GTX 460 SLI or Wait for Southern Islands

[v8envy]

Another 285 might have done the same job

With bing CB at tigerdirect you can get a 460 1gb for a hair under $200 and the castrated one for $170. It's hard to match that value with current prices on last gen hardware. Selling his current 285 and getting two 460s might come out cheaper overall.

 

[woolfe9999]

Skurge is right if you game @ 1900x1080 768mb of memory is ok for now but, it will come back to haunt you later.

A few years back there were 2 great 8800 series cards one had 320mb of ram the other had 640mb of ram. I cant tell you how many dissapointed people I heard from about how "THEY WISHED THEY BOUGHT" THE 640mb model.

I'm one of those people, and I STILL have the 320, and man if I had just spent the extra $50 back then, maybe I wouldn't have the crazy need to upgrade now. I'm actually locked out of higher resolutions in several games, and even if I bypass it, it doesn't play.

I'd never go for less than a gig ever again.

- wolf

 

[pjkenned]

Another 285 might have done the same job

Yea but I haven't needed the second one that I sold for awhile. I'm having a tough time between 1x or 2x GTX 460 1GB's or GTX 470's. $25/ ea more for the 470's v. factory overclocked 460 1GB's.

I'm also likely to sell the EVGA 285. No real point in keeping it.

 

[dust]

Yea but I haven't needed the second one that I sold for awhile. I'm having a tough time between 1x or 2x GTX 460 1GB's or GTX 470's. $25/ ea more for the 470's v. factory overclocked 460 1GB's.

I'm also likely to sell the EVGA 285. No real point in keeping it.

Well, selling it is common sense, and IMO you should go for two 460's @1 gb instead. One alone might not give you that much compared to your existing card. I'd say forget about 470's as they draw way more power and the 460's look indeed well compared to them. If you want 470's performance, wait for a little while longer as I'm sure Nvidia won't stop here and they'll pull out some dual card or a 475, etc. They seem to be on the right track this time.

 

[Blitz1776]

Figured I post here on my experience so far. Positives went with the 768 MB for $175 (Still couldn't beat that deal overall), and tiger direct had it at my house within 2 days. Now that they are working overall pretty good, I still note a minor hitch every once and while like (10 1 second pauses/frame drops in 30 minutes on bad company), but that's probably from just being maxed graphics and lots of explosives going around. Last major positive seems to be good on a 650 power supply, haven't noticed any signs of failing like instability, etc.

Negatives, oh where do I start, when I first got through the cable rerouting and installing, had to move the sound card out of the way into my top slot x4 pci express slot (by my CPU Heatsink). It wouldnt' turn on and was angrily blinking at me, so using standard technician repair 101 I removed a video card (after removing the plug, etc) thinking it could be a bad seat. Tried to kick on and didn't come on went to go power off the power supply and the system kicked on and started shooting smoke out of the Sound Card, immediately removed it and verified all components were fine. Turned it on with one video card and verified it worked, installed the second with some fiddling and it worked.

Main Question of the Day: How the hell does smoke shoot out from a fairly new high end sound card (Asus Xonar Essence STX). My best guesses are it wasn't seated right, but it should just not work (and the connectors looked clean etc). Maybe the voltages weren't high enough have it running at 1.2 on the IOH atm. Last possible is an arc from being close to the cpu Heatsink about 3/4 of an inch gap between it and the metal monster, and I did run cables between the two but I figure they were insulated.

P.S: On the ironic side while my audio quality I would say suffered 15-20% and I miss the built in amp for my headphones, everybody on vent says my mic went from being a 6- to an 8.

 

[DominionSeraph]

I'm one of those people, and I STILL have the 320, and man if I had just spent the extra $50 back then, maybe I wouldn't have the crazy need to upgrade now.

It was $100 difference when they came out: $300 vs 400. With that $100 you can now get a 4850 or used 4870 -- a rather better deal than having a 640MB G80.

However, because he's SLI'ing the 460 GTX's pushing him further into the future than just a single card, and there's more than just a memory size difference between the two, and because there's less of a price difference, this isn't anywhere near the slam-dunk that the 320MB was.
I'd say it's basically a coin flip.
Looks like OP went for the 768MB. As he appears to be a deal-hunter on a long upgrade cycle, I really can't fault the decision. The extra performance of the 1GB cards would probably not be enough to push him to skip an additional generation over the 768MB. When a steal comes out in 3-4 generations, he'd jump on it either way.
If it would allow him to skip another generation, $60 invested now would save him ~$40-50 later, but I don't see the performance differential for that.

 

[Blitz1776]

Basically the same way I felt on it Seraph , although still trying to figure out the whole Sound Card Fiasco, heavily leaning on trying to get them to sub me maybe a monitor since the 460 can output audio over HDMI and using my built in mic port for the other part, and I won't risk frying my other components.

