ATI Still the best choice for performance per dollar

[phanbuey]

ok then... what about a 216 with a mild overclock matching a 280 in COD 4
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Leadtek/GeForce_GTX_260_Extreme_Plus/29.html

"It seems the combination of increased shaders and increased clocks is a winning team because our benchmarks show the GTX 260 AMP² Edition only 1% behind the regular GeForce GTX 280 - which still costs over $130 more."
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Zotac/GeForce_GTX_260_Amp2_Edition/30.html

 

[Aceman.au]

After reading all this thread, all I have to say is that pretty much all l33tGaMeR said is either incorrect or fanboyism.....if you want to buy a 260GTX over a 4870 that's up to you.

Get on with it and enjoy gaming as that's the whole point of owning ANY video card anyway.

I was about to say a similar thing...

The two brands do stack up well against each other... But I just can't get over the fact ATI is so much cheaper......... Sure Nvidia wins in some areas but I cannot think about wasting my money for a few extra FPS

 

[Darren]

I've learned early that its unwise to respond to hayder.master.

He creates all these pointless threads and doesn't respond or follow up. He simply stops responding after creating the threads.

e.g. he will ask for advice, everyone will attempt to help him, but this crackhead would will not reply past his inital post.

Dont feed hayder.master.


Edit:

Urrm, the point is we are debating in the hope to enlighten the thread starter, if the thread starter consistently abandons the thread it defeats the purpose.


Go in hayder.masters log, he asks a lot of questions, but never follows up on responses. NEVER

 

[Aceman.au]

I've learned early that its unwise to respond to hayder.master.

He creates all these pointless threads and doesn't respond or follow up. He simply stops responding after creating the threads.

e.g. he will ask for advice, everyone will attempt to help him, but this crackhead would will not reply past his inital post.

Dont feed hayder.master.

Ok whats this got to do with anything???

 

[phanbuey]

I've learned early that its unwise to respond to hayder.master.

He creates all these pointless threads and doesn't respond or follow up. He simply stops responding after creating the threads.

e.g. he will ask for advice, everyone will attempt to help him, but this crackhead would will not reply past his inital post.

Dont feed hayder.master.

hahaha "feed"

 

[Aceman.au]

Ah kk... Didnt realise that the thread starter was hayden...

 

[newtekie1]

ok then... what about a 216 with a mild overclock matching a 280 in COD 4
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Leadtek/GeForce_GTX_260_Extreme_Plus/29.html

"It seems the combination of increased shaders and increased clocks is a winning team because our benchmarks show the GTX 260 AMP² Edition only 1% behind the regular GeForce GTX 280 - which still costs over $130 more."
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Zotac/GeForce_GTX_260_Amp2_Edition/30.html

1 game doesn't interest me, I've said it before, the COD4 overclocking results should not be used to judge overall performance.

And yes, with the old drivers(175), I would agree that the GTX260 216 could match a GTX280. The older drivers seemed to be optimized a lot more for the GTX260. With the current drivers, the gap between the GTX280 and GTX260 is a lot bigger. With the old drivers, the GTX260 is about 10% behind the GTX280, if you look at one of the newer reviews, the difference is about 15%, that extra 5% is a lot to make up in reality.

I think it is possible to get very close to stock GTX280 performance with a GTX260, either the 192SP which overclocks better or the 216SP version which obviously has more shader power, but not match it or surpass it. It would be so close that the difference would almost impossible to notice in real gaming, which is all that is really imporantant in the end. This is one of the reasons I went
with the much cheaper GTX260 216 when I originally bought, and I only went for a GTX285 because I am getting it for free+Shipping after I trade in my GTX260.

And with the 55nm GTX260's going for under $190, they are definitely a really good buy right now, in fact they are a better buy than the HD4870 1GB which is going for the same price.

 

[dieselcat18]

1 game doesn't interest me, I've said it before, the COD4 overclocking results should not be used to judge overall performance.

And yes, with the old drivers(175), I would agree that the GTX260 216 could match a GTX280. The older drivers seemed to be optimized a lot more for the GTX260. With the current drivers, the gap between the GTX280 and GTX260 is a lot bigger. With the old drivers, the GTX260 is about 10% behind the GTX280, if you look at one of the newer reviews, the difference is about 15%, that extra 5% is a lot to make up in reality.

