Choices =( 5850,5870,5970,480....

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WelshBloke

Lifer
Jan 12, 2005
33,370
11,515
136
One question that I haven't really seen answered:

The 5970 is somewhat new, so drivers are not perfected. Whereas drivers for the 5850 are probably close to optimal.

Is this statement correct? Can I expect the 5970 to only improve from here on out, and the 5850s to pretty much stay where they are?


I would guess that the 5970 would see the highest gains from driver improvements just because its a dual GPU card. I also wouldn't rely on any driver improvements in your buying decisions.
 

Mireli

Member
Apr 28, 2010
65
0
0
http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?p=XFX-5970BK&c=SZ&show=w

Is the cheapest XFX I can find. I have never heard of the site before though, they are reliable?

Newegg is $30 more.

EDIT: ACK. Shipping to Canada from the above site is $50.

EDIT#2: Oh wow. I may not be able to get the 5970 after all. Out of stock in a lot of places, and the version I want is higher than it should be on newegg.ca, totallying to 1000~ after tax/shipping.
 
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MagickMan

Diamond Member
Aug 11, 2008
7,460
3
76
ewiz is great, bought maybe a dozen things from them and never had an issue. Yeah, that shipping is a bitch, though.
 

Mireli

Member
Apr 28, 2010
65
0
0
I'm ordering from ewiz now, $689.99+$44.56 shipping, I am all the way to the pay step and there is no tax., total is $737.

Am I missing something?
 

happy medium

Lifer
Jun 8, 2003
14,387
480
126
700$ for a gtx 470 in sli and more performance then 5870's in crossfire and you buy a 5970 for 737$ with 1gb of memory?

7 wins and 1 loss buy only 2 fps in Warhead vs crossfired 5870's >>> (faster then a 5970)

http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-470-2-3-way-sli-review/14
http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-470-2-3-way-sli-review/15
http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-470-2-3-way-sli-review/16
http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-470-2-3-way-sli-review/17
http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-470-2-3-way-sli-review/18
http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-470-2-3-way-sli-review/20
http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-470-2-3-way-sli-review/21
http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-470-2-3-way-sli-review/19

And this is with the old drivers for the gtx 470's. The new drivers add another 5% at least across the board.
I guess they are to hot for ya?
The idle noise levels are quiet.
When you game and the fans start spinning you use speakers right?

It must be the heat?
What case do you have?

Edit: never mind you made your choice. I was eating dinner in the middle of that post. sorry
 

Mireli

Member
Apr 28, 2010
65
0
0
I haven't made my choice yet. I was worried about SLI'd 470 on my system. My specs are in the original post.

It was the heat i was worried about, and the PSU, not the noise. The noise is fine.
 
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Mireli

Member
Apr 28, 2010
65
0
0
I can't really order from ewiz due to the border problems and ultra-high shiipping prices, it is better to grab them from ncix or newegg.
 

Mireli

Member
Apr 28, 2010
65
0
0
Thanks, I'm done now!

I just said screw it. I'm tired of all this stressing and all this researching. Whatever I do is going to be well over what I need.

So, I went with the 5970.

Thanks for all the support^_^
 

RussianSensation

Elite Member
Sep 5, 2003
19,458
765
126
It's funny how the same people who claimed tessellation didn't matter are now claiming it does...

Tessellation does not matter as much for a single card because a single GTX470 for example cannot handle tessellation, while still providing smooth gameplay at 2560x1600 (OP's res. as he said). When you are talking about buying $700 worth of videocards, you aren't buying them for just 6 months. When you are spending that kind of $$, then it's fair to say that you'll probably keep them a while (in which case the extra features will come to play, and you will be able to utilize them with dual cards since you have the horsepower).

For example, we knew that 6800 Ultra could run HDR in Crysis, but it's performance was slow. However, if you were looking to purchase dual 6800 Ultras, then perhaps this extra feature would have been more of an advantage compared to X850XTs in CF. Think of it this way, DX11 isn't really a selling feature of 5770, since it can hardly provide playability in DX11 games at 1920x1080. But that's not to say that DX11 is unimportant.

OP, 5970 is an awesome card, you won't be disappointed.
 
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MrK6

Diamond Member
Aug 9, 2004
4,458
4
81
Thanks, I'm done now!

I just said screw it. I'm tired of all this stressing and all this researching. Whatever I do is going to be well over what I need.

So, I went with the 5970.

Thanks for all the support^_^
Enjoy your card! Post some pics and impressions when you do get it :thumbsup:.