 

[StinkyPinky]

At the end of the day if you can't play your games at a setting you enjoy, then go buy a faster card. Who cares what is coming out in 5 months, you'll always be waiting for something.

I bought my 5850 when they came out because my 8800gt wasn't cutting it...never regretted it.

 

[pugh]

At the end of the day if you can't play your games at a setting you enjoy, then go buy a faster card. Who cares what is coming out in 5 months, you'll always be waiting for something.

I bought my 5850 when they came out because my 8800gt wasn't cutting it...never regretted it.

All that matters...

 

[bryanW1995]

Yea but I haven't needed the second one that I sold for awhile. I'm having a tough time between 1x or 2x GTX 460 1GB's or GTX 470's. $25/ ea more for the 470's v. factory overclocked 460 1GB's.

I'm also likely to sell the EVGA 285. No real point in keeping it.

seriously, it's only $25 more for the 470? as long as your psu can handle it, the 470 is a no-brainer over the 460 for that tiny price difference.

Well, selling it is common sense, and IMO you should go for two 460's @1 gb instead. One alone might not give you that much compared to your existing card. I'd say forget about 470's as they draw way more power and the 460's look indeed well compared to them. If you want 470's performance, wait for a little while longer as I'm sure Nvidia won't stop here and they'll pull out some dual card or a 475, etc. They seem to be on the right track this time.

It makes me laugh how we finally have a hot new girl in school and everyone has forgotten about all the other hot chicks that we've known for a while now. the gtx 460 1gb is a MIDRANGE card that just happens to be priced right. Does it emit less heat than a 470? sure, by about 30% at load. at idle they are much closer, and when you're gaming at high res and want the eye candy you're typically much more concerned about what you see on the screen than an extra .2 degree c of temperature in your room. All these thermal comparisons are fine for cards of similar performance, but it's foolish to take a midrange card and expect a high end offering to offer much better performance but similar thermals. /rant

 

[dust]

seriously, it's only $25 more for the 470? as long as your psu can handle it, the 470 is a no-brainer over the 460 for that tiny price difference.



It makes me laugh how we finally have a hot new girl in school and everyone has forgotten about all the other hot chicks that we've known for a while now. the gtx 460 1gb is a MIDRANGE card that just happens to be priced right. Does it emit less heat than a 470? sure, by about 30% at load. at idle they are much closer, and when you're gaming at high res and want the eye candy you're typically much more concerned about what you see on the screen than an extra .2 degree c of temperature in your room. All these thermal comparisons are fine for cards of similar performance, but it's foolish to take a midrange card and expect a high end offering to offer much better performance but similar thermals. /rant

Since you are already laughing, let me give you yet another reason, how about the fact that most of the posts in the video forum would need an "IMO" typed somewhere inside.
I am aware the 460 is nothing but mid-range and it needs less everything than the 470 while pulling out less performance also, but, as you said also, it happens to be priced correctly. The last time I checked the 470's are still about 60-70$ higher, while "benefiting" of all the cons the Fermi gen currently suffers from.

Do I believe the 460 is a worthwhile upgrade from a 285? I most certainly don't, but it does offer limited advantages over the previous gen.Hell, I don't consider 460 as an upgrade from my 4870! If it were me, I would simply get another 285 for another year or so, but hey that's what I would do. The reasons that you might find trivial might be seriously considered by others, it is that simple.

Also the op stated the difference of 25$ from the factory oced 460, not from the stock one.

BTW, I'm married, so the whole thing with the hot new chick doesn't work

 

[rgallant]

seriously, it's only $25 more for the 470? as long as your psu can handle it, the 470 is a no-brainer over the 460 for that tiny price difference.



It makes me laugh how we finally have a hot new girl in school and everyone has forgotten about all the other hot chicks that we've known for a while now. the gtx 460 1gb is a MIDRANGE card that just happens to be priced right. Does it emit less heat than a 470? sure, by about 30% at load. at idle they are much closer, and when you're gaming at high res and want the eye candy you're typically much more concerned about what you see on the screen than an extra .2 degree c of temperature in your room. All these thermal comparisons are fine for cards of similar performance, but it's foolish to take a midrange card and expect a high end offering to offer much better performance but similar thermals. /rant

+1

-also the 1 gig version is missing 1\8 of it's core
-the 786 version is missing 1\8 of it's core and 25% of it's memory
-I don't see the deal of saving $25.00 ,when spending $ 200.00 if the card won't play the all games out now close to max. settings , let alone whats coming out.
-also you know nvidia crippled these cards for a higher volume of yields
-so when nvidia does release the full version most likely these 460's can't be used in sli.
-dead end product ,but you can save 25 bucks. lol
-I say wait for the full version if you can,

 

[taltamir]

the noise doesn't bother you?