I think it is possible to get very close to stock GTX280 performance with a GTX260, either the 192SP which overclocks better or the 216SP version which obviously has more shader power, but not match it or surpass it. It would be so close that the difference would almost impossible to notice in real gaming, which is all that is really imporantant in the end. This is one of the reasons I went
with the much cheaper GTX260 216 when I originally bought, and I only went for a GTX285 because I am getting it for free+Shipping after I trade in my GTX260.

And with the 55nm GTX260's going for under $190, they are definitely a really good buy right now, in fact they are a better buy than the HD4870 1GB which is going for the same price.

I agree with your last statement, the 260's are at a better price point than most of the 4870 1GB...though there are some really good deals on the 512mb models right now.

Under 200 bucks + free S&H.....
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127409

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130434

*+

 

[ShadowFold]

I agree with your last statement, the 260's are at a better price point than most of the 4870 1GB...though there are some really good deals on the 512mb models right now.

Under 200 bucks + free S&H.....
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127409

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130434

*+

You mean just over 200$? Neither of those are under 200$.

 

[dieselcat18]

You mean just over 200$? Neither of those are under 200$.

After MIR's...all are under 200 dollars.....

*+

 

[ShadowFold]

After MIR's...all are under 200 dollars.....

*+

Good luck with those. I have yet to get 4 rebates that I sent in last year..

 

[dieselcat18]

Yes, I know some people have had problems with mir's....but I personally sent in quite a few and have only had 1 problem (a Foxxconn 8800GTX) and newegg finally credited me the 30 bucks after I complained to them about it....
But, every other rebate that I sent in was honored with no issues...

*+

 

[wolf]

And with the 55nm GTX260's going for under $190, they are definitely a really good buy right now, in fact they are a better buy than the HD4870 1GB which is going for the same price.

thats what im sayyyyyin'

honestly this whole price performance war is location dependant too.

my local stores tend to sell GPU's that match up at exactly the same price, which leaves ATi with no price advantage, nvidia with sometimes a slight performance advantage, then they have it all over 48xx once overclocking is a consideration.

but that could just be me, in Perth Australia.

 

[Binge]

"This new card is between a pair of GeForce GTX 280 and 260 cards in SLI on a single board."

lol

The GTX295 is a GTX260 sandwich, not a GTX280 and GTX260 sandwich

on second thought it appears to be two GTX280s but with 896MB memory (448 memory bus). It appears to be a whole nother animal alltogeather. The memory size and bus width of two GTX260s, but the shader count of two GTX280s.

I don't know what the hell it is... but it's not a GTX280 and a GTX260 in SLI, that would never work

The GTX280 IS the bandwidth... They're selling at a higher price with more shader cores TBH but not getting the bandwidth to run them effectively. A 295 is a 260 sandwich.

 

[wolf]

The GTX280 IS the bandwidth... They're selling at a higher price with more shader cores TBH but not getting the bandwidth to run them effectively. A 295 is a 260 sandwich.

easiest way to think of whats inside a GTX295 is to think of it as GTX260 core 240 SLi, everything is the same as the normal GTX260 55nm, except it has all shaders unlocked.

I'd have to say I've never seen a 4870 beat a GTX280 in benchmarks although right now I'm doing my own benchmarks and would love to test a 4870 1gb.

thats the thing right, because a GTX260 c216 OC to the realm of 680/1450/2400 is par to a GTX280 (minus memory limitations) and a 4870 practically never beats a GTX280, naturally there will always be the few exceptions, so the GTX260 is completely superior imo as you can unlock that next echelon that a 4870 just cannot reach. not to mention the decent percentage of 700+ clockers out there.

 

[DarkMatter]

The prices don't have to be exact, for our ever changing economy its obvious the price will change, but in a gradual manner. Even then the price go lower or high or back to the normal price its not enough to consider otherwise as the prices are not the same for everyone. It depends on when the retailer purchases their stock it could be when dollar decreases meaning they gotta pay more for an ATI supply of cards compared to the previous NVIDIA stock that was bought when currency was higher. This is where I think what you're saying is completely biased, the prices are right as Tom's Hardware did a calculation of its real set price, retail price will always change but not enough to conclude to Tom's Hardware posting incorrect information. You talk like Tom's Hardware knows of every PC retailer in the world and failed to calculate the average with all their stocks combined together .


