HD3850 or HD4670 ?

[angelkiller]

I would sell the 4670 and keep the 3850. Hear me out. Performance wise, they are about equal. So in terms of games and such, it doesn't matter which one you keep. But value wise, they're not equal. A used 3850 is only worth $30-40, while a 4670 is worth around $50. (I bought a 3870 for $50 btw) Since the 3850 is worth less, sell the 4670 and then you'd have equal gaming performance and $50 in your pocket. If you did it the other way around, gaming performance would be the same, but you would have less in your pocket.

But that assumes that the 3850 is worth less than the 4670. (If you sell it on a forum, the prices I gave earlier are very accurate) BUT, if you can somehow get $50 for the 3850, then sell the 3850.

The idea of selling both cards and getting 1 faster card is a good one. A used 4850 or GTS 250 are good choices. Both are very capable cards and sell for under $1000

 

[sweeper]

The 4670 came today and I'm just not going to use it. I am getting enough performance out of this HD3850 flashed to (750 core, 982 Memory). I've put it through several tests and it's a decent performance card. It came Pre-OC'd also. So I am assuming the Bios has been flashed to allow for the higher clocks. It was given to me so I don't know the story behind it. Anyway, there's a new Saphire HD4670 1GB DDR3 128-bit card sitting in the living room. I'm going to see if my finances allow me to grab a better card so I can be done with this build and not worry about upgrading for some time.

 

[pantherx12]

Sitting doing nothing?

How much would you sell it shipped to the UK per chance?

if you don't know shipping rates don't worry I do just PM me a price : ]

 

[sweeper]

Ok, so I've decided to spend $100-$200 on a card to finish this system and be happy with it for awhile. I am looking at ATI cards (not really a fan of Nvidia). Now I found this one checking (most reviews) but I want a card that will perform above this HD3850 which is already giving me 11,000+ in 3DMARK06.

Here is what I was looking at:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150351

Sweeper

 

[pantherx12]

Don't 5770s cost around 130 ?

Why not get a 5770?

 

[T3kl0rd]

Cheaper HD 4850

Cheapest HD 5770 I see on the Egg is $145 with only 512MB of memory. HD 4850 is your best bet unless you absolutely must have DX 11. Only a few games support that ATM, none of which are A+++ titles or IOW, killer apps. No one is seriously going to use Eyefinity, although the prospects of that setup is tantalizing.

 

[pantherx12]

Well i'd get this rather than the 4850 then ( 5750)http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150448&cm_re=5750-_-14-150-448-_-Product $10 more more DX 11 less, lower power less heat, potentially more over-clocking using after market cooling.

Or this 5770 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161317&cm_re=5770-_-14-161-317-_-Product for $20 more or only 139.99 after a mail in rebate.

 

[sweeper]

Not sure on the 5770... didn't see any that had alot of reviews. It's freaking me out how this HD3850 is performing so well vs the benchmarks I see on other cards. It's just as fast or a tad bit slower and that's just a SMALL amount slower than my brothers HIS HD5670 and he's all grumpy about it. lol.

 

[angelkiller]

Best Graphics Cards for the Money Feb 2010

I agree completely with their decisions in this price point.

 

[sweeper]

Which would you choose with the setup I have. Looking for a card that will work with my setup and not have my CPU or anything else bottleneck the performance of the card. The 4850 they list looks good except it doesn't have anything to cool the memory modules? The HS is nice but it just covers the GPU not any of the memory modules.

 

[angelkiller]

If memory isn't cooled in it's stock form, I doubt the memory needs to be cooled. The manufacturer (who has to deal/pay with/for all RMAs) didn't bother to cool the memory, so I don't think it's an issue.

As for what card to get, I would pick a 5750 or 5770. They're pretty good on power and offer good midrange performance, short of a 5850, which is out of budget.

 

[T3kl0rd]

+1 to angelkiller's Tom's Hardware link. I read that earlier today and I completely agree with their GPU value assessments.

If you aren't going to OC every last MHz out of the card, don't have to have DX 11 support and you don't see yourself needing Eyefinity anytime soon, then get the HD 4850.

 

[sweeper]

What about the HD4870 ?

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0294030

 

[angelkiller]

5770 is about the same as a 4870 performance wise, but the 5770 uses significantly less power.

That 4870 isn't worth it because you can get this 5770 for $9 more. That 5770 uses about 50% less power and has 100% more RAM.

 

[sweeper]

What's up with all the gray screens and Vertical black lines, line breaks, artifacts? I keep seeing this on the 5000 series cards? Also alot of scale issues. Has this been addressed yet?

As seen here by the hotfix by AMD: http://support.amd.com/us/kbarticles/Pages/Grey-screen-and-vertical-line-corruptions.aspx
But even as the hotfix was issued it still doesn't fix it 100%. This worries me ....

 

[pantherx12]

A lot of people don't get any issues at all, if you get a card with issues do what I do, return it for another one, if problem persists then return it and ask for a completely different card of the same price, hell sometimes you can wait til another card is cheaper and get a better card ha ha

 

[Lionheart]

What's up with all the gray screens and Vertical black lines, line breaks, artifacts? I keep seeing this on the 5000 series cards? Also alot of scale issues. Has this been addressed yet?

As seen here by the hotfix by AMD: http://support.amd.com/us/kbarticles/Pages/Grey-screen-and-vertical-line-corruptions.aspx
But even as the hotfix was issued it still doesn't fix it 100%. This worries me ....

Yo man, that hotfix is for HD5800 series cards only, amd are workin on the other series.

 

[sweeper]

hmmmm..... well I'll probably hang on to this OC'd HD3850 till I can make sure the card I get works with ATI's drivers. Only thing I hate about this 3850 is it runs HOT! 72c-80c under load! Fan spins up to full speed and still won't drop it. This is in a FULL Tower too. Plenty of air flow. Guess if she goes boom I'll buy something. Dang, I just noticed this thread is going on to 3 pages. Guess I'm to picky........ Someone make up my mind.

 

[Lionheart]

like u said man, wait for amd to release 10.2 drivers and hopefully the grey artifacts are long gone, if so definitely consider a HD5770 and OC it a bit.

Going from a HD3850 to a HD5770, you should notice a good performance boost, plus it doesnt use that much power.

Check this one out http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/MSI/HD_5770_HAWK/