PC Buying Guide 2011- Q4

[topgear]

before jumping into any conclusion I would like to point out something :

GTX 560 Ti HAWK has strong Tessellation performance
*benchmarkreviews.com/images/reviews/video_cards/N560GTX-Ti-Hawk/Unigine_Heaven.jpg
from this review

now coming to 3DMark 11 benchmarks

MSI GeForce GTX 560 Ti HAWK 3DMark 11 P4853 @ stock and P5108 when OCed with ~213W power consumption and 65C load temp @ stock speed and priced @ 14k at lynx-india

All benches based on guru3d

MSI R6950 Twin Frozr II OC 2 GB 3DMark 11 P4977 @ stock and P5758 when OCed with ~155W power consumption and 60C load temp and priced @ 14.8k at lynx-india

So which one is better and more future proof - share your views.

 

[Jaskanwar Singh]

@ jaskanwar
Read the deusX review i gave properly. Its the best tessellation title released yet and surely looks better than avp and metro as well. Being an AMD optimized game, it responds well to nvidia architecture due to more emphasis on the polymorph engines that compute tessellation.

have you seen that or played that game. then please post some screen shots of both metro 2033, avp, dragon age 2 in comparison to deus x. and do remember to keep the settings high so that we can see the clear picture.
otherwise i cant believe you.

about responding to nvidia etc amd might have to optimize drivers still.

Though metro is a bit shader intensive, deus X has better tessellation and thus has more realistic rendered objects.

oh i see what a tessellation heavy game is deus X -
Screenshots | [H]ard|OCP
1 fps difference in that scene

even dirt 3 uses tessellation with 6950 ahead -

In DirectX® 11 mode the HW tessellator is used to generate hundreds of triangles dependent on how close to the water the camera is. The Domain Shader samples the height field texture to displace the tessellated mesh accordingly, the result, a gorgeous physically accurate water surface.

DiRT 3- Rally racing is back | Game Blog

see how taxing metro is with tessellation-
Metro 2033 Performance review - AnandTech Forums

simply put prove your point by images so that we see which looks better. and uses tessellation to greater extent efficiently

And you are absolutely wrong about that fact that tessellation gives low fps. Properly optimized game will give much better fps and will assist rendering as well. The next metro game dubbed "metro last light" will be more optimized, will look better than metro 2033 and will provide more fps as well.

That's because the developer will now fully utilize and optimize the engine as well as the code for tessellating objects.

if at all you read my post. i meant extreme tessellation.

taking case of unigine -
MSI N560GTX-Ti Hawk Review » Page 10 - Testing: Unigine 2.1 - Overclockers Club

 

[vickybat]

oh i see what a tessellation heavy game is deus X -
Screenshots | [H]ard|OCP
1 fps difference in that scene

So if the difference would have been 10-15fps atleast , you would have been convinced its tess heavy right?

This is what optimization is all about. Read below carefully:

Deus Ex: Human Revolution uses a Phong tessellation "to turn triangle patches into curves based on the position and normals of each vertex defining a patch." (For more information on Phong tessellation, see this PDF whitepaper.) This technique allegedly improves on standard tessellation mechanisms by more realistically mimicking organic human shapes. Tessellation magnitude in Deus Ex: Human Revolution varies with the object's distance from the camera, so meshes further away from the camera will be shown with less detail, which wouldn't be visible anyway.

That's why the good performance and besides its based on crystal engine (tombraider) which isn't that much of a tasking engine.

And why should i provide you comparisons? You have a powerful accelerator than me. Buy the titles are see them for yourself side by side.
If possible, post them here as well.

even dirt 3 uses tessellation with 6950 ahead -

DiRT 3- Rally racing is back | Game Blog

Dirt 3 has tessellation applicable to water and not any other object model. You don't encounter water in dirt 3 that often. So how did it become tess heavy? Actually, it doesn't have to be tess heavy. Water in crysis 2 is also tessellated and it looks better than the water in dirt 3.

