video card for new computer

[Xen]

Liam Proven schreef op 15-12-2017 20:32:

>> But, they merged CPU and GPU which I think is a very bad idea because 
>> it is
>> only useful for video acceleration and not for gaming, because any APU 
>> is
>> not good enough
> 
> Speak for yourself.

I am speaking for myself, and for many other gamers. You can quit it, 
you know.

> For the very occasional level of gaming I do,
> onboard GPUs are more than enough.

So what. Portal 2 has system requirements 46x less than current entry 
level games.

You can play that game on onboard graphics from 2009, the HD Radeon 3200 
I mentioned.

>> and it takes out the fun of buying a graphics card,
> 
> Fun? O_o

Yeah, you know, gaming, fun, people think it's fun.

>> and you
>> now cannot upgrade your CPU without your GPU and vice versa.
> 
> That's not true.
> 
> You can add a graphics card, or even multiple ones, and the on-board
> GPU just gets disabled.

That's not what I said. I said that you cannot change the CPU without 
changing the GPU, not the other way around.

> So such machines are every bit as upgradable as those with no GPU.

The difference was not with a system with no GPU, the comparison was 
with a system with onboard GPU.

If you compare it with a system with no GPU, of course it won't matter 
much.

>> I thought motherboard GPU was a much better solution.
> 
> Then you can't upgrade it at all, ever.

You didn't need to because you had discrete GPUs for that.

Now you can upgrade your APU, yes, but the CPU itself is so much more 
powerful than the APU that comes with it, that upgrading your APU for 
playing games makes no sense; you don't need the CPU horsepower, only 
the GPU horsepower.

So why would you upgrade the APU to get better graphics performance?

And if you need better graphics performance, why would you upgrade the 
APU?

So in order to upgrade, you *still* need to buy a graphics card (and not 
a faster CPU).

However, if you did not buy an APU, you had to buy a graphics card from 
the get go, which is annoying, because they are expensive and you cannot 
test your system first on the onboard graphics that way.


So for about the same price AMD now has an offering of the Ryzen 3 1200 
and the A12 9800E.

The Ryzen is 40% faster but has no graphics.

So you would choose graphics over 29% lower performance, I mean that you 
get your graphics chip but you pay with ~29% lower performance.

Previously this was merely the choice between ATX and mATX motherboards.

So if you think you are going to be buying a discrete GPU at some point 
anyway, it makes no sense to now buy a CPU that's 29% slower.

So you now have to make this choice ahead of time instead of after the 
fact, which is a huge detriment, at least to me.

So for someone like me, I have no choice but to get the Ryzen and then 
to immediately get the GPU I think I need (If I didn't have any).

But that's tricky business.

More than that, I now don't have a fallback.

I can't fall back to internal graphics anymore.


Before I would get onboard GPU, CPU, and then later graphics card.

The mere fallback to internal graphics is not worth 29% slower CPU.

> You can _replace_ it with a
> separate card, but not take it out and put a better one.

This is void; that's what discrete cards are for.

With an APU, you also cannot say "Well, my CPU is fast enough, but I 
need a faster GPU, so I guess I will.... replace the GPU part of the APU 
now."

You are simply stuck in the same upgrade cycle for both. Getting a 
faster CPU makes no sense unless it is a lot faster,
and you are also paying for the graphics card at the same time, making 
you unwilling to spend that money again.

The APU is also quite slow and even paired with good graphics card 
performs sometimes abysmally.

https://www.techspot.com/review/1486-amd-a12-9800/page2.html

It's simply a slow CPU and a slow graphics card.

Yes you can play games from 2008, of course.

You can also play Diablo III and World of Warcraft and Rift or Guild 
Wars 2 will also do fine.

Yet you will never have the appetite to upgrade your CPU to a Ryzen 
because you lose your graphics, and you don't have much appetite to buy 
a GPU because the CPU is more likely to bottleneck you at that point, so 
you need to upgrade both.

Upgrading both means you can throw away your APU.

Moreover you have already paid for your GPU... so in the end you might 
decide to get a graphics card and then succumb to also replacing the APU 
with a Ryzen, and then keeping the APU in reserve for whatever...

So for upgrade paths, this is terrible.


> Honestly, after the Intel management code debacle, I am considering an
> AMD for next time.

Well I can understand that.

It's just that previously you could get a cheap motherboard with 
reasonable onboard graphics
and all upgrade paths available to you; faster CPU, easy, faster GPU, 
easy.

Now you have to choose: APU or CPU + discrete?

The choice for me is always going to be Ryzen.

But I hate not having onboard graphics.


>> So, for me that day meant that I grew less fond of ATI graphics 
>> cards....
>> (AMD now).
> 
> Don't care about that.

Well then there is little reason to comment :p.

This was about video cards you know :p.