Very happy with Radeon HD 5870

[icmacdon]

Just got the 5870 a couple of days ago and its great compared to my GTX 260. I am running it with a Q6600 @ 3.33ghz on a P965 mobo and it rips through bioshock, CODMW2 and I can run Crysis @ 1680x1050 Very high settings with 2x AA. People talk a lot about bottlenecks and sure the Q6600 wont be as quick as an I7 but I am not complaining. Hardly any performance difference with my 'old' PCI-E 1.0 either. Hey I am happy as I have had the mobo for over 2 years and it still does the job great!

 

[LifeOnMars]

Just got the 5870 a couple of days ago and its great compared to my GTX 260. I am running it with a Q6600 @ 3.33ghz on a P965 mobo and it rips through bioshock, CODMW2 and I can run Crysis @ 1680x1050 Very high settings with 2x AA. People talk a lot about bottlenecks and sure the Q6600 wont be as quick as an I7 but I am not complaining. Hardly any performance difference with my 'old' PCI-E 1.0 either. Hey I am happy as I have had the mobo for over 2 years and it still does the job great!

Nice to know mate, what about a few benchies at your res and possibly lower res with a few different games? Would be a great reference for alot of members on the site who are still rocking a Q6600 setup(including me).

 

[assaulter_99]

Great card, have fun with it. I'd love to have one myself, but the price for the moment begs for a bank to be robbed lol. So how's the leap from a gtx260 compared to it? If thats so much of a leap, I wonder what it would be for me!

 

[icmacdon]

Have not done much benching but in Bioshock @ 1680 x 1050 I get anywhere from about 100fps to 160 fps. The GTX 260 ran about 60 - 100 fps. I know not an accurate test but the new card is approx. 50% faster. In crysis @ 1680 x 1050 with the GTX 260 I could run on high with no AA, but on the 5870 I get about 35fps with very high settings and 2 xAA.

 

[kyle2020]

Nice, im just glad some other people are still using whats been claimed to be the best processor ever released.

 

[buggalugs]

Nice, im just glad some other people are still using whats been claimed to be the best processor ever released.

How is it better than a 920 or even 860?

Anyway ya i just got the Asus 5870 and its an awesome fast card. Runs quiet and cool, cant ask for more.

 

[Zubasa]

How is it better than a 920 or even 860?

The fact that is holds its ground pretty solid all the way until the I7 are released?
The Q6600s in general OCs quite well and it is still a good performer at this date.

 

[InnocentCriminal]

How is it better than a 920 or even 860?

He didn't say it was better than an 920 or even an 860 - he said some people claim it's the best processor ever released - and I can relate to why they state that. As
Zubasa stated the Q6600 can hold it's ground still with other C2Qs and it really, like most quads hasn't really fulfilled its destiny. I mean, we don't really have many applications (mainly games) that are natively multi-threaded.

However, the point behind it was due to it being one of the most purchased processors due to the fact it was a fast quad core CPU, it was affordable and highly overclockable in most cases. A lot of people bought this CPU and as you can see still use it today.

It's great to see icmacdon relishing his new purchase whilst using it on what most would consider to be a very outdated framework, but it suits his needs and he's lovin' it!

HAZZARH!



Am I one of those people that claim the Q6600 (G0) as the best processor ever released? I'd definitely say it's one of them.

 

[icmacdon]

Thanks InnocentCriminal. I will probably upgrade to the I7 eventually but am content as my rig runs everything with details turned up. I probably am missing some fps to the I7 but as long as that minimum does not drop below about 40fps I am happpy!

 

[InnocentCriminal]

You've still got a very potential rig and I can't help but think the price of a new i5/7 rig really isn't justified yet. I mean, it's completely wasted processing power. Once you've hit your maximum performance on that 965 chipset the current i5/i7 stuff will be cheap and actually worth investing in.

 

[assaulter_99]

That's what I think too, the price isn't worth it, especially if you've got a good 775 rig. Heck like you, I'm happy as long as I'm getting 30+ fps. As for people who do heavy video editing and other stuff, well that's another question.

 

[Zubasa]

That's what I think too, the price isn't worth it, especially if you've got a good 775 rig. Heck like you, I'm happy as long as I'm getting 30+ fps. As for people who do heavy video editing and other stuff, well that's another question.

This is why I wish OpenCL can take off.
The GPU with its superior parallel processing power should be doing this job

 

[BarbaricSoul]

I replaced a pair of GTX280 cards I was running in SLI with a single 5870, and the 5870 is alittle faster.

Have not done much benching but in Bioshock @ 1680 x 1050 I get anywhere from about 100fps to 160 fps. The GTX 260 ran about 60 - 100 fps. I know not an accurate test but the new card is approx. 50% faster. In crysis @ 1680 x 1050 with the GTX 260 I could run on high with no AA, but on the 5870 I get about 35fps with very high settings and 2 xAA.

Your q6600 is holding you back alittle. Playing the early stages(koreans soldiers only, no aliens) I got between 40-50fps constant, very high settings at 1920*1200 resolution with my q9650 at 3.6ghz, no OC on the 5870.

