Looking to Upgrade GPU. Need Help.

I currently have an R9 380 graphics card and it constantly overheats on me when trying to play games like far cry 4 and a few others. I want to trade it out for either a gtx 1070 or gtx 1080. I have the cash to pay for it, I am just unsure of which brand to go with. I have heard that 3rd party cards tend to have better cooling but not as good customer service if something were to be bad with it. Right now I am looking at Asus Strix cards and Gigabyte G1 cards. I am not going to OC it nor am I going to LQ it. I am running a simple FX-6300 cpu, 16gb ram, win 10, with SSD/HDD and a mid-tier gaming MB. I am using a full case that has plenty of room in it so I won't be worrying about the size of the card. Last notes: I don't want to be paying more than $850 for it.

Please let me know what your recommendations are and if you have one yourself then let me know what you like and dislike about it. Thanks in advance!

You should check first if your CPU and GPU combination won't cause any bottlenecking: http://thebottlenecker.com

If there's bottlenecking, upgrading your CPU is essential if you want to take full advantage of a graphics card like a 1070/1080.

As for selecting the appropriate graphics card, it depends on the resolution that you're planning to play on, a 1070 should perfectly handle 1080p resolutions and even some games at 1440p (assuming max settings).

I think the 1080 is more appropriate in 1440p, but it should be a matter of looking for some benchmarks on the Internet.

I suggest this video in case you're not decided if going with reference card/ third party card: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8RoVXZBsJ8

You will need to upgrade CPU as well in order to use GTX 1070 or that FX 6300 will bottleneck really bad.

I have ASUS ROG STRIX GTX 1070 and Overclocked it to 2073 Mhz and had no issues running it at that speed. Temperature stays stable 65C. That card is a beast but I have 6600k overclocked to 4.2 Ghz which allows it to fully utilize the power of that GPU. I get 120 - 200 fps in Battlefield 4 with all maxed out at 1080p 144hz.

Well if you like new AAA titles a 1080 would be perfectly fine. I would personally go with a 1070 from MSI or ASUS that has at least 2 fans built in. I just think that the 1080 is not worth it's price for the amount of power that it has


Sent from my nuclear fusion reactor

If you are worried about customer support down the road I would avoid Gigabyte. There are a lot of good companies out there but I have always had great experiences with EVGA. Id recommend them to anyone.

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Originally Posted by AOD_Boba

If you are worried about customer support down the road I would avoid Gigabyte. There are a lot of good companies out there but I have always had great experiences with EVGA. Id recommend them to anyone.

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Yeah, Gigabyte has very bad customer support. I had to ditch Gigabyte Z170 Gaming 7 motherboard and sell it after 6 month of having headaches and problems that Gigabyte did not want to fix. I replaced that mobo with ASUS Z170 Maximus VIII Hero. I've been with ASUS for 15 years and never had any problems with them. Their customer service is also great. I had some problems with ASUS G75 gaming laptop once and they fixed it in 2 days and they even allowed me to drop it off and pick it up myself from the service center even though they changed the policy that they would accept only if you ship it but they were so nice and allowed me to come to the service because I needed laptop urgently for my school.

Moreover, I noticed that ASUS are the only company that really care about what customers think. As a proof go take a look on Amazon, they respond almost to every unsatisfied customer or bad review. I've never seen any other company actually reading customer reviews on their products and then respond. On top of that, ASUS ROG STRIX GTX 10xx series are the only GPU's made based on customer demand - yeah pure black awesome design with RGBs ONLY and no bullshit accent colors.

My ASUS ROG STRIX GTX 1070. It is so damn sexy! :-)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQTGVAiso0w

I appreciate all the feedback everyone. And I am planning on upgrading my CPU to an I5 skylake or better within the next month. But if you think I wont get really any performance boost until I get the CPU then I might go ahead and grab it at the same time. Looking to spend around $250 for the CPU so I should be fine considering the bottlenecking issue. And where are you guys buying your parts from. (I am in the US) I was thinking Newegg or amazon but I dont really know of many other reputable companies I can buy from.

I am also looking to upgrade by adding a new monitor within the next 3 months or so. It will most likely use display port because my current one will be using the hdmi port. So if you have any suggestions on a cpu to work well with my gpu and possibly a monitor then I am all ears. Thanks again everyone.

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Originally Posted by AOD_Johnbooth1423

I am also looking to upgrade by adding a new monitor within the next 3 months or so. It will most likely use display port because my current one will be using the hdmi port. So if you have any suggestions on a cpu to work well with my gpu and possibly a monitor then I am all ears. Thanks again everyone.

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Don't forget that you will need a motherboard and RAM as well since you want i5 Skylake. i5 6400 should do fine to start and later down the road you can upgrade to a higher model if needed.

As for the monitor, make sure you get 144Hz monitor. You will enjoy the smoothness of the 144Hz screen. I absolutely love my BenQ XL2411 1080p 144Hz monitor. It's a very good quality built, has very good colors, and the most important very low input lag and response time, which is a huge benefit in FPS games.

On the other hand, if you want to save then just grab FX 8350 CPU and RX 480 GPU and you should be fine.

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Originally Posted by AOD_Johnbooth1423

I appreciate all the feedback everyone. And I am planning on upgrading my CPU to an I5 skylake or better within the next month. But if you think I wont get really any performance boost until I get the CPU then I might go ahead and grab it at the same time. Looking to spend around $250 for the CPU so I should be fine considering the bottlenecking issue. And where are you guys buying your parts from. (I am in the US) I was thinking Newegg or amazon but I dont really know of many other reputable companies I can buy from.

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That's a good choice, I recently picked up a skylake i5 6600k for $210 (currently @ 4.4ghz w/ Corsair H80I) and it's great man; highly recommended :)

If I were to get a new motherboard and ram then I would be building a new rig pretty much. I just got a new SSD a few months back so that completes the package. And I am done using AMD graphics. Each one has had overheating problems and hasnt been able to put out the performance that I needed. But I guess I am going to have to do more research on whether or not stuff will be compatible and the bottlenecking issues and what not. Thanks again for your posts and all the information provided. I am gonna have this thread closed.

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Originally Posted by AOD_Johnbooth1423

If I were to get a new motherboard and ram then I would be building a new rig pretty much. I just got a new SSD a few months back so that completes the package. And I am done using AMD graphics. Each one has had overheating problems and hasnt been able to put out the performance that I needed. But I guess I am going to have to do more research on whether or not stuff will be compatible and the bottlenecking issues and what not. Thanks again for your posts and all the information provided. I am gonna have this thread closed.

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GTX 1060 will work fine with your FX 6300 but if you want to step up to GTX 1070 then you need a better CPU, at least FX 8350.