My apologies to Crackpot for posting in her thread, but since I'm dealing with a similar situation, I felt like this was an appropriate place to make my post.

I too am considering a GPU upgrade, though in my case, it is mostly motivated by necessity. Recently, I started to experience BSODs caused by the graphics driver, forcing me to remove them. While the on-board graphics thankfully work well enough for any of the more mundane tasks, I obviously can't play games currently.

I've tried a variety of solutions to the problem (including reformatting my PC), but alas, none have worked. At this point, I am forced to consider the possibility that the issue is caused by faulty hardware. That said, even if I do discover that it isn't the hardware and find a software solution, AMD has recently dropped support for many older graphics cards, including my own HD6850. So regardless if I manage to resolve my problem or not, a GPU upgrade might be warranted at this point.

I've been doing some research as a result and, naturally, my curiosity has been piqued by the upcoming release of the new graphics cards running on the Polaris architecture. However, my PC is almost five years old at this point, and I'm not really tech-savvy enough to know whether any of these new cards would be bottlenecked by my CPU, whether my PSU would be sufficient, whether I have enough cooling etc. Since there appear to be some knowledgeable individuals in this thread, I figured I would ask for some advice regarding this matter.

My computer's specifications can be found here. I thank you in advance for any recommendations you may be able to provide.

While I don't mind you posting here - no need to apologize - it'd probably be easier to get replies in a new thread. I'd wager the knowledgeable individuals will find you. Up to you, though, and I may well be mistaken.

Your current card is rated at 127W. The upcoming 480 (assuming you'd like to stick with AMD) is 150W. You should be fine with your current power supply.

Your CPU is an older i5, and will not quite hold its own against something like the 480, but it's still a good enough CPU to use for a while, yet. Some games will run your CPU hard against its limits, but not all games are CPU intensive, just like not all are GPU intensive. It'll depend on what you play. Generally, CPUs outlast GPUs, so you should be ok for a little longer with that i5.

Stock cooling is almost always fine as long as you aren't overclocking. If you're going to upgrade your video card and use it as it comes out of the box, you should be fine, assuming your existing fans actually work.

If you'd prefer to go with nVidia, the 1070 is also rated at 150W, and the 970 (should you not be going for top of the line) is 145W. You'd be fine with either of those, as well.

Your CPU is pretty much at par with Crackpot's. So you'll basically get the same advice: Wait and see what the card one level below the RX 480 will be. If it has the performance of something between a GTX 960 and GTX 970, this is the sweet spot where GPU and CPU don't hold back each other. If it's slower and you don't mind paying for something that can't use it's full potential, you could still get the RX 480. It'll still deliver better performance, just not as much as it could.

Let's say there's a game that the RX 480 would run in 60 fps if the CPU is powerful enough for it. With your CPU it'll only deliver ~53 fps. Still faster than a slower card, but... well... In the long run you'd be better off to put the saved money aside for a new system. Things change if you want to upgrade your CPU too. The i7 3770 is still a beast (and still expensive) and would be enough for any of the new GPUs (even the GTX 1080).

It is. Energy consumption of the RX 480 is almost the same as HD 6850. New GPUs are very efficient.

Every component comes with it's own fans and pipes, so you don't have to worry about cooling. Just make sure your PC isn't full of dust. If you want to run a card that asks a lot from your CPU, you might want to spent a little extra (~$30-40) for a new CPU cooling fan. Not because of the temperature, but because a 5 years old stock fan will be pretty loud when your CPU is under full load.

I was going to comment about some news i came across about the RX 480 (which looks promising), however it seems someone else beat me to it :P

I generally prefer to post in existing threads whenever possible, since that avoids needlessly cluttering the forums. My only concern when doing so is that I don't detract from the topic or issue the original poster raised.

Thank you for your kindness and I hope I haven't detracted too much attention from your issue.

