One of the perennial firms that measures GPU market share, Jon Peddie Research, has come out with a report on Q4 of 2014 this weekend and the results are eye opening. According to the data, NVIDIA and AMD each took dramatic swings from Q4 of 2013 to Q4 of 2014.
Q4 2014 | Q3 2014 | Q4 2013 | Year-to-year Change | |
---|---|---|---|---|
AMD | 24.0% | 28.4% | 35.0% | -11.0% |
Matrox | 0.00% | 0.10% | 0.10% | -0.1% |
NVIDIA | 76.0% | 71.5% | 64.9% | +11.1% |
S3 | 0.00% | 0.00% | 0.00% | +0.0% |
Data source: Jon Peddie Research
Here is the JPR commentary to start us out:
JPR's AIB Report tracks computer add-in graphics boards, which carry discrete graphics chips. AIBs used in desktop PCs, workstations, servers, and other devices such as scientific instruments. They are sold directly to customers as aftermarket products, or are factory installed. In all cases, AIBs represent the higher end of the graphics industry using discrete chips and private high-speed memory, as compared to the integrated GPUs in CPUs that share slower system memory.
The news was encouraging and seasonally understandable, quarter-to-quarter, the market decreased -0.68% (compared to the desktop PC market, which decreased 3.53%).
On a year-to-year basis, we found that total AIB shipments during the quarter fell -17.52% , which is more than desktop PCs, which fell -0.72%.
However, in spite of the overall decline, somewhat due to tablets and embedded graphics, the PC gaming momentum continues to build and is the bright spot in the AIB market.
NVIDIA's Maxwell GPU
The overall PC desktop market increased quarter-to-quarter including double-attach-the adding of a second (or third) AIB to a system with integrated processor graphics-and to a lesser extent, dual AIBs in performance desktop machines using either AMD's Crossfire or Nvidia's SLI technology.
The attach rate of AIBs to desktop PCs has declined from a high of 63% in Q1 2008 to 36% this quarter.
The year to year change that JPR is reporting is substantial and shows a 20+ point change in market share in favor of NVIDIA over AMD. According to this data, AMD's market share has now dropped from 35% at the end of 2013 to just 24% at the end of 2014. Meanwhile, NVIDIA continues to truck forward, going from 64.9% at the end of 2013 to 76% at the end of 2014.
The Radeon R9 285 release didn't have the impact AMD had hoped
Clearly the release of NVIDIA's Maxwell GPUs, the GeForce GTX 750 Ti, GTX 970 and GTX 980 have impacted the market even more than we initially expected. In recent weeks the GTX 970 has been getting a lot of negative press with the memory issue and I will be curious to see what effect this has on sales in the near future. But the 12 month swing that you see in the table above is the likely cause for the sudden departure of John Byrne, Collette LaForce and Raj Naik.
AMD has good products, even better pricing and a team of PR and marketing folks that are talented and aggressive. So how can the company recover from this? Products, people; new products. Will the rumors circling around the Radeon R9 390X develop into such a product?
Hopefully 2015 will provide it.
Id like to see AMD’s R9 300
Id like to see AMD’s R9 300 line give some good competition, that means better products and prices for me. Which is great, especially because i have no issue using either brand, so i go with whatever i see fit.
All but one of the 300 series
All but one of the 300 series are rebrands.
I wonder how much AMD’s
I wonder how much AMD’s market share a year ago was artificially inflated by the GPU crypto-coin mining rush which was still a thing at that time, and now that the GPU mining market has pretty much evaporated, things are swinging back to the normal GPU-for-gaming market demands. Or am I over-estimating the impact of crypto-coin mining demand for AMD GPUs?
In my case, I was an AMD GPU user up until the 6990. Its underwhelming performance and the litany of driver performance/stability issues I was experiencing at the time led me to jump ship for a GTX660Ti (still one of the sweetest price/performance GPUs ever, IMO) and I haven’t looked back. Now, as an early G-SYNC adopter (DIY kit FTW) and reliant on some CUDA only applications I guess I have drunk the Kool-aid and will be glowing green for quite a while…
For sure the crypto-coin
For sure the crypto-coin thing made numbers favorable to AMD, despite every reviewer seemingly making editorials to the contrary. Sales is sales, and that crypto-coin fueled demand kept AMD competitive despite the 280 being rebrands, and the 290s being power hogs.
