GPU upgrade - Radeon 7850 or GTX 570?

Sentineil

So I'm looking to upgrade from my Radeon HD 5450 1GB to something more powerful, since what I have right now just isn't cutting it.

I'm mainly concerned with running 3D applications like 3Ds Max and Zbrush as well as Photoshop and Premiere Pro so there'll be a lot of heavy rendering.
Gaming is only a secondary consideration.

My problem is that I don't have much understanding of GPUs or hardware in general so I've come here for help.

For my needs what would be a better investment? The 2GB 7850 or the 1.25GB 570?

According to benchmarking sites the 570 scores higher, yet it has lower on-board RAM, so what effect does GPU RAM have on a performance? For my situation would I be better off going for the higher RAM?

Is there a better alternative to either card?

I have a Dell Studio XPS 8100, which has 6gb of RAM, a 3.2GHz i5 processor and a 350W power supply. No idea what mainboard though, but from what I've googled it just seems to be generic dell stock.

I understand that I'll have to upgrade my PSU along with the GPU so any suggestions for that would be appreciated also.

Any help at all would be awesome since I'm a bit apprehensive about investing €250 into something that might not do the job.

Edit: My budget for the GPU is around €350 for both the PSU and GPU combined

Skylinehead

Item|Price
Sapphire HD 7870 2GB GDDR5 PCI-Express|€301.34
Super-Flower Amazon 80Plus 450W|€41.80
Shipping|€18.99
Total|€362.13

Probably cheaper to get it off another site with only 2 items being bought.

Sentineil

Thanks for the help! I have a few questions though;

Why the 7870 over the 570? From this it would seem that the 570 scores higher, for cheaper.

Is it because of the extra RAM that the 7870 has over the 570? How does this affect performance when rendering?

According to AMD a 500W power supply is recommended too, so even if I could get away with a 450W would it not be safer to move up to a 500W?

I'll be getting a Wacom off the same site in the same order, so the fixed shipping cost should work out cheaper in the end, although I'll take a look around and see if there's a better store.

Skylinehead

Sentineil wrote: »

Thanks for the help! I have a few questions though;

Why the 7870 over the 570? From this it would seem that the 570 scores higher, for cheaper.

Is it because of the extra RAM that the 7870 has over the 570? How does this affect performance when rendering?

According to AMD a 500W power supply is recommended too, so even if I could get away with a 450W would it not be safer to move up to a 500W?

I'll be getting a Wacom off the same site in the same order, so the fixed shipping cost should work out cheaper in the end, although I'll take a look around and see if there's a better store.

The 570 is in and around the 7850 for performance. The 7870 is better, probably quieter, much better power consumption, and can be overclocked to nearly 7950 levels. I'd take both the 7850 and the 7870 over the 570, unless it goes way down in price.

Tea_Bag

do any of the programs you will be using make use of CUDA, or some form of a mercury engine?

Eboggles

Passmark means absolutely nothing, it's a pathetic benchmark. If you want to see how different GPUs stack up against each other use the AnandTech bench

The 7870 runs perfectly off a 450 watt PSU, like the on Skylinehead recommended.

This link is a review of the Sapphire 7870, the title gives it away .

Sentineil

7870 it is then! Thanks for all the quick replies and help!

@Tea-Bag, from a quick google it seems that 3ds max can use CUDA, but it doesn't seem quite necessary for my level at the moment. I wouldn't really be rendering anything on a scale where CUDA would be useful.

@Eboggles, I'll stay away from Passmark then, it just happened to be the first site to pop up when I googled GPU benchmarking. I'll stay away from it in future then, thanks for the tip.