Gurus: Looking for advice about video card

[myocardia]

The cheapest twp PSU's I would recommend are the 500 watt Antec Earthwatts for $50, if you're going to be running a 3850/3870 or 9600GT/8800GT/9800GT, or the 430 watt Earthwatts for $40, if you're going to be running a lower powered card, like a 4670. They're on sale, though, so don't wait. They probably won't last long at those prices.

edit: The Corsair VX550 is an even better PSU. Now you'll want a better video card, I guess, since you've got the power to run it now, huh?

 

[bigblueman]

Thanks, love your name btw. I went with a Corsair (see above).

Ok, I'm done. No more upgrading this damn thing.

 

[bigblueman]

Originally posted by: myocardia
edit: The Corsair VX550 is an even better PSU. Now you'll want a better video card, I guess, since you've got the power to run it now, huh?

No, I'm done!

I think the 3870 is absolutely perfect for what I want. And I like knowing that I have a little extra power especially since I have a Raid array.

From now on I will always build. If I would have been able to cancel my order today with HP I would have. But in the end it was a pretty good deal up front (less than $700) but I am paying for it on the back end now. Arrrgh!

 

[SolMiester]

Originally posted by: adlep
I would recommend this:

Click

This Radeon HD 3850 512MB is cheap, provides for a good performance, and it goes easy on the power supply that you have in your PC and its only $50.00 AR!

Edit:

Take a look at the benchmarks.


As an alternative, take a look at a bit more expensive card:

Here

It is a $69.00-AR Radeon HD 3870 and it would be another good choice for a computer with a weak PSU.

Basically, I would recommend the HD 3850/3870 over Nvidia cards because of the good ratio of the performance to power requirement.

You are getting confused with there latest 4xxx series cards, NV wiped the floor with the 3xxx series....period.


I think the 3870 is a backwards step to be honest......current gen cuda, DX10 backwards...

 

[rogue1979]

Originally posted by: SolMiester


You are getting confused with there latest 4xxx series cards, NV wiped the floor with the 3xxx series....period.

Hmmm, from what I remember the HD3850 was competitive with the 8800GS and close to the 9600GT. The 3870 was faster than both of those, and not too far behind an 8800GT.

I'm not sure "wiped the floor" is an accurate description.

 

[SolMiester]

Ummm, 96GT had a 20% adv is HL2, the 88GT even more, though that may not be the best game to compare them on....and I see I was wrong re DX10...oops, however I do think the 96GT or GSO would of been a better choice for power, heat and of course later generation......he would of saved money on the PSU anyway...

 

[BenSkywalker]

Hmmm, from what I remember the HD3850 was competitive with the 8800GS and close to the 9600GT. The 3870 was faster than both of those, and not too far behind an 8800GT.

I'm not sure "wiped the floor" is an accurate description.

I linked benches, saying the 9600GT wipes the floor is fairly accurate. The 3850 isn't competitive at all, the 3870 loses almost ever single bench. But hey, they 3870 uses more power and runs hotter and it costs the same. I guess if you want a red pcb really, really badly then the 3870 is a good choice. Other then that, I would say I am a bit confused why anyone would want one over a 9600GT.

 

[cusideabelincoln]

I don't see why you are upgrading the thing when you're not going to need the performance right now. You should have just kept it, and if a game came out that you wanted to play, THEN upgrade. Prices are always falling, so you could have gotten a much better deal. A 9500GS is powerful enough to at least play any new game, and can handle any game 1.5+ years old.

 

[bigblueman]

Originally posted by: cusideabelincoln
I don't see why you are upgrading the thing when you're not going to need the performance right now. You should have just kept it, and if a game came out that you wanted to play, THEN upgrade. Prices are always falling, so you could have gotten a much better deal. A 9500GS is powerful enough to at least play any new game, and can handle any game 1.5+ years old.

I want to be able to play at least Madden and maybe a few others in the next few months (I have vacation coming up). And I'd like to upgrade it now and be done with it.

But you might be correct - maybe I should have just seen what it could do and waited. I guess you guys inspired me.

 

[rogue1979]

Originally posted by: BenSkywalker

Hmmm, from what I remember the HD3850 was competitive with the 8800GS and close to the 9600GT. The 3870 was faster than both of those, and not too far behind an 8800GT.

I'm not sure "wiped the floor" is an accurate description.

I linked benches, saying the 9600GT wipes the floor is fairly accurate. The 3850 isn't competitive at all, the 3870 loses almost ever single bench. But hey, they 3870 uses more power and runs hotter and it costs the same. I guess if you want a red pcb really, really badly then the 3870 is a good choice. Other then that, I would say I am a bit confused why anyone would want one over a 9600GT.

I saw the benchmarks....

