Desktop Computers

spronk_sl said:

this monitor is amaaaaazing, i think i might buy one. 1440p 27" that does up to 144hz and has gSync, reviews started trickling out. $799 msrp

Asus ROG Swift PG278Q 144hz G-Sync Monitor (w/ GTX 780Ti ROG Matrix) | KitGuru - Part 9

4k gSync monitors are going to be coming out next year too, this is TN and the 4k panels are going to be IPS

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I would LOVE 4k Gsync, but even my 780s in SLI would be no match for that res. I'm even worried that 2 880tis won't be enough at highest playable settings. I'd love to see a Korean equivalent or maybe something in 1440p. I assume the only thing holding a lot of people back from buying 4k is GPU power. 2 880s better damn well do the job.

well a secondary benefit of gSync is matching screen refresh to GPU, even if you don't get the full benefits of 144 hz and 140+ fps you will still always get 144 hz and no tearing no matter what FPS you have, and most importantly without the input lag of doing stuff like triple buffering or vSync. A really, really nice feature if you like to play MP fps.

right now most MP FPS players (bf4 titanfall COD etc) tend to tweak down their settings until they get high FPS with no vsync, so you get a little screen tear sometimes but no input lag. Can make those numbers work better with gSync. Also when I switched from 60hz to 120hz I really noticed a smoother browser/document experience especially scrolling around. I am not a huge AA-care guy, don't notice jaggies at all honestly especially since I play a lot of console games which rarely push the envelope, but screen tearing is something that really distracts and annoys me.

You can try yourself

UFO Test: <div id="title">Multiple Framerates</div>

You're all forgetting that on that 4k monitor you can always go 1080 and it will look as good as 4k (but bigger). Since it's using 4 real pixels for 1 pixel you don't have to deal interpolation.

The same can be said for the 27" 1440p ones which you can run at 1280x720 and it works great for some games (well those without much of an interface so pretty much shooters / adventure).

gogusrl_sl said:

You're all forgetting that on that 4k monitor you can always go 1080 and it will look as good as 4k (but bigger). Since it's using 4 real pixels for 1 pixel you don't have to deal interpolation.

The same can be said for the 27" 1440p ones which you can run at 1280x720 and it works great for some games (well those without much of an interface so pretty much shooters / adventure).

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Native res or nothing. Scaling down your res on a 4k monitor to increase fps is blasphemy! Blasphemy I tells you!!!

Mire_sl said:

Native res or nothing. Scaling down your res on a 4k monitor to increase fps is blasphemy! Blasphemy I tells you!!!

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Running down from native res would drive me bonkers too. Your rig would still benefit from GSync at 1440p, even if you did only average a little over 60 FPS with those dual 780s.

jeydax_sl said:

Running down from native res would drive me bonkers too. Your rig would still benefit from GSync at 1440p, even if you did only average a little over 60 FPS with those dual 780s.

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I run all my games at 1440p at 90hz. Most games run pretty good such as Far Cry 3. I can actually play that game with Vsync on, no tearing and the controls/mouse are responsive. Some other high-end games such as Crysis 3 or Metro don't work well with Vsync on because of the extremely varied FPS so I'm forced to live with tearing.

Now, forget Vsync all together...4k res is about 2.5x that of 1440p. I can easily see 2 780s not getting anywhere near 90fps in Far Cry 3. According to HardOCP, a single 780ti gets about 41 fps (here) so with SLI scaling / overhead of 2 cards, you'd get about 50-60 (maybe 70) fps. That Asus ROG screen is 144hz. If I have that much of a range in terms of Hz, I'd like my games to run at a MINIMUM of 90fps (which is asking a lot for any SLI / 700 series card(s) at 4k). I don't think buying a 4k @ 144hz screen and running games at 40 fps on it (with or without Gsync) is ideal. 90 is realllllly nice, but I'm going have to get used to the idea that I'll be lucky to even get 60fps on a 144Hz monitor @ 4k res. It bothers me, not to mention SLI stuttering in general. It can only get worse @ 4k.

Yeah not to mention they have AA turned off in that link, soa single 780 Ti only gets 24 FPSwith FXAA on. For your cards, FXAA in Crysis 3 at 4K gives 780 SLI34 FPS. But at 1440pyou'd be looking at 68 FPS-ish depending on the rest of your rig. So yeah, 4K Ultra is out of the question for those cards but 1440p seems more than adequate, no? True, you'd want a minimum of 90 FPS but Gsync would make up for that difference. Or you're just saying you'd want to utilize the 144 Hz more?

jeydax_sl said:

Yeah not to mention they have AA turned off in that link, soa single 780 Ti only gets 24 FPSwith FXAA on. For your cards, FXAA in Crysis 3 at 4K gives 780 SLI34 FPS. But at 1440pyou'd be looking at 68 FPS-ish depending on the rest of your rig. So yeah, 4K Ultra is out of the question for those cards but 1440p seems more than adequate, no? True, you'd want a minimum of 90 FPS but Gsync would make up for that difference. Or you're just saying you'd want to utilize the 144 Hz more?

