I would buy R9 280x simply because its new and has better resale value...
I doubt they are even making the 7970's anymore. The 280x's are cheaper as well.
Not if you buy used 7970.....
There almost identical cards and should should get the same speeds. There's no reason to go such great lengths to get a 7970.
Used 7970 is cheaper....
Not much of a comparison. GPU's don't have a long lifespan mining. Hopefully you at least get one that a miner didn't owned. So far I've had a 85% failure rate on my cards after 2 years of mining.
The 2nd hand lifespan used to be longer, But I guess due to the recent mining operation the card that you get might most probably be used for mining and the lifespan is like 40%?
