Video cards. What to get?

[Sandman[SA]]

I'm thinking about retiring my 2 aging XFX Radeon 6870 DD's for something much newer and faster.  And I have been looking at a bunch of cards and I really want to get the most bang for my buck.  But I'm not a fan of Nvidea cards or anything made by Sapphire or powercolor.  I had a really bad past experience with drivers with those.

Anyway, I was hoping to stick to something with-in the $500 price range because I still want to use crossfire but don't have X2 money.  So I've boiled it down to the Radeon R9 Fury X or the Radeon R9 390X.

Now keeping in mind I am running multi monitor but it's 1080p.  I don't think I will be going to 1440p (4K) any time soon.  So, I'm looking for anyone's opinion's and options.  What do you think I should go with?

[One Eyed Wonderweasle]

 At 1080p seems to be about a 8-10 fps difference between the 390x /fury x  (source of benchmarks - ) at 1080p. but the 390x go for about $400-$450 while the fury x's start at $600 (plus have liquid coolers). might get a bit  difficult to route at least 3 radiators (crossfire) pretty sure you still are liquid cooled on your cpu still.
 If I had to pick, I'd be looking for the best rated 390x since the pricing is so close on them (atleast at new egg).a lot of people are saying you pretty much have to watercool them to crossfire them anyway. But you probably won't run into to many games that would tax just one of them.
 Or if you want sli now go a pair of GeForce 380x 4 gig cards under 500 for a pair they don't likely run as hot so they might be better for if you wanted air cooled crossfire. Just another way to go.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125836

[Sandman[SA]]

Thanks Dave.  I noticed that the 390X, Fury X and the 980 all seem to be fairly close performance wise.  Where the 980 Ti seems to perform just as good as the dual gpu Titian.   Noticing that the Fury X is only maybe 5% better performance then the 390X, I can't see how $150+ more justifies such a small performance gain.

And yeah, I am running a Corsair H100 280mm water cooler.  It's been doing a fantastic job keeping this old I7 930 comfortable.  Since I have the cooler master HAF-X case, I do have space to mount 2 more small 120mm water coolers if needed.  One on the back wall and one near the middle, side of the hdd bay.  Just below the video cards.  So water cooling won't be a big issue.

Now you gave me something else to think about.  A pair of the R9 380X for around the cost of just one R9 390X?  I know that radeon cards usually see a very noticeable performance gain when crossfired.  But how do a pair of 380X stack up to a single 390X?

[One Eyed Wonderweasle]

Very few articles on cross fired 380x's but found one.
 http://www.eteknix.com/amd-r9-380x-4gb-graphics-card-crossfire-review/

[KT 💣 KλBoƠM]

What will u do with your old card?

[Sandman[SA]]

What will u do with your old card?

Cards?  There are 2 of them.  A identical matching set.  They still work perfectly.  They just don't have enough power for brand new high end games.

I haven't decided yet.  But I would probably just give them away to someone who want's them because they are not worth much now since they are so old.

These are XFX Radeon HD 6870 DD 1gb gaming class cards.  Part no. HD-687A-ZDFC
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150521

[One Eyed Wonderweasle]

 Have you decided what root to take on the upgrade path? 

[Sandman[SA]]

Have you decided what root to take on the upgrade path?

Not as of yet.  But I am leaning towards a pair of R9 380X's.  Maybe black edition if I can find them.  Or maybe hold out a little longer and hope for a 385X?