First of all the 3850/3870 saw some big performance gains with later drivers, Catalyst 8.7 and newer. The Nvidia cards saw marginal performance gains in later versions.

I have two 9600GT's, and a HD 3850. I compare them on my computers on the games that I play. Of course, all of my video cards are overclocked. One of the 9600GT's struggled to run 675/1750/1625 stable (Palit), the other (PNY) hit 710/1800/2025. The HD 3850 hit 825/2200 and was definately faster overall. I'm sure I could hand pick a game or two were it was beaten by the 9600GT, but that's just an Nvidia vs ATI driver/architecture thing. Trust me, overall the HD 3850 was noticeably faster.

The benchmarks you find probably won't tell you that the 9600GSO is a bit faster too when overclocking is considered. Heck, I had a 8800GS 320MB @ 650/1500/2000 that was just about the same speed as the overclocked 9600GT at medium resolutions.

But I guess old school tech is considered obsolete and find a benchmark out there that confirms it and everybody here believes the G80 sucks. I have all these cards and just uses what works best, don't care who makes it. Just have fun pushing relatively cheap hardware to the max and gaming with it.

Maybe you get different results or read about them somewhere, but I am just posting what I have seen first hand, no biased opinions, period.

By the way the power draw between a 9600GT and HD 3850 are almost dead even.
As far as noise goes the stock cooler on my Asus HD 3850 was quieter than either 9600GT.

It was the exact same cooler that is on both of my Asus 9600GSO's and they are quieter too.

Not saying that I don't like the 9600GT, my 17 year old daughter is using the faster PNY in her main rig and loves it.

One final point. I have noticed some people have an affinity for defending their hardware because they purchased it, and how it has to be proven the best. As a matter of fact, I guess I'll just say that philosophy seems to be rampant here at Anandtech as well as other forums. But in this case I bought all of the above mentioned cards and have no preference or motivation to make one seem better than the other.

You're allowed to have your opinion and if you believe it is correct, that's OK.

On the other hand please allow me the same courtesy.

 

[Denithor]

Originally posted by: rogue1979
One final point. I have noticed some people have an affinity for defending their hardware because they purchased it, and how it has to be proven the best.

For the sake of full disclosure, I currently own:
4x 8800GS/9600GSO
1x 9600GT
1x 8800GT
1x 8800GTS 512MB
1x GTX 260

And I still recommend the 3870 for moderate gaming use. The benches I've seen put it a bit ahead of the 9600GT and just behind the 8800GT while consuming less power than the 8800GT.

Now, if you were looking to spend $100, $150, $200 I would have a completely different recommendation for you...but for moderate gaming on a budget the 3870 is a great value.

 

[rogue1979]

Originally posted by: Denithor

For the sake of full disclosure, I currently own:
4x 8800GS/9600GSO
1x 9600GT
1x 8800GT
1x 8800GTS 512MB
1x GTX 260

And I still recommend the 3870 for moderate gaming use. The benches I've seen put it a bit ahead of the 9600GT and just behind the 8800GT while consuming less power than the 8800GT.

This agrees with my findings, considering my Asus HD3850 was overclocked faster than a stock 3870.

I might add an overclocked 8800GS/9600GSO gains a bunch of performance over stock, putting it slightly ahead of the 9600GT also. I did notice at stock speeds the 9600GT was faster, but overclocking only gives it a mild boost. A good overclocking 8800GS/9600GSO turns into a whole different card. Same thing with an older 8800GTS (G80), once overclocked those extra shaders and 320-bit really make a big difference when comparing to a G94.

By the way all those video cards I bought were a steal.

2 x 9600GT's about 7 months ago for $99 (shipped after rebate).
1 8800 GTS 320MB overclocked for ($75 shipped used) about 4 months ago.
1 HD3850 512MB for $63 (shipped after rebate) about 3 months ago.
2 x 9600GSO's for $72 (shipped no rebate) about 1.5 months ago.

It sure is a great time for budget PC gaming. With cheap C2D's and stellar deals on midrange video cards, throw in a healthy dose of overclocking and it sure doesn't feel like budget PC gaming

 

[cusideabelincoln]

Originally posted by: bigblueman

Originally posted by: cusideabelincoln
I don't see why you are upgrading the thing when you're not going to need the performance right now. You should have just kept it, and if a game came out that you wanted to play, THEN upgrade. Prices are always falling, so you could have gotten a much better deal. A 9500GS is powerful enough to at least play any new game, and can handle any game 1.5+ years old.

I want to be able to play at least Madden and maybe a few others in the next few months (I have vacation coming up). And I'd like to upgrade it now and be done with it.

But you might be correct - maybe I should have just seen what it could do and waited. I guess you guys inspired me.

Hehe, that's completely understandable. I'm more of a cautious man and I rarely make a decision without doing some research.

