[jrockpunk1]

I have a dilemma. Can someone tell me what to be expecting, which one's best, and which one's the best bang for buck out of the following cards? Also, links to COD 5 benchmarks for each of them would be nice:

http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductId=1005142
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/1Gb-Sapphire-Radeon-HD-4870-GDDR5-CC-750MHz-PCIE-2xDVI
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/1GB-...z-GDDR5-GPU-850MHz-Cores-800-2x-DL-DVI-I-HDTV

I think it's fairly obvious which one's are better that which, but I'm just wondering their actual projected framerates, and whether it would be worth paying more for the 4890, or if paying less for the 4770 would get me nearly as good as experience as the others. Just so you know, I was originally going to buy a 4870, and think I will probably stick to that. But once I know the facts and your opinions, I can judge from there.

Thanks in advance,
jrockpunk1.

 

[emosun]

The 4770 is pretty much equal to your current 9600. The 4870 has the best price to performance ratio out of the three.

However , Your 550w power supply (no matter which brand) isn't enough for a 4870. You'll need a quality 600-650w or higher. I would also look at nvidia cards instead of ati. They will be more cooperative with your nvidia motherboard.

 

[jrockpunk1]

Well, to clear things up, I'm buying a corsair 750TX PSU with whatever graphics card I choose. The people in the shop I'm going to (if I buy the PSU off them) are going to let me fit the card/PSU with them watching, and if I go wrong/don't know what to do they'll help. They then help me set everything up and let me test a game or something on it, all this is for free. So, I know ATI might not be cooperative with my mobo, but if it isn't, they'll get it working (I actually asked if the ATI card would work with my mobo, and they said it will, and even though it's ATI they'll get it working for me).

So, is it worth the extra £50 for a 4890? From what I see, the 4870 goes above 60FPS maxed on all games apart from a couple, like crysis etc. If the 4890 has an extra 20 or so FPS, I don't think it would make much a difference. Am I right?

 

[resiguy15]

take a look at this one i've been staring at
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?XFX-96GT5
Some have been saying they can run crysis maxed out, and at a decent resolution and stay at around 40-50 FPS, pretty damn cheap and it looks nice

 

[jrockpunk1]

That's the card I've got at the moment, and I get 18 FPS, 1680 res nearly maxed out. That card is nowhere near as good as the one I want.

 

[emosun]

If you are getting that power supply then a 4870 would be the best choice. Make sure you use driver cleaner to remove the nvidia software from your machine before you install the ati card. However , do not remove any of the motherboard software.

I'm still gonna recommend an nvidia card , although I cannot stop you from buying ati. It'll just work easier and be less of a hassle.

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/896M...106-MHz-GPU-626-MHz-192-Cores-2-x-DL-DVI-HDTV

 

[jrockpunk1]

well which one would you say was better?

 

[emosun]

If it were me buying it I would get the 260. The performance between the 4870 and 260 is very similar. The 260 also supports physx which will be an advantage in games that support it.

 

[McNinja]

Yea I'd agree with emosun and you should get a Nvidia graphics card with a Nvidia chipset.

This card is good

GX-275X-ADQF - 896MB XFX GTX 275, PCI-E 2.0 (x16), Mem 2268MHz GDDR3, GPU 640MHz, 240 Cores, 2x DL DVI-I/HDTV
£206.16 Inc VAT
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/896M...z-GDDR3-GPU-640MHz-240-Cores-2x-DL-DVI-I-HDTV

 

[jrockpunk1]

I need something around the £150 mark, so that's a little too much.

Well, the GTX 260 is certainly looking like a good option:

http://www.techspot.com/review/109-geforce-gtx-260-280-versus-radeon-4850-4870/

As they are basically the same, but the GTX uses less power when idle and doesn't get as hot. Does anyone know what the difference in FPS (between the 4870 and GTX 260) would be in COD 5? The main games I go on are COD 4, COD 5 and TF2, so any info on them would be good. Also, I would obviously be going on games such as crysis more when I get it.

[edit]
Also, if I wanted 2 GTX 260s in SLI in the future, what's the minimum PSU I would need?

 

[McNinja]

SLI is a waste as games don't use the second card properly. In may own opinion you may as well just save up and get another new graphics card later on.

If you want to future proof yourself for SLI I would say get a Corsair 850w as its worth every penny for the quality you get.

 

[jrockpunk1]

OK, another question. Which card under £160-£165 is the best?
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/dirresults.html?s=GTX 260&d=
Is it worth it to get the OC version?

Also, last question now, will my CPU or anything bottleneck the graphics card a lot. Quad cores are being seen more often these days, is mine still OK?

 

[McNinja]

I like this card and it comes with Far Cry 2 and Mirror's edge.

XFX GeForce GTX260 XT *216 Stream Processor* SLI 896MB DDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI PCI-Express - Retail ** With Far Cry 2 & Mirrors Edge
£149.49 inc vat
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?XFX-265

I have my GPU overclocked manually by around 19% to 20% via the GPU bios.

Only 1 game comes to mind that supports quad cores and that is GTA 4, so no I don't think games will be bottlenecked by your CPU. I use a AMD 6000+ AM2 CPU that is a 3ghz X 2 and I get no bottlenecking.

 

[jrockpunk1]

wow, I'm definitaly getting that card, thanks for the advice. What sort of an increase would I see in performance if I did a nice easy overclock with RivaTuner?

 

[McNinja]

For my GTX 260 my memory bandwidth from 111.6 gbs/s to 136.6 gb/s

I went from barely able to play Crysis with 4x AA to being able to play Crysis with 8x AA with no lag or barely noticeable.

Plus you will be getting the improved GTX 260 with 216 processing cores, and I just have the 192 cores. I think you will see a better FPS than me.

 

[emosun]

You probably should consider a quad core in the future though. In games like gta4 a quad core machine with a poor gpu could easily out perform a dual core machine with a good gpu. Pretty much all the next gen games that are coming out support quads now.

 

[McNinja]

I would very much like a list with quad core support emosun if you have it. I really really want to be able to give solid reason to give to a OP for getting a quad core. They're not cheap and its quite the investment.

 

[emosun]

I do know off hand that crysis supports quads , but a list would be better.

 

[jrockpunk1]

The only ones I know are crysis and GTA IV.

Anyway, to sum this thread up: A GTX 260 is the same as a 4870, but it runs cooler and is less resource heavy. Also, I can overclock it to get the most out of it and it has a PhysX card, and it comes with 2 games for the same price. I might get a Quad core in the future, but not at the moment. Thanks for the advice guys

 

[McNinja]

I'm a little jealous as I've never seen a graphics card come with two decent games before and the price is very nice too.