's proving to be surprisingly good for general computer usage and even a bit of modern PC gaming. My little bro's enjoying it, at any rate.

 

[seanwee]

   
I had to go for custom water just to keep my Q6600 from cooking itself at 3.6 GHz with the required 1.45V.
 
Even then, it won't touch an i5-2500K or i7-4770K at stock, and that's before factoring in how I have my 4770K pushed to 4.6 GHz (also with the help of custom water, but hindered by the fact that I haven't delidded it yet). Between that and the old P35 board only supporting PCIe 1.1, it's proving to be quite a bottleneck for modern games since it held even the GTX 480 back, and now it's packing a GTX 760.
 
Still, for a nearly nine-year-old system at its core, it's proving to be surprisingly good for general computer usage and even a bit of modern PC gaming. My little bro's enjoying it, at any rate.

Mine has a big ass cooler master vapour chamber air cooler . It overvolts and overclocks very stably , Im using a P5Q3 board so it has PCIe 2.0.

 

[Caruryn]

Following the rule of not spending more than 300EURO for a card and seeing the disappointing rx480 performance i just ordered a used 980ti from amazon.Hopefully it's not oced to the gills and DOA 

 

[Dobrescu George]

Can't go Ati... At that temperature, the guys from Ati might as well open one single electric power plant to feed the entire planet 

 

 
 
Credits:http://9gag.com/gag/aPWD7WQ

 

[seanwee]

  Can't go Ati... At that temperature, the guys from Ati might as well open one single electric power plant to feed the entire planet 

 

 
 
Credits:http://9gag.com/gag/aPWD7WQ

XD

 

[NamelessPFG]

Mine has a big ass cooler master vapour chamber air cooler . It overvolts and overclocks very stably , Im using a P5Q3 board so it has PCIe 2.0.

 
I went from stock to a Sunbeamtech Core-Contact Freezer to custom water (XSPC Raystorm full copper, D5 pump, HW Labs Black Ice GTX 360) on that Q6600.
 
The Core-Contact Freezer happened to be my choice for a big tower HSF since it reviewed well and was a heck of a lot cheaper than the Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme, but the mounting system is a PITA for Intel CPUs because of the mounting bracket basically converting the LGA775 mount to an AMD one - and using fragile push-pins to do so in the process. That and it just couldn't really keep the CPU cool enough for overclocks past 3.2 GHz when stressing with Linpack deriatives (IntelBurnTest, LinX), whereas the custom loop could easily handle all that at 3.6 GHz and then some.
 
As for PCIe 1.1, note that I built it on a Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3P. P45 wasn't released yet (that was in 2008, this was a late 2007 build), and X38/X48 boards were simply too far out of my price range at the time. In hindsight, I probably should've waited another year and then built my system, but at the time, I was so fed up with the Athlon XP 1800+ box I was using that I couldn't wait any longer.
 
I actually get sort of the same feeling with my current 4770K build and the Haswell-DT platform's general lack of PCIe 3.0 lanes compared to Skylake-DT (which are going to be a bigger deal going forward as NVMe SSDs proliferate and things like the Intel SSD 750 want PCIe 3.0 x4 for full bandwidth), but when Micro Center was selling off i7s for $200 apiece, that was just too good of a deal to resist.

 

[seanwee]

   
I went from stock to a Sunbeamtech Core-Contact Freezer to custom water (XSPC Raystorm full copper, D5 pump, HW Labs Black Ice GTX 360) on that Q6600.
 
The Core-Contact Freezer happened to be my choice for a big tower HSF since it reviewed well and was a heck of a lot cheaper than the Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme, but the mounting system is a PITA for Intel CPUs because of the mounting bracket basically converting the LGA775 mount to an AMD one - and using fragile push-pins to do so in the process. That and it just couldn't really keep the CPU cool enough for overclocks past 3.2 GHz when stressing with Linpack deriatives (IntelBurnTest, LinX), whereas the custom loop could easily handle all that at 3.6 GHz and then some.
 
As for PCIe 1.1, note that I built it on a Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3P. P45 wasn't released yet (that was in 2008, this was a late 2007 build), and X38/X48 boards were simply too far out of my price range at the time. In hindsight, I probably should've waited another year and then built my system, but at the time, I was so fed up with the Athlon XP 1800+ box I was using that I couldn't wait any longer.
 
I actually get sort of the same feeling with my current 4770K build and the Haswell-DT platform's general lack of PCIe 3.0 lanes compared to Skylake-DT (which are going to be a bigger deal going forward as NVMe SSDs proliferate and things like the Intel SSD 750 want PCIe 3.0 x4 for full bandwidth), but when Micro Center was selling off i7s for $200 apiece, that was just too good of a deal to resist.

I asked my father to wait a little longer for Skylake to come out but he was impatient and didnt want to wait so he got the 4790K. No NVMe SSDs for him then. Currently the setup is considered to be nearly as good as the Skylake variant but over time the difference will become more obvious.

 

[Kukuk]

Bought me a GTX 1070 and have been playing around with it for the last week or so. I really had my heart set on the 1080, but it seems the only people who can get those for under $900 are the people who plan on selling them for $900.
 
While not the huge upgrade over my GTX 970 I was hoping for, it's still a sound upgrade. Basically all my games run maxed out at 2880x1620 at 45FPS or higher.
 




 
 
Then, of course, less demanding games run 4k@60FPS, like Alien Isolation and Bioshock Infinite.




 
 
But probably the biggest feast for the eyes is The Division. Just absolutely stunning.






 
 
Now I just have to figure out what to do with my old 970. Seems like there's a decent used market for it...

 

[seanwee]

Have you tried overclocking it?