GPU for DK2

[ChinaGoldFarmer]

Hello all!

I am in need of a little advice. I currently have to run the rift on too low of settings for my liking. I have everything set on low and SS at .75. With settings at this level I can play the game fluidly. Only lag in RES or system with a ton of commanders. However, this is not to my liking. I've come to the conclusion that the issue is my GPU. Should I upgrade to 2x 280 or just get a gtx 970? 980? Thanks for any advice in advance.

MSI R9 280 (OC)
I-5 4670k (haswell)
Gigabyte GA-Z97x UD5H
Samsung 840 Evo
G.skills ares series 8gb (2x4)
Corsiar vengance series c70 case
Antec 650 watt bronze rated power supply

 

[djbordie]

whatever is cheap for now.

id say what is it worth to sell you 280 locally? vs buying a used 970? vs buying two 970s? vs buying a 980?

an overclocked 980 (moderate overclock, ~1500mhz) is plenty to run ED on max with some super sampling.

that being said, once most of us got a single 980...we wanted SLI 980s...

so maybe your cheapest option is a dual 280 setup?

that being said again, is it enough for 1440p + for consumer release? is it worth the money? or worth the wait?

i personally have talked to many running a single 280 overlocked a bit, with no issue for now on medium settings. its less than a 970 but still OK ish with many tweaks and setups...
maybe wait until the 980ti drops??? that may help the price of 980s and titans go down?

me personally, im thinking dual 980s should kick the everything out of whatever comes in 2016 ... maybe...

 

[Thoemse]

At the moment the game does not support crossfire. That being sait i get judder in res sites with my heavily overclocked r290 too. With crossfire active even more so (it does "work" but performance goes down, not up).
Buying a gpu right now is not the best idea. Amd fiji and nvidia 980 Ti will release within the next two months. Even if they are not in your price range they will affect prices of all current cards.

 

[Frank]

My choice was to go for the Single Nvidia 980, and I happy with that choice. The DK2 is a demanding bit of kit. It eats up all the power you throw at it, and then begs you for more. I can only imagine its sibling being even more hungry. Hopefully by the time of the commercial release there will be drivers that utilise SLI and I'll then have the option to drop in another 980.

The thing about waiting for a couple of months is that the DK2 is on borrowed time. You have to consider if the money you save by waiting is worth the months of fun you'll lose.

 

[AndreyATGB]

A single 980 is not enough for maxed SS with DK2. Not even close actually. I run medium with 1.5x and I get 45-50 FPS in stations but 75 in SC for the most part. Rings are another area where I get FPS drops, as well as the Galaxy map. A 980 is easily enough for a monitor maxed yes, but not even close for DK2 if you want SS. As for what you should get, right now a single card is best since AFR with multi-GPU adds latency. This could change with DX12/new drivers when VR releases. I'd wait a week for Computex and see what AMD and nvidia are releasing.

 

[djbordie]

thats odd andre, i run a single 980 @ 1550mhz and either do 1.5 in game or 2x dsr with a good 72-75 fps.
medium-high settings

but ya no crossfire support hurts....nvidia will be champ as usual.

 

[Olmis Aremja]

Having got a 970 and a DK2 recently, I now regret not waiting a bit longer so I could afford a 980, so that's what I'd recommend if you are desperate to get something now and not wait.

 

[Y2K]

crossfire runs perfect on my setup. low-med settings @ 75fps 1.5ss with dk2.

As for new GPU. WAIT! were about 2 wk off new AMD cards and you dont want to be upgrading now for the DK2, you want to be upgrading in a few months for the CV1

 

[ChinaGoldFarmer]

Thanks so much for all the replies guys! Solid advice seems to be to wait and see what is launched. I was undecided on the 970 or 980, hopefully the price drops enough on the 980 to spur me towards that decision. Was also planning on picking up a 2nd one closer to release of CV1. Have u guys sold old graphics cards? What site do you use to sell yours? Gonna need to get rid of this 280 at some point. Also looking at the rest of my specs, I'm assuming they are all in line with what the CV1 needs except the gpu?

 

[Thoemse]

crossfire runs perfect on my setup. low-med settings @ 75fps 1.5ss with dk2.

As for new GPU. WAIT! were about 2 wk off new AMD cards and you dont want to be upgrading now for the DK2, you want to be upgrading in a few months for the CV1

What GPU's and what profile you using? With R290's the FPS are worse than with single GPU no matter wich profile i try and others report the same. An AMD employee also confirmed they work on fixing it so i am kind of condused that you managed where we others don't.
Achieving 75 FPS is easy. Getting 75 FPS in RES sites isn't. That being said 75 FPS with crossfire on is jittery and with it off it is smooth (both times at 75 solid FPS).

If your experience is different please tell us what you did. Thanks in advance.

