Video card pricing

[floppybootstomp]

I'll shortly be buying a new graphics card and so today compiled a spreadsheet of different cards and supplier's prices.

Three computers here, media machine is using Intel i3 graphics which is fine for films and video but now I've sold my Xbox360 I decided I'd like to play a few games that use a gamepad on the big TV screen using the media computer.

To do this I figured I'd need to upgrade a few items - the PSU (currently only a Corsair 430W); the graphics and a hard disk to store the games on.

I had a spare 1Tb hard disk, fitted that and a new Corsair 750W PSU is ordered, this just left the vid card.

My other 2 machines have an Nvidia 660 and 560 so I figured I'd slot these down a machine and put my new card in my main gaming machine. This would mean the GTX560 would go in the media machine which would handle all the games I intend to play on it just fine (mostly racing games - gamepad only here).

So I settled on a GTX 760 4Gb memory, a worthwhile upgrade and not outrageously expensive, imo.

So I shopped around and here's the result.

All of these prices also attract postage charges except Scan, I get free postage with them, but I think I'd rather play hopscotch on the live rail than use Scan again, they upset me once too often.

Cheapest is the Palit from Amazon (also postage free) but I'm favouring the MSI from Dabs (add £10 for next day delivery) cos it'sa a better manufacturer and you get the new Assassins Creed Game with it which is currently selling for 40 quid.

I won't be ordering until at least next week so I have time to consider. Here's the table I compiled, quite self explanatory really. There is one supplier apart from Scan I won't be using - Kustom PC's - and that's because every model I was interested in was out of stock. Kustom PC's are good but they are their own worst enemy when it comes to keeping stock.

 

[muckshifter]

so, who has the better cooling?

re, actually cools and doesn't sound like a Focke-Wolf 190 ... err, actually that's a sweet sounding engine, but you get what I mean.

 

[V_R]

You should get the free game(s) with any of them iirc Flops, anything over a 660?

http://www.geforce.co.uk/games-applications/pc-games/assassins-creed-4-black-flag/bundle

You got til the end of Feb.


If it were me it would be EVGA or Gigabyte, both have great warranties.

 

[floppybootstomp]

In the end went for the EVGA GTX 760 4Gb which cost £257 plus £6 for next day postage from Novatech and it's now in place in my main machine. I chose the EVGA after V_R pointed out the excellent warranty and I done a little reading. I noted the EVGA's construction was better than most of it's rivals and it also ran very quiet.

But I have to be honest I can't really notice much difference compared to my 2Gb GTX 660 except to see my 3DBenchmark figure has improved, as has my average frame rate. Crysis 3 does look a bit good And it is quiet, a tad quieter than it's MSI 660 predecessor. Not much, but noticeable.

I forgot to tick the 'I would like a free game' box when I ordered from Novatech, they're a bit naughty, it's easily missed when ordering. So I got on live chat with a certain lady named Gemma and my code for the Assassins Creed game is in the post.

My 660 is now in my AMD machine and the 1Gb EVGA 560 is now in my media machine, which was the whole point of the purchase. After fitting the Corsair 750W PSU into the media machine the right way up I realised I had no room for the 74Gb Raptor HDD I was using for the Win 7 OS.

So I done a fresh install on the 750Gb HDD (not 1Gb as I mentioned in a previous post) and then installed Steam on that disk. All my films, videos, photos and music are on a 3Tb disk with another 3Tb HDD purely to backup that media.

I only intend to install games that use a gamepad on this machine and so far I've tried the race game 'Blur' using the wireless MS controller and it looks great on the big telly. I can't see me buying a console in the near future, tbh.

Coupla pix, media machine, before & after - new PSU and 'new' old vid card, it's a very tight fit in there: