eyefinity vs surround: please advise

Hi all,
I'm on the verge of settling a deal to upgrade my amd 7850 to a gtx 970.
I've done some research and it seems that Nvidia surround is a lot more trickier to set up.

My purpose is to keep my current mismatched size and resolutions triple screen setup. With eyefinity, with just some fiddling I have set it up in a very satisfying way, with no major issues.

From your experience, will I be able to achieve the same with nvidia surround or is it really a much more difficult / impossible process

tx in advance
 
Mismatched resolutions and refreshrates do work better on AMD in my experience. I had trouble with my 680, mostly in Windows though, not games.

That said, why do you want to upgrade to a generation old card that has 3.5gb of vram? Better to upgrade to a R9 390 as it's both a higher vram card and it has much better driver support now a days. The 390 overtook the 970 with current days drivers in pretty much anything. Prices seem to be lower to where I live, but your mileage may vary. I'd buy a 390 or RX 480 or so over a 970. Depending on what you are paying for it of course (I assume 150-200?) Otherwise I'd rather go for the 980 as it doesn't have any of the vram issues the 970 has.
 
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Hey, tx for your comment!

it has to do with my budget. I have a deal in sight for a used (yet with still one year warranty) 970 for 190 Euros. All others I've found are in the 220/30 range.
I dont think I can find a 390 or 480 under that price but I'll look again.

The thing with Eyefinity is that I already know the ins and outs and to get it setup nicely.
On the other hand, I'd really like to try a Nvidia card and specifically the 970. I've always read so good reviews about its triple screen capabilities. I'm also curious to try and compare Surround vs eyefinity but the info I've been gathering makes me staying on the back foot.
 
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Mismatched resolutions and refreshrates do work better on AMD in my experience. I had trouble with my 680, mostly in Windows though, not games.

Well, I dont care much about triples in Windows. In fact, I'm not interested at all. I just want some assurance that it is possible to setup nicely with my sim titles. When I say nicely I mean using the Nvidia surround, with its tools (bezel compensation etc) and not using a third party program, such as softth
 
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Hey, tx for your comment!

it has to do with my budget. I have a deal in sight for a used (yet with still one year warranty) 970 for 190 Euros. All others I've found are in the 220/30 range.
I dont think I can find a 390 or 480 under that price but I'll look again.

The thing with Eyefinity is that I already know the ins and outs and to get it setup nicely.
On the other hand, I'd really like to try a Nvidia card and specifically the 970. I've always read so good reviews about its triple screen capabilities. I'm also curious to try and compare Surround vs eyefinity but the info I've been gathering makes me staying on the back foot.
Well I ditched my 970, decent card, but it has the entire 3.5gb vram debacle and I generally think it's overrated. I went back to my GTX 680, now recently upgraded to a RX 480 8gb.

Depending where you are from ,you should be able to do a R9 390 (or 290 which is only slightly slower than a 390) for 190. But I don't know your market. I assume you won't be able to find a 980 for 190/200.

Take a look at this video

The RX 480 and RX 470 both had huge performance increases since release with their drivers. As seen in the video here


To my quick eye both the RX 470 and GTX 970 seem to be similar in performance at their launch ,so the RX 470 should be slightly faster (5-8%) depending on the games you play. In terms of simracing only Project CARs (1) has shown a clear bias towards Nvidia when it comes to performance. I've generally had good experiences with both Nvidia as well as AMD although I must say that with AMDs GCN architecture their long term driver support seem to be much better.

I'd say your option are a RX 470 or RX 480 , a R9 390 or a GTX 970/980. Which one to buy of those depends on pricing entirely. I'd go with the new RX cards personally as new cards will likely get more driver support while Maxwell will likely get dropped from active support when the new Volta cards come out.


Well, I dont care much about triples in Windows. In fact, I'm not interested at all. I just want some assurance that it is possible to setup nicely with my sim titles. When I say nicely I mean using the Nvidia surround, with its tools (bezel compensation etc) and not using a third party program, such as softth

I've only briefly used Triples (also mixed and match consisting of a 144hz 1080p, 1440p 60hz and 1080p 60hz) since my setup cannot have triple permanently. So I cannot comment on bezel correction or such. I just rolled with it set up in Surround, which means you'll use it in Windows as surround. I had issue with every time I exit a game, the 144hz monitor would flicker on off repeatedly until I opend the driver and saved the surround setup. Possibly to do with it trying to go to 144hz or so. I am not sure, never managed or bothered to fix it.

Some guys with Nvidia triple setups are probably better suited to help you with Nvidia Surround :)
 
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