And I wouldn't mind seeing some benchmarks of the 9600GSO. A few months ago I was looking at benchmarks for the 8800GS, and the review I found showed it being beaten (not badly, but by a decent amount) by a 256MB HD3850. Is the 9600GSO any faster than an 8800GS? And how's the difference betweent the 128- and 192-bit memory interfaces?

 

[BenSkywalker]

You're allowed to have your opinion and if you believe it is correct, that's OK.

On the other hand please allow me the same courtesy.

The difference is that you are giving your viewpoint, I am providing hard numbers. It has nothing to do with perspective, far too much emotion and extremely bad reccomendations are handed out that way. I have seen people base their support for a part on their own anecdotal heavily OCd parts for casual gamers who have no intention of overclocking and are just looking for a basic card for games. What I do for those people is simply provide hard data for stock setups.

More numbers.

If the OP is interested in heavily overclocking his parts then your perspective becomes far more valid, given you are basing your reccomendation around a set of circumstances he gave no indication whatsoever he plans to use you may want to look more at actual stock numbers.

 

[MarcVenice]

WHat constitutes wiping the floor ? Wiping the floor sounds like the 9600gt completely owns the HD3870, as if the HD3870 is a piece of junk yada yada yada. But that's simply not true. Using the phrase 'wipes the floor' diminishes your credibility almost instantly to 0. If there's someone not being completely objective, it's you ...

 

[BenSkywalker]

WHat constitutes wiping the floor ? Wiping the floor sounds like the 9600gt completely owns the HD3870, as if the HD3870 is a piece of junk yada yada yada. But that's simply not true. Using the phrase 'wipes the floor' diminishes your credibility almost instantly to 0. If there's someone not being completely objective, it's you ...

Users criteria-

Low Power
Low thermal properties
Low Price
Best performance

Looking at hard data-

Lowest Power- 9600GT
Lowest Thermal Properties- 9600GT
Lowest Price- Tie
Best Performance- 9600GT

Given the criteria requested of the part, how exactly is that not wiping the floor? When the given price point is met and every other metric the OP requires is topped by one part, how is that not a rather decisive victory? You should lay off the personal attacks also, it is in violation of AT's forum policies and if moderators can not uphold the basic forum conduct guidelines I don't see how you can expect forum users to follow them.

 

[rogue1979]

Originally posted by: BenSkywalker

Users criteria-

Low Power
Low thermal properties
Low Price
Best performance

Looking at hard data-

Lowest Power- 9600GT
Lowest Thermal Properties- 9600GT
Lowest Price- Tie
Best Performance- 9600GT

Given the criteria requested of the part, how exactly is that not wiping the floor? When the given price point is met and every other metric the OP requires is topped by one part, how is that not a rather decisive victory? You should lay off the personal attacks also, it is in violation of AT's forum policies and if moderators can not uphold the basic forum conduct guidelines I don't see how you can expect forum users to follow them.

Lowest Power- 9600GT - link

Common sense tell me a 55nm part would probably use less power than a 65nm part,
but since you need hard data, here it is.

Lowest Thermal Properties - hmm... well, the HD 3870 uses less power on a smaller die, but since we don't have hard data on a 3850 I guess we can't assume it uses even less power and produces even less heat?

Lowest Price The HD 3850 is $10 cheaper than the 9600GT at $74 with free shipping at the egg right now, no rebates necessary.

Best performance Like I said, the last couple of driver releases improved performance significantly, especially in the area of AA were the 9600GT showed well in earlier reviews.

Summary:

BenSkywalker, your performance summary at stock speeds is a valid point.

If I conceed that the 9600GT is indeed faster, then 1 out of your 4 criteria is correct! Not bad!

The OP's biggest concern was power draw, so it looks like the HD3850 is still a better choice.

Now if we take overclocking into account maybe things would change a bit? I couldn't find any hard data to support that, so I guess my viewpoint is completely invalid.

My bad for throwing overclocking results into the mix, but since this is Anandtech maybe suggesting overclocking isn't out of the question?

I guess owning, using and tweaking both the 9600GT and HD 3850 is not as valid as benchmarks from people that get paid to post the results. Of course getting paid by advertisers and the like, I am 100% certain no manufacturers have any financial influence on the results!

Sorry to give you guys a bad recommendation

 

[bigblueman]

Thanks for all the replies. Unfortunately this has turned into a nightmare. The money I would have saved is now gone. Arrrgghh.

But it is my own damn fault.

One other thing --- I have a question about the PSU that I bought. If you have a minute please let me know what you think about if the thing will even fit in my case. I've started a new thread here: http://forums.anandtech.com/me...=2240279&enterthread=y

I'm tired of talking about this thing. It arrives tomorrow.

 

[cusideabelincoln]

If it's a mid-tower ATX case, then the PSU will fit. Also, contrary to what you believe I think an HD3870 would work just fine with the strock PSU, and the 550W Corsair unit is most certainly overkill.