These guys aren't judging cards, they're recommending the cards that would simply be the best choice for ANY gamer out there. And no not every gamer overclocks their card because as mentioned before, they do not want to void their warranty or risk any damage to what they have. I can confidently say that the farthest MOST users will go is overclock via driver software. Only a small fraction of us volt mod etc compared to the whole world.

Because the prices are ever changing, as even you recognize, it's misleading to recommend any card over any other one, in such an article, as if it was an absolute and never changing truth that an HD4870 is always better buy than a GTX260. That afirmation can't be farther away from the truth, as at the time of writing this, the FACTORY OCed (user doesn't have to OC a shit) GTX260 216 is far and away the better choice at that price point in such etailers as Newegg and Tigerdirect.

Another condern is that they generalize as the HD4870 being equal in performance to the GTX260, when not only that's no longer truth (4 consecutive performance increases through WHQL drivers have changed that), but HD4870 512MB is very different from the 1GB model, both in price and in performance. When it comes to price they stack up this way: HD4870 < GTX260 < GTX260 216 < GTX260 216 @ 650-700 Mhz < stock HD4870 1GB. There's no need to mention that stock GTX 260 216 is faster than 1GB HD4870 and that models running overcloked simply decimate them.

See how, an afirmation like the above is misleading, because it won't stand the pass of time (at the moment is true though), then think how misleading is to publicate it in something like THG.

EDIT: The problem, I guess, is that they base their comparisons and recommendations on this chart. That chart probably never changes and agglutinates several cards with different performances at the same level of the chart and go from there. So is, that for them a 9800GTX and GTX+ are the same and have the same performance as the 4850, when that is not truth for the GTX+ which is faster. Seing how at the moment, the GTX+ go for the same price as HD4850's, the former is the better buy, bt they won't say that, because they have both cards at the same scale in the chart. As I said, it's completely misleading, like having the 8800GTS 512 in the same level as the 8800GT, the GTX285 at the same level as the GTX280, while is closer to the HD4870X2 than it's lower clocked brother, etc.

 

[eidairaman1]

more info on removing catalyst drivers here


http://www.tweakguides.com/ATICAT_3.html

http://www.tweakguides.com/NVFORCE_3.html

there is a NV tweakguide too

 

[Tatty_Two]

aloso i see good drop price for saphhire 4850x2 in newegg only 235
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102813
so there is no troll this is best single card and and if anyone say something about gtx295 i want tell him put 2x4850x2 and tell me what you feel

HD4850x2's are getting really cheap, thats mainly because they have had terrible driver support..... only Sapphire makes them...... and most of all people fear that there will be little or no future ATi driver enhancements for a card that 90% of ATI's board parners snubbed.

A GTX285 is pretty much on a par with the HD4850x2 performance wise (the x2 was slightly faster than a GTX280 but the 285 is said to be 5-10% faster than a 280) so the choice in reality is less straightforward.

 

[Deleted member 3]

"This new card is between a pair of GeForce GTX 280 and 260 cards in SLI on a single board."

lol

The GTX295 is a GTX260 sandwich, not a GTX280 and GTX260 sandwich

on second thought it appears to be two GTX280s but with 896MB memory (448 memory bus). It appears to be a whole nother animal alltogeather. The memory size and bus width of two GTX260s, but the shader count of two GTX280s.

I don't know what the hell it is... but it's not a GTX280 and a GTX260 in SLI, that would never work

So you're basically saying it's something in between a 260 and 280? Just like the thing you're disagreeing with.

 

[wolf]

So you're basically saying it's something in between a 260 and 280? Just like the thing you're disagreeing with.

easiest way to think of whats inside a GTX295 is to think of it as GTX260 core 240 SLi, everything is the same as the normal GTX260 55nm, except it has all shaders unlocked.

does that help? I'm not sure what you're saying...

 

[Frizz]

Because the prices are ever changing, as even you recognize, it's misleading to recommend any card over any other one, in such an article, as if it was an absolute and never changing truth that an HD4870 is always better buy than a GTX260. That afirmation can't be farther away from the truth, as at the time of writing this, the FACTORY OCed (user doesn't have to OC a shit) GTX260 216 is far and away the better choice at that price point in such etailers as Newegg and Tigerdirect.

