Flip_Propspin Posted February 21, 2016 Posted February 21, 2016 Howdy! My wife and I just booted up our new computer for the first time today (running onboard graphics) and my brother has been bugging me for months about getting back into IL2 after a long hiatus, so I'm thinking of adding a graphics card to our new rig, firing up the old games and getting BOS. Price wise, I'd be looking for a GTX 970 4 gb, or R9 390 8gb, that is, under $500 Canadian. What we already have:i5 6500 processor Asus z170 Gaming Pro MB 16 Gb DDR4 250 GB SSD + 2 Hard Drives 750 watt EVGA power supply. windows 10. I'm not sure the games the Mrs. wants to play but they would be far more up to date than the old IL2 offerings. Of the two graphics chips, which would work best for BOS? I've also been thinking of getting x-planes if I really get back into the flying. We won't be overclocking the card or the CPU. I'd be grateful for any help, advice, or cautions.
Soarfeat Posted February 22, 2016 Posted February 22, 2016 Hey Flip_Propspin, Here is an interesting comparison. http://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Nvidia-GTX-970-vs-AMD-R9-390/2577vs3481 I believe for these two cards it depends upon your preference ( NVIDIA vs AMD ). They appear very close in performance. Personally, I have gone with NVIDIA cards, mostly out of habit and have not had any problems with any I have owned, I currently am using the Gigabyte GTX 970 G-1 and am happy with the performance. Cheers--sf
=362nd_FS=RoflSeal Posted February 22, 2016 Posted February 22, 2016 Howdy! My wife and I just booted up our new computer for the first time today (running onboard graphics) and my brother has been bugging me for months about getting back into IL2 after a long hiatus, so I'm thinking of adding a graphics card to our new rig, firing up the old games and getting BOS. Price wise, I'd be looking for a GTX 970 4 gb, or R9 390 8gb, that is, under $500 Canadian. What we already have: i5 6500 processor Asus z170 Gaming Pro MB 16 Gb DDR4 250 GB SSD + 2 Hard Drives 750 watt EVGA power supply. windows 10. I'm not sure the games the Mrs. wants to play but they would be far more up to date than the old IL2 offerings. Of the two graphics chips, which would work best for BOS? I've also been thinking of getting x-planes if I really get back into the flying. We won't be overclocking the card or the CPU. I'd be grateful for any help, advice, or cautions. Just a heads up, GTX 970 has actually got 3.5GB of VRAM. 970 is pretty much identical to the 390 overall at 1080p, 390 is slightly better at higher resolutions IL-2 is 32 bit so it maximum memory that can be used is 4GB, this is usually spread 1.5GB+2.5GB across RAM and VRAM respectively. So neither RAM nor VRAM on either of the cards is an issue. Also, since IL-2 is CPU intensive, you should look at getting into some overclock. Good thing is that the Z170 Boards can overclock the i5 6500 and this chip is actually a good overclocker, but Intel being the money grubby bastards they are is probably going to put a stop to that
Dakpilot Posted February 22, 2016 Posted February 22, 2016 Generally Nvidia has a much better history of working with DX9 due to continued driver support for the older API's with newer models. Both have very similar performance overall but the AMD card uses a lot more power and produces more heat, at the kind of resolutions where the R9 390's 8GB of VRam is very useful, the performance is not really suitable and a different option would be desirable. The GTX 970 has 4GB of Vram but the last 500mb is only accessible at a slower speed, however in 95% of real world applications this is not an issue, born out in performance tests, at very high resolution's neither card is suitable, there are definitely situations where the AMD card will perform better but in the most common situations the GTX slightly edges it Either card is a good choice Cheers Dakpilot
SharpeXB Posted February 23, 2016 Posted February 23, 2016 Also, since IL-2 is CPU intensive, you should look at getting into some overclock. Good thing is that the Z170 Boards can overclock the i5 6500 and this chip is actually a good overclocker As far as I know, only the "K" chips can be overclocked.
Flip_Propspin Posted February 23, 2016 Author Posted February 23, 2016 That's what I understood too. In any case, our regular i5 6500 will be a heck of a lot more powerful than the what was in my previous computer (which is about 6 years old). I think I'm going with the nvidia GTX. I'm grateful for the advice!
SharpeXB Posted February 23, 2016 Posted February 23, 2016 (edited) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZFOfO9BuagThe guys in this video are complaining about a $20 price difference between a i5-6600 and i5-6600KMaybe they could earn an extra $20 by not wasting time on YouTube rants... Edited February 23, 2016 by SharpeXB
SCG_Space_Ghost Posted February 23, 2016 Posted February 23, 2016 As far as I know, only the "K" chips can be overclocked. K is unlocked for higher multiplier overclocks. Non-K is overclockable... At least for the time... But generally not as overclockable as their K-series cousins. 1
Matt Posted February 24, 2016 Posted February 24, 2016 I just upgraded from a 660 TI to a GTX 970. I didn't do this for BoS and, as expected, got almost zero increase in performance in BoS. But for other games, like Witcher 3 for instance, the difference is extreme and it exceeded my expectations. Having said that, there are basically only two reasons why I went for the 970. First being same power usage as before, so I could keep my old PSU (would've needed to upgrade mine for a R9 390) and because I never had any issues with NVIDIA and plenty of problems with ATI in the past. Otherwise I would've went with the R9, because it's the better card for that price.
No_85_Gramps Posted February 24, 2016 Posted February 24, 2016 I just upgraded from a 660 TI to a GTX 970. I didn't do this for BoS and, as expected, got almost zero increase in performance in BoS. But for other games, like Witcher 3 for instance, the difference is extreme and it exceeded my expectations. Interesting, I just upgraded from a 750ti to a 970 and definitely saw an increase in performance in BOS, still an occasional stutter but overall tons better. W/the 750ti I was running balanced settings, no ssao/hdr, aa x4, and ground detail x4. This is at 1080p. Increasing to ultra settings, and leaving the rest as is, resulted in better performance overall w/the 970. With 3 Yaks and 6 HE-111's in the sky the frame rate will drop slightly below 50 when there is a lot of action, but for the most part the performance is lots better. That occasional stutter is still a pain. I have yet to fiddle with the Nvidia control panel settings and/or Nvidia inspector.
=362nd_FS=RoflSeal Posted February 24, 2016 Posted February 24, 2016 (edited) As far as I know, only the "K" chips can be overclocked. Non K Skylake CPUs can be overclocked with a Z170 chipset motherboard by upping base clock, and can achieve nearly same stable clock as K (4.4-4.5Ghz compared to 4.6 to 4.8Ghz avg). Edited February 24, 2016 by RoflSeal
Flip_Propspin Posted February 25, 2016 Author Posted February 25, 2016 Woot! My Asus GTX 970 Strix arrived today! It's pretty massive but it should fit.
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