 

[Keysplayr]

One last little tidbit here. Is anyone here certain that the PSU that shipped with the HP computer is not proprietary?
For example. The power connectors to the motherboard (ATX connector, 4/8 pin aux power connector for the CPU, etc.)

Dell used to have this. Not sure about HPs.

I ask because, when the OP gets his shiny new PSU, will he be looking at the connectors and saying to himself, "WTF?".

 

[bigblueman]

Originally posted by: keysplayr2003
One last little tidbit here. Is anyone here certain that the PSU that shipped with the HP computer is not proprietary?
For example. The power connectors to the motherboard (ATX connector, 4/8 pin aux power connector for the CPU, etc.)

Dell used to have this. Not sure about HPs.

I ask because, when the OP gets his shiny new PSU, will he be looking at the connectors and saying to himself, "WTF?".

That's a very good point. Last night I spent a while googling this very question and found out that in the last few years HP has not used proprietary parts on their PSUs. This is based on a few forum discussions from various website that were asking the same question.

 

[bigblueman]

Originally posted by: cusideabelincoln
If it's a mid-tower ATX case, then the PSU will fit. Also, contrary to what you believe I think an HD3870 would work just fine with the strock PSU, and the 550W Corsair unit is most certainly overkill.

Now this is interesting. Does anyone else agree with this? I'm worried that the stock 350W HP power supply will not be that good and will not be able to power a RAID array plus a hew videocard.

Can anyone else let me know about this? If I don't need the 550W I'll either return it or craigslist it.

 

[bigblueman]

Received the HP today. Its a little smaller than what I am used to but otherwise it is very nice.

The video card makes a very annoying hum.

And I have noticed that the stock PSU does not have a 12V lead (at least I don't see one)! So in order to get rid of this stupid hum and upgrade my video card I have to upgrade the PSU whether I want to or not. My new Corsair psu gets here tomorrow and I have measured it ---- it is going to fit perfectly.

Another mistake that I made (and this is because I haven't built or upgraded a computer in 5 years) is thinking that I could use 1 of my old DVD burners in the second bay. Well, the motherboard doesn't even have IDE connections so I am SOL there. I ordered another SATA DVD burner from the egg today for an additional $27.

So overall I paid about $720 for this thing but spent about $140 for the PSU and Video card and another $27 for the extra burner. I guess $900 isn't terrible but in retrospect I didn't do my homework (I don't have a lot of time now - hence the reason I elected not to build) and I could have probably built this for the same or not much more and ended up with a better system.

In the end I'm still happy though. This is a nice machine and I have learned a lot by going this route. Next time I'll be building though.

 

[rogue1979]

BenSkywalker, I have an update for you:

After reading up on several benchmark results and trying to compare 9600GT vs HD 3850 peformance, I decided to just try out the HD 3850 and 9600GT for a direct comparison.

PNY 9600GT @ 765/1775/2050 Xtreme-G 177.41, stock cooling.
Asus HD 3850 (512MB) @ 777/2000 Xtreme-G Catalyst 8.7 stock cooling.

Tested on a E6600 (4MB L2 cache) @ 3GHz, 2GB of ram (dual channel), same rig as in my sig. Windows XP Pro SP2.

I actually clocked the HD 3850 slower than it could run, trying to approximate an average
overclocking result. The 9600GT was running as fast as it could, which also seems to be about average comparing to results around the web.

I don't have any graphs, but I tested in GRAW2, COD4, GRID and Crysis.

Running 1152 x 864 with 16AF and 4X AA, all details on high, except Crysis where
I had to drop to 8AF and 2XAA details on high to get playable frames.

I have to eat some crow and say that I was wrong!

The 9600GT consistently ran between 10-15% faster in all of the above games.
Not a huge amount and certainly not "wiping the floor", but better performance for sure.

The HD 3850 topped out at 58C under full load with the stock Asus cooler (pretty big).

The 9600GT topped out at 64C under full load, both cards having slightly modified fan profiles to hit 80-90% by 55C.

Not that it means much, but 3Dmark06 showed both card hitting 11,300 pts.

Now keep in mind most people probably game in higher resolutions these days,
so their results might not be the same.

 

[bigblueman]

Just an update.

I'm genuinely happy with this setup. I upgraded the video card and the PSU and am very happy with this thing. It is completely quiet - the only thing I can hear is my external hard drive. It is light years faster than my 2003 system (obviously) and the frustration and man-hours of completing it were minimal.

I could have built a better rig for about another $100 and for my next system I will definitely do so.

The ironic part about all of this is that I upgraded the noisy video card and PSU so that I could mainly play Madden a max settings. The ironic part is that as of last year they quit making Madden for the PC because of pirating. Dammit!