Read and comprehend carefully before posting.

Spoiler

before jumping into any conclusion I would like to point out something :

GTX 560 Ti HAWK has strong Tessellation performance
*benchmarkreviews.com/images/reviews/video_cards/N560GTX-Ti-Hawk/Unigine_Heaven.jpg
from this review

now coming to 3DMark 11 benchmarks

MSI GeForce GTX 560 Ti HAWK 3DMark 11 P4853 @ stock and P5108 when OCed with ~213W power consumption and 65C load temp @ stock speed and priced @ 14k at lynx-india

All benches based on guru3d

MSI R6950 Twin Frozr II OC 2 GB 3DMark 11 P4977 @ stock and P5758 when OCed with ~155W power consumption and 60C load temp and priced @ 14.8k at lynx-india

So which one is better and more future proof - share your views.

Nice one topgear.

Actually buddy we should consider real world gaming performance instead of benches to decide performance. Tomshardware recently wrote that they did away with unigine heaven and other benchmarks to measure tessellation because they were early benchmarks and did not give a clear picture. They instead test on real world titles.

So now , they test tessellation with actual titles employing the technique like hawx 2 etc.

Coming to your picture, i think both the cards are worth recommending. Msi 6950 series are one of the best (better than sapphire anyday), runs cool and safely overclockable as well.
So i think both of them can be given as an option at different pricepoints as they can be pushed a bit further owing to their good cooler.

This is my opinion.

 

[Jaskanwar Singh]

So if the difference would have been 10-15fps atleast , you would have been convinced its tess heavy right?

This is what optimization is all about. Read below carefully:


That's why the good performance and besides its based on unreal engine which isn't that much of a tasking engine.

lol, if it uses some tessellation to good extent fps should drop. after all card has to work more.

And why should i provide you comparisons? You have a powerful and accelerator than me. Buy the titles are see them for yourself side by side.
If possible, post them here as well.

rofl, you haven't even seen those games running at highest settings and you are commenting which one looks better and which one doesnt.

Actually buddy we should consider real world gaming performance instead of benches to decide performance. Tomshardware recently wrote that they did away with unigine heaven and other benchmarks to measure tessellation because they were early benchmarks and did not give a clear picture. They instead test on real world titles.

So now , they test tessellation with actual titles employing the technique like hawx 2 etc.

hawx 2 is one nvidia biased game.
AMD Says The H.A.W.X. 2 PC Game Benchmark Is Not Valid : All About The Games
amd complained about use of so called tessellation in that.


coming to unigine -
MSI N560GTX-Ti Hawk Review » Page 10 - Testing: Unigine 2.1 - Overclockers Club

xfx 6950 stock - 41
560 ti hawk - 43

xfx 6950 - 906mhz - 47
560 ti hawk - 1100mhz - 45

@tenida -
this is mafia 2 comparison in toms -
*img683.imageshack.us/img683/2417/07mafiaenthusiast.png
Tom's Graphics Card Guide: 32 Mid-Range Cards Benchmarked : Picking The Right Graphics Card
a hawk beating a stock 6950 1gb by 0.2 fps!

so bottomline -
i will give hawk with sapphire 6950 2gb in 50k rig. but r6950 pe is superior and i will put it alone.
ok?

 

[thetechfreak]

Guys, I think we should have Workstion rigs in our Buying guide as well-

Here is a Sub 60k rig-

Component | Make | Price Processor |Intel Core i7 2600k|15900
Motherboard |MSI Z68A-GD55(B3)|8700
RAM |Gskill Ripjaws X F3-12800CL9S-4GBXL|1600
Graphic Card |ATI FireGL V5600|14000
HDD |Seagate 500GB 7200.12|1900
DVD Writer |LG 22X SATA DVD|900
PSU |Corsair GS600|4000
Case |CM Elite 430|2500
Monitor |Benq G2220HD|7000
Mouse and Keyboard |Razer Cyclosa Gaming Bundle|2000
UPS |APC 800VA|2800
Speakers |Logitech Z313|1500
| Total |62500

Can we suggest different KB and Mouse? Also will a LED monitor be better?