These two posts were very informative. Thank you again for all your help, it's very much appreciated! =)

I guess my system is alright enough that it could handle a GPU upgrade. I'll definitely be keeping an eye out for a card one level below RX 480; that would suit me well both from a financial and performance perspective. If such a card is significantly slower than the RX 480, however, then I'll consider just going with the RX 480. The fact that my CPU would bottleneck it somewhat is unfortunate, but based on this information, it's a limitation I'm willing to accept for the time being.

I'll definitely consider a CPU upgrade, if not a system overhaul, once my financial situation will allow for such an expenditure. Until then, I'll be content with this.

If you're interested in Polaris, your choice: R9 470. It's power consumption will be less than 50W (around 2 times less than Geforce 950).

If you don't want to wait and buy, probably, overpriced new hardware (new stuff is usually overpriced due to high demand and low availability, or just greed), just get Geforce 950 or 960.

Take a look at the CPU benchmark page. Not sure how you missed it. And no, they didn't test an FX-6300 specifically, but they tested CPU's close to it.

Now take a step back and consider: the CPU isn't a bottleneck at all here. You're seriously trying to say that there's a discernible difference between 88 and 110 fps?

Edit: What I mean is, if you bought a GeForce 980 Ti for this game, you made a bad deal anyway. If f you got a CPU that doesn't bottleneck the 980 TI, you know what, it's even a worse deal, because you bought an expensive CPU to go with an expensive GPU to get a meaningless boost to frame rate.

But we're not talking about a 980 Ti. We're talking 960 vs. RX 480. A 960 will be the bottleneck most of the time, but even if it wasn't, getting a slower card for the same amount of money is never smart.
After the Bristol Ridge AM4 debacle, I'd suggest not to base buying decisions on rumours.

I didn't miss the CPU benchmark. But the CPU benchmark doesn't say what you said. You said:
You're reffering to the GPU benchmark here. This is the system that they used for the GPU benchmark:

Intel Core i7-6700K (4.00GHz)
4GBx2 Kingston Predator DDR4-2400
Asrock Z170 Extreme7+ (Intel Z170)
Silverstone Strider 700w PSU
Crucial MX200 1TB
Microsoft Windows 10 Pro 64-bit
Nvidia GeForce 364.51 Beta
AMD Crimson Edition 16.3 Hotfix

It's a fixed system, where they only change the GPU. It is a system that won't bottleneck the GPU, no matter what you throw at it. This way they get good results on the GPU. And it shows that a 970 will deliver 25 fps more on a system like that (i7 6700k), not on a FX-6300 (which would limit the 970 slightly). The CPU benchmark works in a similar way, just that they do it with a powerful, fixed GPU (GTX 980 Ti) and only exchange the CPUs (and obviously mainboards, because of the socket) to get the best possible CPU results.

No. 60 fps with Vsync is 60 fps, no matter if you could get 110 or 88 fps without Vsync. I just wanted to show that a 980 Ti would lose 20% of her performance in Battlefront (10% in The Division, which is exceptionally good! ) when you pair it with a FX-6300. Why the GTX 980 Ti? Because it's the only card they use for their CPU benchmarks. And if the RX 480 is really faster than the GTX 980 (non-Ti), this tells us that it'd get bottlenecked by ~15% in Battlefront (~6% in The Divison).

And Battlefront isn't even an extreme example. There's a CPU benchmark of XCOM-2, where a 980 Ti delivers 90 fps when paired with a i7 4770k and only 69 when paired with a FX 8370. That's almost 25%. (link to German website, but numbers are numbers)

I know. But CPU benchmark is CPU benchmark and done with the GTX 980 Ti. They didn't do it with any other card. I wouldn't get an overpriced 980 Ti for gaming with a 1080p monitor. 1440p and above, yes, but not 1080p. A waste of money and power.