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The funny thing is I'll probably end up with that exact monitor in the future once the new wave of cards come out regardless of shitty performance. It's the 144Hz part. If the monitor can provide me 144Hz, I'd like to exploit that feature as much as possible. I would like games to run as close as possible to 144fps but that's not gonna happen at 4k or even at 1440p. 4k 144Hz is a double whammy, not only do you have deal with all of those extra pixels which makes any system crawl but the monitor needs the extra fps to show off all of its glory.

This is why I'm really skeptical about the 880s coming out in October, plopping down about $21-2200 for the whole setup might be futile because of simple card performance, bad optimization/console ports (favoring console development) and the ever annoying SLI stutter. We JUST had a console launch/refresh and they're STILL stuck at 900p/30fps on a 400 dollar machine. 4k displays seem to be WAY ahead of GPU power and even farther head of game development. There will be literally no market for 4k gaming for years to come, except for the small number of hardware fanatics such as us. It's actually quite grim.

It bugs me how hamstrung the gaming industry is from a graphics stand point due to consoles. Fucking consoles ruining our fun... "Next" gen my ass.

It's the developer's fault. They're too pussy to offer different graphical quality based on platform because they don't want MS/Sony to get mad at them if they make one shine and the other sucks.

Lenas_sl said:

It's the developer's fault. They're too pussy to offer different graphical quality based on platform because they don't want MS/Sony to get mad at them if they make one shine and the other sucks.

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The conspiracy behind Watchdogs (and possibly with The Division soon to come) was basically that Ubisoft went hog wild with graphics (E3 footage) before even knowing what hardware they had to work with. Naturally they used a high end PC for dev. When they ported over Watchdogs to the "new" PS4 and X1 hardware, they saw their game crawling at unplayable frame rates. Ubisoft was sort of "forced" to tone down the graphics of the game on ALL platforms as to not create too much of a gap between "next gen" consoles and the PC. After all, both MS and Sony want to advertise their hardware as cutting edge, state-of-the-art. All off this...within mere months of the new consoles being released. This was/still is the "honeymoon" period between console early adopters and MS/Sony. They couldn't show the world such a huge gap in graphic fidelity so early on. It would not be surprising if Ubisoft was pressured by MS/Sony to tone down all version of the game.

In 2006, the 360 and PS3 launched with a small gap (Call of duty 2 launch title running at 60fps) when comparing them to the PC. Slowly but surely, the gap got bigger and bigger. By the time 2012 rolled around, the PC was way ahead of 2006 console hardware. Fast forward to November 2013 and the new console releases, the gap showed itself to be much bigger and much earlier on. Since the PC is not tied to a single manufacturer like the consoles are, there is no reason for Ubisoft NOT to tone down all versions of the game.

How many of you guys were SURE that the new consoles would be able to push 1080p/60fps back in 2012 when MS/Sony announced the next gen of consoles? I know I did. I assumed it was a given. Apparently it's not. Apparently $400 boxes still can't do 1080p/60fps. This is why I weep when it comes to 4k.

Eh it varies from studio and game the last of us for example is doing[email protected]/* <![CDATA[ */!function(t,e,r,n,c,a,p){try{t=document.currentScript||function(){for(t=document.getElementsByTagName('script'),e=t.length;e--if(t[e].getAttribute('data-cfhash'))return t[e]}();if(t&&(c=t.previousSibling{p=t.parentNode;if(a=c.getAttribute('data-cfemail'{for(e='',r='0x'+a.substr(0,2)|0,n=2;a.length-n;n+=2)e+='%'+('0'+('0x'+a.substr(n,2)^r).toString(16.slice(-2);p.replaceChild(document.createTextNode(decodeURIComponent(e,c)}p.removeChild(t)}}catch(u){}}()/* ]]> */no problem, but its targeted at PS4 only. Ubisoft targets everything under the sun, including Wii U, so its not a huge surprise their games aren't tuned very well.

4k is not that awesome and actually a hindrance (fps hit) for FPS or AAA studio story games. It is awesome however for MMOs, RTS, MOBAs, Sims, and certain indie games. Star Citizen for example I think is gonna be great on it, having all that extra real estate is fantastic when you have a ton of data coming at you. I loved running wow at 1440p for all the extra real estate, I even tried once dual spanning monitors and it was great having all my UI and a big map on one monitor and a clean and free screen on another, although most games won't let you tweak your UI like that.

but yeah your point stands that consoles are always going to seriously hold back PC visuals, a year or two from now especially its going to be a joke how powerful PC cards are compared to ps4/xbone. I just hope more devs don't deliberately neuter the PC versions like Ubisoft is doing.