Another condern is that they generalize as the HD4870 being equal in performance to the GTX260, when not only that's no longer truth (4 consecutive performance increases through WHQL drivers have changed that), but HD4870 512MB is very different from the 1GB model, both in price and in performance. When it comes to price they stack up this way: HD4870 < GTX260 < GTX260 216 < GTX260 216 @ 650-700 Mhz < stock HD4870 1GB. There's no need to mention that stock GTX 260 216 is faster than 1GB HD4870 and that models running overcloked simply decimate them.

See how, an afirmation like the above is misleading, because it won't stand the pass of time (at the moment is true though), then think how misleading is to publicate it in something like THG.

EDIT: The problem, I guess, is that they base their comparisons and recommendations on this chart. That chart probably never changes and agglutinates several cards with different performances at the same level of the chart and go from there. So is, that for them a 9800GTX and GTX+ are the same and have the same performance as the 4850, when that is not truth for the GTX+ which is faster. Seing how at the moment, the GTX+ go for the same price as HD4850's, the former is the better buy, bt they won't say that, because they have both cards at the same scale in the chart. As I said, it's completely misleading, like having the 8800GTS 512 in the same level as the 8800GT, the GTX285 at the same level as the GTX280, while is closer to the HD4870X2 than it's lower clocked brother, etc.

I've trusted sites like these for a while, what I'm confused about is why would the people in Tom's Hardware release a misleading review for the public?

My question is to you, who would you trust? An end-user that owns an ATI card recommending the same brand of cards or a legit internet site dedicated on informing consumers the latest and greatest by testing every single piece of new hardware that comes out.

This is actually the first time I've seen a review like this online. Its a hell of alot more convincing than real world benchers ranting in forums about how much better their card is compared to a different brand in the same performance price margin. And as I said before the prices do change, but not enough to consider a big difference, just like those cards you've mentioned so far, the only real big difference right now within the two companies are the extra features and the high end gtx295 vs 4870x2 cards. Those cards I can truly say the gtx295 is faster, im not gonna say better because I don't know that, Iver never had both of them in my hands.

The difference between 9800GTX+ vs 4850? less than 10-15 fps but completely different cards, so different only performance can compare.
But tell me, do you think there are 90% more people that own SLI mobo's compared to Intel ...? Does everyone want to go crossfire or SLI? Does everyone rather stick with single GPU? Does anyone want to buy a single GPU then upgrade to another one later? Does anyone want to change their motherboards just so they can go Crossfire to SLI or SLI to Crossfire?

There are too many questions that don't support your argument to why Tom's Hardware is giving misleading recommendations to people, personally I think their just pointing fingers to which products would be better for mainstream consumers. And its definitely up to the end-user, cause frankly if I owned an evga 780i motherboard there is no way in hell I'd be putting in a 4870x2 in that, same with having an intel mobo that supports crossfire and buying an NVIDIA card for it. But to be quite honest more people own Intel motherboards. The compatibilities are everywhere and spread out way too far for someone to conclude which company is better too many setups to determine which card is better for who. But what should users be buying for their "to be new gaming systems"? I think that's what Tom's Hardware is trying to point out, the cheapest and best alternatives.

 

[Tatty_Two]

There is always very "muddy water" on these things, for example, the comment......GTX295 is "faster" than the HD4870x2 is of course true, unless you have a 30+ inch monitor as at those highest resolutions, the HD4870x2 is in fact "faster" My point being, there can always be a counter argument to an argument, it's the way in which they are worded that determines if they are actually meaningful...... damn I have confused meself now

 

[DarkMatter]

I've trusted sites like these for a while, what I'm confused about is why would the people in Tom's Hardware release a misleading review for the public?

My question is to you, who would you trust? An end-user that owns an ATI card recommending the same brand of cards or a legit internet site dedicated on informing consumers the latest and greatest by testing every single piece of new hardware that comes out.

This is actually the first time I've seen a review like this online. Its a hell of alot more convincing than real world benchers ranting in forums about how much better their card is compared to a different brand in the same performance price margin. And as I said before the prices do change, but not enough to consider a big difference, just like those cards you've mentioned so far, the only real big difference right now within the two companies are the extra features and the high end gtx295 vs 4870x2 cards. Those cards I can truly say the gtx295 is faster, im not gonna say better because I don't know that, Iver never had both of them in my hands.