Yeah, but I never recommended to get a 960 (Quite the contrary... I even pissed off Magic_of_Light because I didn't stop telling him that getting a 960 for $200 now would be effin' stupid with the RX 480 coming out - just read our little discussion here). I just answered your "moving from a 960 to a 970 would up frame rate at 1080p from a minimum of 36 fps to a minimum of 61 fps, while CPU is hardly a bottleneck" line, which isn't quite true.

My recommendation was pretty much to wait and see what the GPU just one step behind the 480 will be and to get this one if it's performance is between the 960 and 970 (closer to 970). Why? Because the GTX 970 is already where the FX-6300 starts to bottleneck the GPU (not by much, but it starts). And if the RX 470 (or whatever it'll be called) is $50-80 cheaper ($150 is floating around a lot) than a RX 480, that's the first $50-80 you can put aside for a new system. I think this'd be better than to spend those $50-80 more on a card that'll "lose" 15% of it's actual performance (if the RX 480 really is ahead of the GTX 980).

I'd never recommend a GTX 960 right now. It'd be stupid to get one of those now when there's a card coming out at the same price, that'll be 60-70% faster.

ps. My i5 2500k would bottleneck a GTX 980 Ti by 10% in Battlefront. That's why I said that a RX 480 will be the perfect match for it. It'll only slow it down by ~5% (which would be 57 fps instead of 60, if I would play a game that runs exactly @60 fps without VSync), which is negligible.

Whats a decent card which has similar value to what the GTX ti650 used to be? (was still considering picking one of these up before they disappear entirely)

Seems like don't understand the concept of a bottleneck. You seem to be under the impression that if a CPU provides 20% less performance with a powerful card, it will provide 20% less performance with a slower card, or something like that.

That's not really the case. In general (it's not 100% true) if a CPU can run a game at 70 fps with a fast card then that's the limit of its fps. A GPU that provides 60 fps with a CPU that can reach 100 fps will also reach 60 fps on a CPU that can reach 70 fps. So a comparison of cards on a faster CPU will be just as valid for a slower CPU, as long as it can achieve a faster frame rate with a more powerful GPU, i.e., that it's not the bottleneck.

I don't know what you're talking about. Dude wants Polaris. If you have problem with that - tell him it doesn't exist.

Uhm... I never said that!? oO

I think you didn't really understand the concept of a CPU benchmark.

Look. Techspot's CPU benchmarks are done with this system:
4GBx4 Kingston Predator DDR4-2400 (16 GB of some way too fast RAM)
Silverstone Strider Series (700w) (an overpowered PSU)
Crucial MX200 1TB (SATA 6Gb/s) (because you need something to install stuff on)
GTX 980 Ti (an extremely fast GPU)

The only thing they do, is to exchange the CPU (and the mainboard, because of the different CPU sockets). The system above delivers 110 fps in Battlefront if there's an i7 6700k dong its work. The same system delivers 88 fps in Battlefront with a FX 6350. Same system, with two different CPUs. One system delivers 20% less frames per second. What's the bottleneck? The CPU! (what else?)

---
Side note: This doesn't mean that 88 fps is the maximum a FX 6300 can do in this game, no matter what GPU you use. An even faster GPU than the 980 Ti would still deliver more fps, because whatever the GPU does: it'll do its job faster. But whenever it has to ask the CPU for something more complicated, it'll have to "wait" for it. A GTX 960 wouldn't have to wait, because it can't do its part of the job as quick as faster cards can (in other words: it'll still be busy doing its own job). A 970 would have to take small breaks, because it's already "too fast" for a FX 6300. A 980 would have to take longer breaks than a 970. And something that's even faster than a 980, would have to take even longer breaks. But since GPU and CPU don't have the same amount of work all the time (there's much more work for the GPU), a faster card will always be faster and deliver more fps. Just not as much as it could with a faster CPU.
---

I never said that a system with an FX 6300 would deliver 20% less frames with a GTX 960 or RX 480 than it would with an i7 6700k. I specifically sait that a GTX 960 wouldn't get bottlenecked at all by a FX 6300 and that a 970 is where the CPU would start to limit the GPU (just google "GTX 970 FX 6300 bottleneck", if you don't believe me). And that a RX 480 would deliver ~15% less fps than it could with a faster CPU, if it is true that it'll be faster than a GTX 980 (which lost about 10% of its maximum possible performance with CPUs like the FX 6300, in most CPU benchmarks when it was still used).