 

[Y2K]

didnt do anything special.
i7 4770k @ 4ghz
16gig kingston savage 2400
1000w silverstone psu
Win 8.1 pro
latest AMD R9 BETA drivers.
2x280x vapour-x crossfire clocked @ 1160 and mem @1500 - reduced by 50 for stability

Get almost double fps with xfire enabled have comfirmed this with afterburner both in and out of rift with 2nd gpu running 80-98%

Crossfire has worked for me since beta, never had an issue with it.

pBeta backer.

 

[JediMstr]

Win 10 latest build and Catalyst Beta 15.4 drivers and Crossfire working for me as well (in my case, triple crossfire):

3x MSI Twin Frozr III 7950 overclocked to 1000/1500

Using different drivers and tweaking the CCC settings were key for me.

Various Windows 10 AMD WDM2.0 Engineering Sample Drivers (what Windows 10 likes to install with changes every few weeks to a different build) gives me "ok" visuals with Crossfire turned off, and flashing textures and missing text (sometimes rainbow glowing disco textures) with Crossfire on, and lower and inconsistent FPS in either case.

Using the Beta 15.4 Catalyst drivers (not really made for Windows10), I get 20-100FPS depending on situation (on regular screen at 1440 not Rift, and dipping into 20's and 30's often in station and hanger, but 60-80's flying about) while I have Crossfire off. With Crossfire on I get 56-126FPS (around 50-70 FPS in Hanger and station, often 90's average flying about at 1440 with occasional spikes in the 120's or higher like 200+FPS on spinning ship loading screen). So I'm definitely keeping my Crossfire on for now (until I get a 390x, or two).

I've also noticed that the dreaded "Approaching Destination" FPS slowdown only occurred for me with Crossfire off with the Win10 ES drivers. 15.4 with Crossfire on totally made the Approach slowdown disappear.

All this is with CCC settings of Anisotropic forced and 16x High Quality, Morphologic Filtering off and a 96Hz overclocked QNIX monitor and VSync and Frame Limiting off in game.

Still waiting for my Rift to arrive, so I can update with my experience with it then and see if forcing 75Hz and Vsync changes things.

 

[Darth Sidious]

didnt do anything special.
i7 4770k @ 4ghz
16gig kingston savage 2400
1000w silverstone psu
Win 8.1 pro
latest AMD R9 BETA drivers.
2x280x vapour-x crossfire clocked @ 1160 and mem @1500 - reduced by 50 for stability

Get almost double fps with xfire enabled have comfirmed this with afterburner both in and out of rift with 2nd gpu running 80-98%

Crossfire has worked for me since beta, never had an issue with it.

pBeta backer.

+1 this
crossfire support was added during beta Micheal said it was surprisingly similar to sli.
although im currently running a 980 the two HD6950 I was using did quite well it was that inside space stations the dip was too much and my room running hot plus greed that I updated.

 

[Thoemse]

1. Do you actually use the DK2 - It sort of works with monitors!
2. Did you actually check how the game runs without CF with the DK2? You will be in for a surprise.

Just to clarify. I can force CF on as well and i do get GPU usage on both of my R9 290's. It's just the experience that suffers massively. Even at locked 75 FPS there is constant judder while 75 FPS with a single GPU deliver smooth positional tracking. The next thing is that crossfire has massive dips below 75 FPS while a single GPU doesn't.
Better max FPS are completely irrelevant when gaming with the DK2.

Again please confirm it works judder free 100% smooth with the DK2. Your comments about double FPS make me wonder. You should see 75 FPS no more no less otherwise the Rift is a mess. Even then positional trackign has to be smooth wich it ain't for me with 2 GPU's.

My rig:
i3770k @ 4.7 ghz
16 GB RAM
SSD
2x R9 290's.
1000w PSU
Everything watercooled running stable.

 

[Y2K]

Crossfire works with or without DK2. I always try with + without on new games because i know sometimes they do run better with just 1 card.

On the settings im using med - low and 1.5 ss with crossfire enabled i get hardly no stuttering ( most occur in SC ) and maintain 75fps. This is not achievable with crossfire off.

So on my rig as ive said crossfire has worked well since beta with ED and continues to work in the DK2.

Im also upgrading to 2x390X's for the CV1 ^_^

 

[Thoemse]

Crossfire works with or without DK2. I always try with + without on new games because i know sometimes they do run better with just 1 card.

On the settings im using med - low and 1.5 ss with crossfire enabled i get hardly no stuttering ( most occur in SC ) and maintain 75fps. This is not achievable with crossfire off.

So on my rig as ive said crossfire has worked well since beta with ED and continues to work in the DK2.

Im also upgrading to 2x390X's for the CV1 ^_^

What you describe is the typical SC stutter. From what i read you'd get that with two Titan X's too. It appears that CF is working fine for you.
I am planning on 2xFiji myself but you might be in for a surprise. The unplayable 2xR290 is a thing so who knows how they work. It's not just me. Others reported it too. AMDMatt (AMD employee) posted on guru3d and overclockers UK that they are working on crossfire support for elite dangerous.

Is there anyone here playing ED with the DK2 and crossfire R290's?