The difference between 9800GTX+ vs 4850? less than 10-15 fps but completely different cards, so different only performance can compare.
But tell me, do you think there are 90% more people that own SLI mobo's compared to Intel ...? Does everyone want to go crossfire or SLI? Does everyone rather stick with single GPU? Does anyone want to buy a single GPU then upgrade to another one later? Does anyone want to change their motherboards just so they can go Crossfire to SLI or SLI to Crossfire?

There are too many questions that don't support your argument to why Tom's Hardware is giving misleading recommendations to people, personally I think their just pointing fingers to which products would be better for mainstream consumers. And its definitely up to the end-user, cause frankly if I owned an evga 780i motherboard there is no way in hell I'd be putting in a 4870x2 in that, same with having an intel mobo that supports crossfire and buying an NVIDIA card for it. But to be quite honest more people own Intel motherboards. The compatibilities are everywhere and spread out way too far for someone to conclude which company is better too many setups to determine which card is better for who. But what should users be buying for their "to be new gaming systems"? I think that's what Tom's Hardware is trying to point out, the cheapest and best alternatives.

THG can have all the good intentions of the world but that article, that kind of article is totally misleading. You can't recommend a card without knowing what specs the potential buyer will have.

Considering their recommendations about multi-GPU and the fact they have the HD4870 X2 in a different level than the GTX285 means they are basing their performance numbers in Core i7 systems. Because at anything lower in terms of CPU and system multi-GPUs are not so much faster than a GTX280, no scaling. FYI X58 can do both CrossFire and SLI so the argument argument about intel mobos is of no weight. BUT if they are consifering most people have Core2, then that's misleading again, because they are saying this card (or this crossfire/sli setup) is faster than this one card, basing on Core i7 performance, but selling the idea to Core2 owners, once again misleading.

They are basing their recommendations considering performance at high resolutions, because once again, multi-gpu is NOT much faster than a single GTX260 or HD4870 at lower resolutions. No matter how you look at it, it's all speculation on their part and thus misleading to the buyer.

 

[Frizz]

THG can have all the good intentions of the world but that article, that kind of article is totally misleading. You can't recommend a card without knowing what specs the potential buyer will have.

Considering their recommendations about multi-GPU and the fact they have the HD4870 X2 in a different level than the GTX285 means they are basing their performance numbers in Core i7 systems. Because at anything lower in terms of CPU and system multi-GPUs are not so much faster than a GTX280, no scaling. FYI X58 can do both CrossFire and SLI so the argument argument about intel mobos is of no weight. BUT if they are consifering most people have Core2, then that's misleading again, because they are saying this card (or this crossfire/sli setup) is faster than this one card, basing on Core i7 performance, but selling the idea to Core2 owners, once again misleading.

They are basing their recommendations considering performance at high resolutions, because once again, multi-gpu is NOT much faster than a single GTX260 or HD4870 at lower resolutions. No matter how you look at it, it's all speculation on their part and thus misleading to the buyer.

Yes I know X58 can do both, the fact I didn't include it in my post was because not everyone has it yet. So far the target market for that setup are enthusiast and not the everyday user, thus not mainstream *yet*. Core2 IS mainstream. There's really no difference between the CPU's between gaming as long as the core 2 is OC'd enough to eliminate bottlenecks on both the GPU's and add the fact they are scaling 1 card on an i7core system, wether it be a core2duo on a p45, x48, there is no visible difference because their not recommending crossfire or sli systems, Its 1 card on a X16 lane no matter what. They just also considered the potential for upgrades yet again for users buying one now and who want to upgrade later at the same time; 4870 to another 4870 instead of 4870 to a 4870x2 or gtx295 which obviously costs more whereas you can get similar performance just buying the same card be it i7 or core2 setup. **I know there's a diff in performance between the mobo's in crossfire or sli but still not down to considering differences as its behind 15fps**

who would buy crossfire at 1024x768 res? I used 1 4850 at that res and ever since i got a new 22" inch I needed to overclock and buy a second card so that it would run identical to games in 1024x768 resolution despite being in 1680x1050, I think its up to the user's common sense to determine that, obviously if they have enough money for a second GPU they would have the spare change to get a high res monitor or the other way around.

Speculation probably, but I'm still not convinced that they have purposely released a misleading review.

 

[spearman914]

My HD 4830 is the best card for under 100$ no doubt. I am playing all my games at max settings with 8x AA.

+1 they overclock like heaven!!!! But nvidia is for fun to oc with.