 

[Cilus]

When the fight has started earlier, I was expecting some more violence and was worried about it. But it never took that path and every forum members taking part in the discussion have provided some valuable information to lighten their point.....Thanks to all of you guys.
Jas and Vicky, I think this is a PC buying segment, not to prove which is card is superior or not, we all have basic knowledge about the performance. Now come to the HD 6950 Vs GTX 560 Ti, no one is telling that this is better than that. I've checked all the reviews, benchmarks posted here and found out that if there is some performance difference favoring any of these two cards, it is by very small margin which is not going to hurt the Gaming experience at all. Both of them are having some cons and pros.
Sapphire HD6950 2 GB is a really value for money card, very good performer, better AA performance and comes with 2 GB memory, making it a little future proof. At the same time the card seems to run hotter on the load, cannot handle much overclocking and may be a little less performance in extreme Tessellation.
Similarly GTX 560 Ti Hawk....it is a wonderful card with great custom cooler, already factory overclocked, can be pushed much further due to its good cooling and runs cooler in load and say good Tessellation performance. But it does have higher power consumption, lower performance in AA and high resolution etc.
But look carefully ..........the performance difference is very very small in most of the cases, power consumption and Thermal levels are within check for both the cards.
So mentioning both of them is I think the right thing to do. Lets the buyer decide which one he likes.

 

[Skud]

Months later, the 560Ti vs 6950 still rages on. Wish someone should release the next gen cards immediately.

 

[vickybat]

lol, if it uses some tessellation to good extent fps should drop. after all card has to work more.

Not always true.Code has to be optimized to assist TLP. If tessellation code and rendering code do not interfere then there won't be any significant drop in frames. Besides tessellation in case of both amd and nvidia are handles by dedicated execution units (polymorph engines in nvidia's case).

In deus x the crystal engine has been optimized amazingly to include tessellation without much of slowdown. Its seems you don't know much about tessellation?

Its has nothing to do with pixel shading but instead of creating an 3d object of geometrical figures consisting of vertices, it divides the object with non-overlapping geometrical figures (mostly triangles) just like a jigsaw puzzle.

This actually helps in rendering objects which look close to as in the real world as possible.

Its has nothing to with hdr, shining of objects, textures etc. So if you can assist parallelism in the code and distingusih these factors properly in the game engine, the result becomes good and well optimized and won't end up in slowdowns.

Try to understand this fact.

rofl, you haven't even seen those games running at highest settings and you are commenting which one looks better and which one doesnt.

You don't have to see it to know it. Sometimes reading helps a lot to acquire info. Besides cilus has a 6870cfx system which can play these games in the highest settings. He has all of them as well. Ask him to know more if you can't play these on your own.

My system can play these in high settings but not in highest and honestly from that list, i've only tried metro in dx10 mode and all settings to high and not very high.

hawx 2 is one nvidia biased game.
AMD Says The H.A.W.X. 2 PC Game Benchmark Is Not Valid : All About The Games
amd complained about use of so called tessellation in that.

Its obvious amd will complain.

coming to unigine -
MSI N560GTX-Ti Hawk Review » Page 10 - Testing: Unigine 2.1 - Overclockers Club

xfx 6950 stock - 41
560 ti hawk - 43

xfx 6950 - 906mhz - 47
560 ti hawk - 1100mhz - 45

Unigine is just a benchmark and was used by benchmarkers early on when there were no proper titles utilizing tessellation. After crysis 2 things are starting to flow and more and more games are utilizing this technique.

So now, its good to do away with the benchmarks and start testing on real world titles and actually most benchmarking sites have started to adopt the same.

so bottomline -
i will give hawk with sapphire 6950 2gb in 50k rig. but r6950 pe is superior and i will put it alone.
ok?