Here is my personal
Here is my personal vision:
Nvidia:
+perfect drivers
+shadowplay
+performance/watt
-shadowplay records audio at laughable 100 kbit (wtf? Even AMD GE allows records audio at 192 kbit)
-shadowplay uses 601 color matrix instead of 709 color matrix (601 color matrix=destroyed color reproduction)
(if anyone from pcper is reading this, pass this info to Nvidia, please. I personally don’t want these two shortcomings to turn into second limited color range bug that was fixed only after 6 years)
-GPUs are more expensive than AMD GPUs with the same performance
-no option to record lossless even on a maxwell card
The best part is that all those options are available in 3rd party software. WTF, Nvidia?
AMD:
+performance/price
+mantle
-drivers (last driver was released in December, are they kidding? Nvidia released two drivers with optimisations for the new games since then)
-AMD GVR records only the games in library, artificial and stupid limitation
-performance/watt (300 watt TDP for 390x, no comments)
You know How LARGE loss-less
You know How LARGE loss-less records would be for 1080p 60fps?
I would ask if mantle at this point is really a + for AMD, Idea of it was great when AMD released it but with DX12 has a release date pretty much set with windows 10? The 300watt TDP that you say for 390x, there isn’t any info on TDP for that card i know if, the rumor for 380x says that will be the TDP for that card since it will be pretty close to a straight re badge. Rumor did say a refined hawaii gpu but we shall see on that.
nV’s drivers are far from
nV’s drivers are far from perfect
You seem to base your
You seem to base your conclusions only on Shadowplay, or 90% on Shadowplay. For people who need Shadowplay Nvidia is a one way ticket. But not everyone cares about Shadowplay.
http://www.pcworld.com/articl
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2887234/nvidia-hit-with-false-advertising-suit-over-gtx-970-performance.html
I’m curious as to the outcome
I’m curious as to the outcome of that lawsuit since like what other tech sites have mentioned, NVIDIA has, technically, never listed down the complete specs on their website, retail packaging, or anywhere else. The only place that information was contained was in the press release packages tech sites got from them. Not sure if that would be considered part of the advertising.
The filing can be read
The filing can be read here
http://www.scribd.com/doc/256406451/Nvidia-lawsuit-over-GTX-970
thats not
thats not true
http://www.geforce.com/hardware/desktop-gpus/geforce-gtx-970/specifications
Memory Interface Width 256 bit giving a bandwidth of 224 GB/s
we do not get a 256 bit memory interface
I find this hilarious.
I
I find this hilarious.
I will trade you an R9 280X with a full 384-bit interface for your “gimped” GTX 970.
I’m sorry to be the bearer of
I'm sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but in court that's not going to hold up. The card does have 256 usable data bus lines. They may not all be active until you hit 3.5GB, but they are there, and they are usable. Nothing in their specs (or anyone's specs) state that all data bus lines are used all of the time. Further, *any* GPU (AMD included) does not saturate the entire data bus width 100% of the time.
GG AMD.
All hail our Intel
GG AMD.
All hail our Intel and Nvidia overlords for the rest of eternity.
Nice going holding back the R9-200 Series for nearly 2 years after the HD 7000 Series because the humble bundle was making you all that market. Now you lost market share.
I bet you hope AMD to become
I bet you hope AMD to become more competitive so you go and buy Nvidia and Intel hardware cheap.
I’ll buy the best card for
I’ll buy the best card for the price at the time I upgrade. It just so happens to have been Nvidia for a long time. They’ve had the lead for a long time and always counter AMD the minute they drop something new. I don’t blame it on AMD’s leadership after consuming ATi dragging the GPU division down to the same timelines as their CPU’s and other products.
Long wait times and no immediate responses as if it wasn’t even taken into consideration that Nvidia would drop something to counter.
Is Jon Peddie Research
Is Jon Peddie Research getting its market metrics from retail channel sales, or from some form of system query system, via the browser/other metric gathered via actual GPUs plugged into/built into the PC/Laptops. There is probably a lot of AMD parts in the second hand channel, owing to the bitcoin craze, now that the ASIC bitcoin/other coin parts are available. AMD did not profit, as much as the retail channel from the coin mining craze, and many bought GPUs from Nvidia, as the price inflated AMD parts reduced AMDs early price advantage, as well as SKU availability in AMD’s retail channel. I would love to see this chart plotted out over 5 years, all business quarters included, just to see the variability over a larger period, and the Bitcoin craze had some adverse results for AMD in market share, in availability of SKUs, forcing consumers towards Nvidia.
Just wondering, this is stats
Just wondering, this is stats for new cards right? Not total active units, right?