I really don't understand where the misunderstanding lies.

Facts:
- An FX-6350 runs the game at a minimum 73 FPS (with a GeForce 980 Ti, High Quality, 1080p).
- A GeForce 960 runs the game at a minimum frame rate of 36 FPS. (Core i7-6700K, High Quality, 1080p.)
- A GeForce 970 runs the game at a minimum frame rate of 61 FPS. (Core i7-6700K, High Quality, 1080p.)

All I meant to say was that the CPU wasn't a bottleneck for either of these cards. Do you dispute that?

By the way, with Ultra Quality:
- The 960 is not on the chart.
- The 970 has a minimum frame rate of 44 fps.
- The 980 Ti has a minimum frame rate of 58 fps.

Can't tell whether the CPU is more of a bottleneck with ultra quality, but if not, even the 980 Ti will be a bottleneck, not the CPU.

That's what I quoted:
Magic_Of_Light said A GTX 960 is all a FX 6300 can handle. You said this isn't true and backed this up with a benchmark where a 970 gets more fps than a 960. Just that this benchmark was done with an i7 6700k, not with an FX 6300. I replied and told you to look at the CPU benchmarks of Battlefront, where you can see that a FX 6350 (pretty much the same as a FX 6300) does bottleneck a 980 Ti (the only card that was used in the CPU benchmark to give reliable results) by 20%. And then I told you that it'll bottleneck a GTX 970 too, just not by that much.

Wrong. The FX 6350 was a bottleneck for the 980 Ti. You can see that because the 980 Ti delivers 7% more fps in The Division when it's paired with a i7 6700k. 7% is negligible, but The Division is a game that seems to run well with almost every CPU. That's why I took Battlefront for a better comparison (it's a pretty average game when it comes to balance of CPU/GPU usage). In this game, the 980 Ti gives 20% less fps with an FX 6350 than it does with an i7 6700k.

For more "brutal" examples (and this one will be brutal!), you could have a look at the Fallout 4 benchmark. A 980 Ti manages 113 fps with an i7 6700k, but only 58 with an FX 6350. 58 fps! I'm not using my calculator here... The 980 Ti only delivers half of it's possible performance in this case! And if you go to the GPU benchmarks, you'll see that a GTX 960 already is enough for 63 fps in this game, when paired with this monstrous i7 6700k. So even the GTX 960 would get bottlenecked in this case! But Fallout 4 is a pretty bad example, because it seems to eat AMD CPUs for breakfast - even some i3 CPUs are faster than an FX 9590 here oO

So, all I wanted to say is, that Magic_of_light is right here. Anything above a GTX 960 will be bottlenecked by a FX 6300. And with anything above a 970, the bottleneck will become very noticeable (A 980 Ti with a FX 6300 would still give more fps than the 970 together with a FX 6300, but you'd pay quite a lot for just a few more frames). If the RX 480 really is ahead of the 980, you're wasting money and are better off to get the RX 470 (or whatever it'll be called) and put the saved money aside for a new PC. If you play The Division, you'll maybe only lose 2 or 3% of the RX 480's maximum performance. If you play Battlefront, it'll be around 15%. If you play Fallout 4, it'll be around some ridiculous 40%. In other words: If you have an FX 6300, don't get anything that's more powerful than a GTX 960/970. Which doesn't mean that you should get a 960 or 970, because they're more expensive AND less powerful than the RX 480 will be. It just means that you should consider a smaller and cheaper card of the new GPU generation.