That's what everyone was trying to say from the every beginning, and you realized so soon !!!!

Everybody also knows 6950 TFIII is superior and there's no question about it.
Actually, that question was never put up here cause nobody has doubts over its integrity.

 

[Jaskanwar Singh]

Ok techfreak.

vickybat now stop making faces lol. I have lot else to study (12th) and not those jargon.

Now please post those links where deus is mentioned best looking game.
And also the visual liking will vary from person to person.

I will surely try after my card comes from RMA.

 

[d3p]

One more query from my side, Can some confirm the availability of Gigabyte GA-880GM-UD2H ???

I came across a few thread where users complained about the availability of the same. Probably we can suggest Gigabyte GA-880GM-USB3 @ 4.8k.

Next one is Intel Motherboard Service centre doesn't accept entertain any mobo burning case & its clearly mentioned in the Manual that they don't accept burnt mobo under warranty. IMO better to start looking for something else & switch to Gigabyte/MSI or Asus [not applicable for WB buyers].

Intel still lacks of good Quality Components & getting it serviced is PITA.

 

[The Sorcerer]

Months later, the 560Ti vs 6950 still rages on.

6950 all the way.

But what is with the "voting" system. If you're going to put configs based on votes that is mostly done by fanboys, it defeats the purpose of having a PC guide.

 

[thetechfreak]

@Jaskanwar @others

Guys why do you keep ignoring whenever I post suggestion for a rig. Why hardly no one comments?

By the way I just dont think the 200k rigs are usefull. even the poll in this thread agrees with me.
And yes please stop fighting about the cards. 2 Gb 6950 is superior than any version of the 560 Ti

 

[d3p]

@Jaskanwar @others

Guys why do you keep ignoring whenever I post suggestion for a rig. Why hardly no one comments?

By the way I just dont think the 200k rigs are usefull. even the poll in this thread agrees with me.
And yes please stop fighting about the cards. 2 Gb 6950 is superior than any version of the 560 Ti

I think Jassi is not yet done with all the config's [only 50k is made till date] & probably your workstation might be included based on others feedback. Nothing Personal, but got to wait for expert guidance or comments.

 

[Skud]

6950 all the way.

But what is with the "voting" system. If you're going to put configs based on votes that is mostly done by fanboys, it defeats the purpose of having a PC guide.

Frankly speaking, I would prefer a more powerful GPU rather than be bothered about temps, noise, OC and all any day as long as they are not 480/2900XT types of cards. But then, others' preference may vary, so it's better to include both at their price points. In any case, you can pretty blindly pick any 6950 (1gb/2gb/MSI/Sapphire etc.); for 560Ti, you have to be very sure about the model and the clocks.

 

[nilgtx260]

guy look at this & now tell me still 2GB HD 6950 or 2GB GTX 560 Ti ?

MSI Announces N560GTX-Ti Twin Frozr II 2 GB Graphics Card | techPowerUp

and by the way look at this also, I think its probably 8.4GHz if I am not seeing wrong, plz make me sure *www.techpowerup.com/img/11-09-13/67a.jpg

 

[Skud]

@nilgtx260: Check the comments too, some are hilarious.

And about that BD OC, AMD finally has something to cheer for, don't know why they are delaying the launch for eternities.

 

[nilgtx260]

yeah I still doubt double extra vram will deliver extra performance or not.
Bulldozer OC is awesome in fact it will make intel concern.

 

[Skud]

^^ yeah I still double extra vram will deliver extra performance or not.

Doubtful.

Bulldozer OC is awesome in fact it will make intel concern.

As long as they are not showing in retail Intel can sleep in peace. In any case, they are already very very delayed. And Intel is almost ready with SNB-E with Ivy to follow. Looks like BD is becoming the "Duke Nukem Forever" of Hardware.

 

[nilgtx260]

no its like AMD Bulldozer Forever

 

[vwad]

Superb Efforts Yet Again Brothers.

Good 50k and 70k ones especially.