Either way this is bad. Monopoly is a bad thing for development, a Duopoly is bad enough.
It wasn’t even that long ago
It wasn’t even that long ago that it was 40% AMD and 60% Nvidia and we still thought that AMD need to light a firecracker to shift momentum. Just prior to even that they were almost neck and neck and have been for an eternity.
This is bad no matter how you want to slice it. I really could never have seen ATi falling in this fashion in its heyday. Hell they propped up AMD for the past 6 years and now AMD whose been struggling for 10 years is destroying two legacies at once.
Successful businesses are
Successful businesses are monopolies. Gotcha. 😐
no, that’s not what I meant.
no, that’s not what I meant. The fact is that when one company is clearly ahead of the competition they (tend to) start to get more comfortable, and less innovative, or work on maximizing profit for existing products, working on new markets, trying not to get stagnant. One of the best things for consumers is fierce/close competition. A recent example is Intel. At the moment Intel has no true competition for its top power CPUs they are not working on more powerful CPUs, they are focusing all their time on another market, low power, mobile and wearables, and emerging markets, all while atempting to maximise chips per wafer and create a CPU for sexy big sell products. I’m glad that nVidia is doing so well, and Intel for that matter, they are earning the market share they are getting while AMD is playing catch-up, but as the gap widens there is less reason for the winner to try so hard.
Basic Grade 10 Economics. At least it was when I was in school.
The real issue is Intel has
The real issue is Intel has so much more money than AMD. Look at the financials. Its ridiculous. AMD CAN’T compete with Intel unless they get help.
AMD is also screwed because if someone buys them, they lose the x86 license.
Really a crappy situation.
As far as Nvidia, they can bankrupt themselves if they don’t get their mobile SoC wins.
well there was a time they
well there was a time they competed with innovation while Intel got stagnant (and made lots of money) HOWEVER Intel learned it’s lesson and spends as much as it should on development. I kinda feel like if AMD had less time Selling bulldozer and more time designing bulldozer they wouldn’t be in the position they are in and could spend more resources competing with nVidia instead of this constant “Just stay alive long enough for shit to get better” mentality they are stuck in.
Just feels like the lawsuit money got pissed away.
Well PR of AMD said bulldozer
Well PR of AMD said bulldozer was gonna get them back in battle with Intel on cpu front, but bulldozer turned out to not perform as well as they were expecting and end up being bit of a turd.
“As far as Nvidia, they can
“As far as Nvidia, they can bankrupt themselves if they don’t get their mobile SoC wins.”
Nvidia has cars SoC wins.
Forget AMD and Nvidia for a
Forget AMD and Nvidia for a minute. Check out those great numbers for Matrox and S3! Lol, what’s it like being in a conference room going over S3’s 2015 strategy? “Alright people, I feel like this will be S3’s breakout year! I feel we can easily continue on with our usual 0.00% market share, or maybe even capture that .10% Matrox just gave up!”
This is a joke right? What
This is a joke right? What part of 0% did you not understand?
It’s a statistical 0% not a
It’s a statistical 0% not a true 0. They still sell products for very specific purposes to small specific needs customers, it’s just that when you compare hundreds of thousands or millions TO hundreds or thousands it’s not possible to explain it as a X.XX%. I suppose the best way to say it would be <0.01% or >0.00%, but statistically non existent.
As far as I know S3 graphics is still an operating company, and they have to be producing something.
I know Matrox still sells a lot of TV cards, not sure if they still produce them.
What part of +0.0% do you
What part of +0.0% do you understand lol
If Nvidia ripped everyone
If Nvidia ripped everyone else off as much as they have me this year it makes perfect sense. See how PR effects that though next year..
All of you fucks wishing for
All of you fucks wishing for AMD to do better have nvidia cards yourselves…
Its YOUR FAULT, not anyone elses. Gaming wise, amd hardware is JUST as good as nvidias and intels, and even cheaper.
Hypocrite dick fags! You get EXACTLY WHAT YOU DESERVE!
Have fun for the rest of your life staying at the same performance level after AMD is out!
Nicely put. Love your
Nicely put. Love your passion. You are the man.
I have an amd card in both my pcs, one on either side of my desk. I would love a flagship card, but not a faux flagship as nividia offers at a sick price that all these entitled assholes buy, only to buy one in a year or so, of course on credit, as they are entitled. It is Ryan’s job to tell them it is worth it, and they listen as crApple folks listen to the verge or engadget only to allow these companies to continue to have huge margins. But I have learned that people’s propensity to consume is unstoppable, especially when they are told by the gov that spending and consumer debt is the American way. I agree with Guiliani that he does not love this country. How the fuck did I stray so far from the subject? Because I am an asshole, but at least I am aware of it.
