Need to buy a new video card

I have been wanting to pick up a new card for a while but there are soo many options out there I just can't decide! I'm not looking to go crazy, just a bit of an upgrade and want to keep under or as close to $400 as possible.

Currently looking at:
gigabyte Gtx 770 2gb at newegg for $359

XFX Radeon R9 290 4GB at ncix for $399

Help me sadistic raiders...you're my only hope

See Anandtech for all of your needs! Here's a comparison chart between the two of them: [url:zmz98k09]http:
//www.
anandtech.
com/bench/product/1037?vs=1068[/url:zmz98k09]

Seems like they trade blows in most games with the 290 winning out more often than not. However, the 290 is louder and draws quite a bit more power which means more heat.

Then you have to consider the vendor specific stuff like Nvidia has things like Shadowplay vs mantle or PhysX vs True Audio.

What resolution do you game at? If it's 1080p then the 4GB on the 290 is useless except in very specific cases (IE extremely modded Skyrim). If you're gaming at 1440p or higher than it might be worth having the extra VRAM.

If it was me I would go with the 770. I prefer quieter/cooler components and the performance trade off isn't that huge. Also Shadowplay is awesome. I think any benefits to Mantle will eventually be negated by DX12 whenever that comes out.

I'm using a Gigabyte card (760) and assuming your case has the space for the open cooler it runs very cool and quiet.

Damn that site is sexy for comparing!!! I know we have talked about this many times and I have come very close to picking up the 770 on many occasions. The only thing that really drew me to the 290 was the price ($180 off is hot). Still leaning towards the gigabyte though I hear xfx has crazy good customer service/warranty.

True, that is a good price for the 290. Looks like the miners have started to slow down with their rabid buying of everything AMD.

I haven't had to use Gigabyte's customer service yet but Reddit has good things to say about both Gigabyte and XFX. Definitely a tough call. I just don't like the amount of noise and heat that the new AMD cards generate.

From what BLizzard has told me over the phone when i asked about the same thing...nVidia are normally better at handling WoW. But mostly is comes down to your CPU if you want more.

I personally run a EVGA GTX 760 Superclocked (4GBs) and i run the game flawlessly, and i paid like 270 for the card. (Considering buying a 2nd one for SLI)

I'd go nVidia personally, you can't really put a price on drivers with constant performance improvements. Not to mention with a price drop like that, wait a minute and nVidia will probably drop their price as well.

Perhaps this will help persuade you Cheeko, [url:1n502ikf]http:
//www.
geforce.
com/whats-new/articles/watch-dogs-nvidia-geforce-gtx-bundle[/url:1n502ikf].

Ohh that is all kinds of hotness! Although Watch Dogs was one of the main reasons I bought a PS4.