I kinda miss the days when consoles had their own games, and PC had their own unique games, and it was worth owning all of them because they offered completely different experiences.

You didn't see any Super Nintendo or Genesis games on a PC at the time, and you certainly didn't see things like Civilization, Warcraft II, or Leisure Suit Larry on consoles. Once they started to use the same media in the mid to late 90s(CD-ROM) you started to see more ports, but even at that point they were mostly PC to Console(and usually done very poorly) and not vice versa.

I'd much rather see a couple hundred unique games on each console as well as PC, than a couple hundred games shared across all systems. The variety and choices that we had in gaming 15-20+ years ago just isn't there anymore, unfortunately.

NewEgg has aMSI R9 280on sale for $200 right now. Along with the card you get to choose 3 free games from the gold listfound here.

It is basically a rehashed 7950 but thought I'd share. Definitely the best card you can buy for $200 right now.

Also, they have theRosewill CAPSTONE-750W 80+ Gold Power Supplyfor $52. That is a steal. It is not a modular unit but that is just about all it has going against it. JonnyGuru, one of the best/most respected PSU review sites,gave it very high regards:"With the Capstone 750W unit, Rosewill has become a brand name to take notice of. Gone are the days when the words "house brand" meant something like Deer or Powmax. This unit is efficient, powerful, and extremely well performing. It is as good as almost anything else out there I could name. I do wish it were at least semi-modular, and was a bit cheaper, but that's just about all it has going against it."

jeydax_sl said:

NewEgg has aMSI R9 280on sale for $200 right now. Along with the card you get to choose 3 free games from the gold listfound here.

It is basically a rehashed 7950 but thought I'd share. Definitely the best card you can buy for $200 right now.

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Great deal for anyone doing 1080p/60fps. I have a 280x on a second PC also with a 1440p monitor. The 280x struggles at that res with a lot of games. I just tried Sniper Elite Nazi Zombie Army 2 and had to turn a lot of stuff down. The 3GB is nice on a 280x but the card is simply not fast enough for 1440p (I know I'm being VERY picky). Moral of the story: frame buffer (3GB) is not the only determining factor for resolutions higher than 1080p.

Yeah but keep in mind this just a plain R9 280. Not the 280X.

Here's rough estimates for FPS for games at 1080p Ultra Settings.

BF4:45to50ish
Bioshock Infinite:55 to 65
Tomb Raider: 80+?
Crysis 3: 30-40?

TomsHardware's FPS run-downhere.

jeydax_sl said:

Yeah but keep in mind this just a plain R9 280. Not the 280X.

Here's rough estimates for FPS for games at 1080p Ultra Settings.

BF4:45to50ish
Bioshock Infinite:55 to 65
Tomb Raider: 80+?
Crysis 3: 30-40?

TomsHardware's FPS run-downhere.

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Ya the 280 is a great deal for its performance. Props to the red team for keeping things affordable.

Groover_sl said:

Grab a G3258, appropriate mobo and hsf for about the same. It's unlocked and cheap as hell - should give much better performance when overclocked.

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I almost went this route before my brother told me to add a little more money into the build and gave me a $600-650 budget. Here is what I came up with after the budget change:

Link:Intel Core i5-4690K, Gigabyte GeForce GTX 650 Ti Boost, NZXT Source 210 (Black) - System Build - PCPartPicker


Everything is purchased and I'm building it tonight. Prices listed are what we paid after taxes/shipping. I over nighted a couple of the parts for him (his gf is out of town all weekend... I don't blame him) so that would explain why some of the prices may look a little off. Everything except the RAM and SSD were bought from MicroCenter. RAM was purchased from NewEgg and SSD was from Amazon. I'm pretty glad he added the extra money. This build should last him a minimum of 4 years if he just upgrades the GPU if he ends up finding a new game that requires it. I'll probably end up giving him my current PSU down the line if that potential GPU needs it.

Since I have a Radeon 6950 2gb that's getting pretty old, that R9 280 for $200 sounds like a hell of a deal, but I think I'll hold off and pick up a nVidia 770 soon. That'll be a nice upgrade to what I have, and carry me through another couple years.

You might want to look into an R9 280X like Mire was just mentioning, too. It is about $40 cheaper and+/- 2 FPS of the 770 at both 1080p and 2160p.

This is coming from an nVidia nutjob fanboy too.