For all you who continue to buy faux flagship nvidia cards for $580 or so, wait until real life hits you in the face. For the rest of us, we are fucked because this other real life sucks too.
Keep on keepin on with the
Keep on keepin on with the passion dude, just try not to commit a hate crime.
And also, I always buy AMD first, I’m a fan boy since the Am5x86 for AMD and the all-in-wonder 128 for ATI. but the fact is that I will probably be building my next gaming rig sometime in 2016, and if by then the choice is APUs with the same CPU and slightly higher GPU or the same FX processors they have today I will have to go Intel weather I want to or not. If I have to chose betwine a leaf blower in my living room or nVidia I will chose nVidia.
Who buys reference cards?
Who buys reference cards? Only those who know they will be doing watercooling…
wtf – your argument about amd vs nvidia cards is PURE BULLSHIT
I could agree on the cpu`s. They are disappointing.
If you are playing @ 1080p you should go intel.
However
If you are playing @ 1440p it doesnt matter if you go amd or intel.
If you are playing @ 2160p a kaveri athlon will perform EXACTLY as good as a 1000$ intel cpu.
“your argument about amd vs
“your argument about amd vs nvidia cards is PURE BULLSHIT”
Stop being so agresive and think, it’s just making you look like a fuck-wit Eddy.
It has nothing to do with Stock, reference, water, Fan quality or anything else you are thinking. It’s heat and cooling pure and simple. a 75-W-TDP part will not run as hot as a 250-w-TDP card, more heat means more cooling, more cooling means more noise, period. (unless you are using some completly non mechanical cooling system but fringe cases are cool but never statistically significant) No quiet fan argument, because that fan will always be quieter if it is running slower working less. Case in point, I have a Super Quiet r7-260, crazy overpowered after market double thick fan SUUUUUUUUPER quiet. If I had the same fan on a 750ti it would be spinning at half the speed AND I would be getting a nice graphics boost. Why did I go AMD? Because I love AMD that’s why. That love isn’t strong enough to influence my choice forever.
Also, as far as your “If you are playing @…..” while you are mostly right most rigs are for more than just gameing. Good rule of thumb: you should get the best CPU and motherboard you can fit into your budget.
I don’t think Edmond is being
I don’t think Edmond is being aggressive or not thinking. He is using a bit of colorful language is all, all in good fun.
Unless you do SLI, in which
Unless you do SLI, in which case the CPU does matter a little bit at 2160p, but even then it’s only about 5-10% on average if you are using a 4770K.
You have no clue what you’re
You have no clue what you’re talking about. Stop rambling this bullshit because it’s poor misinformed people like you who fucked it up for others.
Keep on keepin on with the
Keep on keepin on with the passion dude, just try not to commit a hate crime.
And also, I always buy AMD first, I’m a fan boy since the Am5x86 for AMD and the all-in-wonder 128 for ATI. but the fact is that I will probably be building my next gaming rig sometime in 2016, and if by then the choice is APUs with the same CPU and slightly higher GPU or the same FX processors they have today I will have to go Intel weather I want to or not. If I have to chose betwine a leaf blower in my living room or nVidia I will chose nVidia.
Put a lid on it. I’m not a
Put a lid on it. I’m not a charity. I buy the cards that work better, and after years of struggling with AMD’s drivers giving me a BSOD twice a week, I have concluded that the cards that work better are nVidia.
I’ll give AMD another shot maybe when it’s time to replace my current card. I hear their drivers have improved, and nVidia is getting complacent. But if AMD goes out of business before then, it’s not my fault. It’s theirs, for failing so abjectly to produce a quality product that would retain my loyalty.
Here’s to hoping AMD pulls a
Here’s to hoping AMD pulls a rabbit out of its hat this time around, performance and efficiency, and prices it aggressively. Nvidia will not be in a position then to rape us. Not to say, AMD would not do the same if the shoe was on the other foot. Still want real flagships in the $300 range, but I guess that is too much to hope for these days since so many people are willing to pay much more.
LOL nvidia rises with a
LOL nvidia rises with a failure like 970?