 

[buggalugs]

Thanks InnocentCriminal. I will probably upgrade to the I7 eventually but am content as my rig runs everything with details turned up. I probably am missing some fps to the I7 but as long as that minimum does not drop below about 40fps I am happpy!

Ya , thats fair enough if you just want to run games at acceptable settings, it still pretty good. Although, the biggest performance increase came with i7's for me and worth every cent.

 

[bpgt64]

Nice, im just glad some other people are still using whats been claimed to be the best processor ever released.

I think the I7 920 has claimed that title however I am interested to know the performance difference, If the OP would post some Benches, I'd gladly throw up some of my own with matching settings...say Crysis 1.0/Far Cry 2?

I'd even be so bold as to post the same sets with a single HD 5870 in my old E8400 box just to compare dual/quad previous gen to dual/quad current gen?

 

[ToTTenTranz]

I'm selling my two HD4890s to switch for a single used HD5870 (yes, there are used HD5870s for sale, go figure).

So I'm losing a couple of FPS and paying for it.. about 60€ to be precise.


But FPS isn't everything. I'd rather have the better anisotropic filtering and supersampled AA + 60fps.
I could also brag about tesselation and computing but it doesn't really matter now, does it? Sure, there's future-proofness but if I can spend the money now, I could also spend the money later.
But more important than that, no more Crossfire thingies, lower noise, lower heat output (damn, it's winter here but my room gets too hot to sleep in when I game at night), etc etc.


The thing is, as soon as Fermi comes out and AMD lowers the HD5800's prices, the HD4890 will be worth almost nothing, so it was more of a tactical action than anything else (or at least that's what I keep telling myself to justify getting the new toy). Right now, I can still sell my HD4890s for about 110€..

And I'll now have a free PCI-E 16x slot so I can buy an used 8800-series graphics card just to try out a couple of PhysX games, brag about how much it sucks, and then sell the 8800 again.


So DX11, here I go.

 

[InnocentCriminal]

I'm selling my two HD4890s to switch for a single used HD5870 (yes, there are used HD5870s for sale, go figure).

So I'm losing a couple of FPS and paying for it.. about 60€ to be precise.


But FPS isn't everything. I'd rather have the better anisotropic filtering and supersampled AA + 60fps.
I could also brag about tesselation and computing but it doesn't really matter now, does it? Sure, there's future-proofness but if I can spend the money now, I could also spend the money later.
But more important than that, no more Crossfire thingies, lower noise, lower heat output (damn, it's winter here but my room gets too hot to sleep in when I game at night), etc etc.


The thing is, as soon as Fermi comes out and AMD lowers the HD5800's prices, the HD4890 will be worth almost nothing, so it was more of a tactical action than anything else (or at least that's what I keep telling myself to justify getting the new toy). Right now, I can still sell my HD4890s for about 110€..

And I'll now have a free PCI-E 16x slot so I can buy an used 8800-series graphics card just to try out a couple of PhysX games, brag about how much it sucks, and then sell the 8800 again.


So DX11, here I go.

I like the cut of your jib.

 

[bpgt64]

Yea I agree ToTTenTranz, I wanted to wait till Fermi dropped, but I had no choice...Newegg.com gave me 550 bucks in credit to spend as I saw fit(which burns a nuclear hole in my pocket) so I sold my current GTX 275 setup for the difference for twin HD 5870s

 

[Wrigleyvillain]

Wow on an old 965 too. Though I'd point out that you claim hardly any perf diff with your "old 1.0" but you haven't personally tested 2.0 with your Q6600 so...

If there are benches somewhere supporting this of which you are aware please post them.

 

[InnocentCriminal]

Wow on an old 965 too. Though I'd point out that you claim hardly any perf diff with your "old 1.0" but you haven't personally tested 2.0 with your Q6600 so...

If there are benches somewhere supporting this of which you are aware please post them.

I can't find the article W1zzard did on the differences between PCIe 1.0 and 2.0 but if you look at icmacdon's other thread you get the word from the horses mouth (not meaning to insult Horses).

 

[icmacdon]

With the GTX 260 I was getting 40-45 fps with Farcry 2 with everything very high/ultra high with no antialising. With the Radeon 5870 I am getting average 60 fps with everything maxed including 8x AA.

 

[ToTTenTranz]

Well, I got my HD5870.
Playing Mass Effect 1 maxed out in the .ini file, with 4xSSAA and the new anisotropic filtering, it almost becomes a whole new experience

It also reminds you of how crappy those console-like textures are, though.
And there's that same problem with Garrus' textures I had 2 years ago, they didn't fix that?! Damn..

 

[InnocentCriminal]

With the GTX 260 I was getting 40-45 fps with Farcry 2 with everything very high/ultra high with no antialising. With the Radeon 5870 I am getting average 60 fps with everything maxed including 8x AA.

Are you getting any micro-stutter? That game seemed to be plagued with it if you had more than 2x AA enabled regardless of what GFX card you had.