Just to show the n00b recess word of mouth time works “hey brah my CoD: AW blazes with nvidia yo foreel, AMD sux0rs cause the cool geek that mommy just got him a computer said so!!!”
this is market share for Q4
this is market share for Q4 2014. the 970 was not reported by tech sites until mid january. but even in Q3 AMD lost market share to nvidia (down to 28% from 38% in Q2 2014). AMD probably won’t gain market share from nvidia until they release their next series.
Not with all that stock in
Not with all that stock in the supply chain, there are plenty of AMD new, an used(in bitcoin) GPU SKUs out there, so the new will have to make AMD some share back, and there better be less rebrands in both AMD’s and Nvidia’s future. AMD will not go under, too many console, Apple, and other things to help keep them afloat. SkyBridge, K12, and Zen with hopefully better performance. At least AMD is not all in with just x86, and the K12 custom ARMv8a ISA based SKUs, if it can get the extra wide order superscalar execution pipelines that will compete with Apple’s A9 cores, that and AMD’s graphics. AMD has that going for it with an custom ARM APU, with AMD’s version of HSA baked in. AMD has more hope in the ARM based mainstream tablet market with K12, and maybe a few high end Tablet SKUs built around its x86 offerings. AMD should focus less on getting the x86 into mainstream tablets, it will have K12 for that, and ZEN, if it is what they have been saying, will keep AMD in the x86 game, people are complaining on other sites that ZEN will be mostly for the server side, but even Intel develops for the server side, and derives its consumer SKUs from the server R&D.
AMD also owns the SeaMicro server business so there is revenue that is not tied to AMD’s server SKUs alone, SeaMicro had some customers that utilized Xeon SKUs and once AMD acquired SeaMicro, those contracts did not change, I just hope that AMD gets a power8 license from OpenPower, this could make SeaMicro more competitive in the upcoming licensed power8 server market, and get AMD more business if AMD can combine its GPUs as accelerators for the power8 line, for sure Nvidia is doing this. IBM is not the only one that will be making and selling power8 bases systems, Tyan is already offering Power8 based kit, and every day there are new licensees signing up with OpenPower, ARM style licensing has come to the server market, and the power8’s are server beasts. At least AMD will not have the market slip out from underneath it, by AMD not having all its eggs in one ISA basket, Intel has yet to make a dent in the mobile devices market with x86, so AMD is smart to adopt an ARM architectural license, now for the trifecta AMD should get a Power8 license, that market could explode upward at any moment, and AMD should jump all over that.
There will be plenty of Power8 based systems running Linux, and not tied to IBM, Google is one that is in trials now, and AMD should try to maybe get some business as a supplier of system integration services to Google, like its custom console business, AMD could sell its GPUs as accelerators more, Nvidia will be going after that business, and currently leads in that market also, but AMD has the lower price point, if it can get in the nascent licensed power8 server market and use its GPUs as accelerators.
True, its a never ending ping
True, its a never ending ping pong table battle with green and red.
Weird, I have had both Nvidia
Weird, I have had both Nvidia and AMD graphics cards for many years and never once had any issues with drivers and I usually update hardware every year or so.
Exactly. I also have NEVER
Exactly. I also have NEVER had ANY issues with drivers on any brand.
Im guessing all these kids are trying to run those cards with some home-made CPUs and dont know that you can reinstall windows at all.
It really depends on which
It really depends on which games you play and in what configuration. The sort of people who have issues are the crossfire users, the eyefinity users and people who play AAA games on the day of release and those who play less well known games. If you use an interface that others don’t (display port blacking out bug for example) or configure your sound differently (HDMI sound bug) or a host of other less than usual configurations you run into these sorts of problems, but if you are a 1080p AAA game player then its less of a problem.
This in many ways is about resources. Every game that comes out, every feature and every new innovation takes development time to correct problems. As Nvidia continues to out R&D AMD over the long term the odds are it will continue to dominate on the less well used areas such as older games. AMD is better off spending resources on the mainstream, where many of its customers are more than happy.
Personally, I’ve owned one
Personally, I’ve owned one AMD card, and had a ton of driver problems with it. Driver install program crashed with a MSVC Runtime error, that forced me to install via command prompt in safe mode (a real hassle these days). Oh, and the card died after 6 months.
AMD was never good on
AMD was never good on marketing. The press makes this even worst. AMD messes up, the press eats AMD alive. Nvidia messes up, the press try to excuse Nvidia and point to other “facts”.
AMD is like the weaker team that plays a soccer/basketball/whatever game against a stronger opponent and the referee is also favoring the stronger opponent. So if it was a soccer game it would look like 11 vs 14 players in the field. Well, they better win this match with better discrete GPUs and not just wait for the integrated graphics to give them half of the market on the plate. Because Intel is also getting better in the GPU game.
I agree. The press response
I agree. The press response (even on this site) to the 970 issues was disgustingly apologetic.
Um, AMD messes up a ton is
Um, AMD messes up a ton is the problem. Almost everytime their PR staff opens their mouth it ends up being a mess up. Reason excuse 970 is the issue wasn’t as big of a problem as some made it out to be. It was a problem still yes but only when you pushed as ryan proved super high settings and/or resolution. AMD needs to tell their PR department to stop digging them a hole they can’t get out of.
Blatant false advertising
Blatant false advertising isn’t a big deal now?
Sure AMD messes up sometimes (especially in marketing) but they have never tried to deliberately mislead customers as Nvidia has. The closest things I can think of is the Bulldozer specs being 800M transistors too high, but that was caught and corrected by AMD themselves (suggesting an honest mistake) – Nvidia only admitted their 970 lies once they were already caught red-handed. People also don’t generally select CPUs based on transistor count (so lying about that specification probably wouldn’t do much), whereas they do select GPUs based on ROPs, memory bandwidth, and memory capacity. AMD also had a PR issue with the 290x “up to 1ghz” and while they certainly could have stated it better, it’s a far cry from the kind of false advertising that Nvidia does – “up to” has been a marketing staple for decades.
Looks at benchmarks that
Looks at benchmarks that actually mean something…shrugs shoulders…
Perhaps if AMD launched some
Perhaps if AMD launched some new products they’d see better sales.
Should see a bit of a boost
Should see a bit of a boost on AMD side when 300 series comes out,
Problem is in the response.
Problem is in the response. The GM200 has been rumored to counter or equal the R9-390X “leaked” specs for months. So what could AMD launch that wouldn’t be stolen by the GM200 a couple months later and hold for the rest of the year?
If they drop the R9-380X that barely has higher performance than the GTX 980 it’ll be considered a flop. If they drop the 390X then Nvidia will soon drop the GTX 980 Ti and take the lead. I wouldn’t call a single card dual chip configuration a “lead” either. Basically they’re back in the same pickle they were in before for the remaining time until the next product launch unless they go to a 6 month schedule to drop a line immediately when 16nm is available.
This is how they keep losing. They are missing crucial dates and always forced to be reactionary to whatever Nvidia is doing.
All but the top card in the
All but the top card in the 300 series are rebrands and Nvidia is holding the GM200 back to take the fight to the top AMD card when it is released.
Miners stopped buying amd
Miners stopped buying amd cards, no one cares about mantle, everyone loves gsync and power-efficient cards. Keep rebadging your old power-hungry designs AMD, it’s working great for you!
To me it’s really simple:
To me it’s really simple: Better performance and efficiency means you win you win a race. A competitive price means you win a market.
Right now, it should be obvious who is winning this race and people are voting with their dollars.
If AMD is going to show, they better keep producing competitive boards or this is going to go pear-shaped like their processors.
See? It’s simple.
Nvidia’s Maxwell is the
Nvidia’s Maxwell is the performance per watt champion, and runs cool and quiet with superior drivers and SLI. AMD has been falling behind with its re-branded GPUs and still has driver issues, their reference cards sound like throttling leaf blowers where as Nvidia has great stock coolers. Both cards need a Intel CPU to get the most out of them especially when in SLI/Xfire. AMD’s CPUs and GPUs are watt suckers and their CPUs/APUs bottle neck high powered GPUs.
AMD has been for years now over hyping every product with bogus benchmarks and never walking on their hype pumping talk, AMD should of been sued for false marketing where as Nvidia’s GTX970 is still the biggest bang for your GPU buck that I highly recommend. Yes they should of disclosed GTX970 memory specs as different from GTX980 but its still the best GPU buy.
I buy the best for my customers custom gaming rigs, its my reputation that gets me happy repeat business and that’s why I choose Intel/Nvidia and say no to AMD. All integrated graphics suck for gaming so its a discreet GPU for me matched up with a powerful Intel CPU. Case heat has to be dealt with in a quiet manner, GPU water cooling is not a option when the competition does it better on air.
AMD has lost the CPU war and is losing GPU battles with its re-branded hot watt wasting GPUs, its APUs are a gutter gaming bottle necking waste of money. AMD better get its game on and start walking its over hyping talk, when they do I will put them on my my short list but after years of many failed attempts I kinda gave up on AMD.
So sorry but its so true.