Please recommend a video card for me

[Oyeve]

I have been out of the PC gaming loop for nearly 2 years now. The PC in my sig was purchased long ago and not even fully built yet. Anyway, I realize my 3870 card is utter crap by now and I recently purchased Windows 7, 3 1TB HDs and Dragon Age:Origins. I want to get back into PC gaming as I have finally started working again. In the last 2 years PCs have changed drastically. My e6850 is now old-school S775! Anyhoot, I am looking for a video card that will play DA:O fluently and other games that I have missed out on. My monitor will only do 1680x1050 and I dont plan to get another as I love my monitor. So, please recommend a decent vid card for me. I dont want to spend a fortune and am not picky, so ATI or Nvidia is fine. THX!

 

[happy medium]

I have been out of the PC gaming loop for nearly 2 years now. The PC in my sig was purchased long ago and not even fully built yet. Anyway, I realize my 3870 card is utter crap by now and I recently purchased Windows 7, 3 1TB HDs and Dragon Age:Origins. I want to get back into PC gaming as I have finally started working again. In the last 2 years PCs have changed drastically. My e6850 is now old-school S775! Anyhoot, I am looking for a video card that will play DA:O fluently and other games that I have missed out on. My monitor will only do 1680x1050 and I dont plan to get another as I love my monitor. So, please recommend a decent vid card for me. I dont want to spend a fortune and am not picky, so ATI or Nvidia is fine. THX!

Best bang for your buck is a hd5770 for 152$ shipped with rebate 142$ shipped. This card is 2x as fast as your 3870.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...D=3332167&SID=

5830 is overpriced and it just came out yesterday at 250$ shipped.
5850's are over 300$ now. So I would not recommend them.

If you like Nvidia you might score a gtx 260 for 175$

Edit: Here is a used Leadtech gtx 260 factory overclocked for 150$ shipped.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2053433

 

[MrK6]

The 5770 is probably going to be your best bet. As happy medium pointed out, prices aren't so great right now, and the 5770 for $140 is about the only thing that's decently priced.

 

[lifeblood]

If you can't wait, get the 5770 and you will not be disappointed. If you can wait, see what Nvidia puts on the table in a month (maybe). They may cause the prices to go down a bit on the 5770 if nothing else. But like I said, if you get a 5770 now you won't be disappointed.

 

[yh125d]

Ditto on the 5770, it's roughly comparable to 3870 xfire. A really good deal is the MSI twinfrozr GTS250 1gb for $95 AR, but it's not quite as fast as a 5770

 

[jtisgeek]

I have to disagree I would go 4890 or gtx260 maybe better bang for your money but harder to find I think 5770 are kinda of a disappointment.

You will be about 10 to 15 percent faster with the 4890 compared to the 5770 just read all the reviews. Do you have your e6850 overclocked? Should have some nice head room in there that will go nice with the new video card.

 

[yh125d]

I have to disagree I would go 4890 or gtx260 maybe better bang for your money but harder to find I think 5770 are kinda of a disappointment.

You will be about 10 to 15 percent faster with the 4890 compared to the 5770 just read all the reviews. Do you have your e6850 overclocked? Should have some nice head room in there that will go nice with the new video card.

4890/gtx260 are a little more than hard to find... almost impossible to. And if you do find one they are costin $50+ more than 6 mos. ago.

Even if you could find a 4890 for $200, it's NOT worth $55 over a 5770

 

[jtisgeek]

Where I live they still have them at best buy for 170. I just looked on newegg didn't realize the supply has gotten so bad.

 

[blanketyblank]

I'm not sure if this merchant is legitimate, but check this link:
http://slickdeals.net/forums/showthread.php?t=1890232
Seems like a pretty good deal for a 4870 which is roughly the same as a 5770 though faster in certain games.
Personally since I prefer quiet card so I think the extra for a 5770 is worth it for the lower temps/ power usage over a 4870.

 

[Oyeve]

I'm not sure if this merchant is legitimate, but check this link:
http://slickdeals.net/forums/showthread.php?t=1890232
Seems like a pretty good deal for a 4870 which is roughly the same as a 5770 though faster in certain games.
Personally since I prefer quiet card so I think the extra for a 5770 is worth it for the lower temps/ power usage over a 4870.

Yeah, I was thinking of the 4870 seeing it is a little faster than the 5770. I may have use for the ports on the 5770. Vid cards change a lot in 2 years. 5770 is 128bit and is still pretty decent. Both spank my 3870 by at least 100 percent. Shame on me for stopping PC gaming for so long. My 3870 probably saw 2 hours of life if that.

I am now considering a 5770 or a 4870. Have to look at Dragon Age comparisions as that is the game I just got and know I will be devoting 100s of hours on it..

Another variable: Which card would run better in Windows 7 64bit? I bought it recently and will be adding a Win7 HD to the mix (keeping an XP drive for older/non-compatible SW)

THX

 

[tweakboy]

You have good gear except your 3870 video card, completly bottlenecking your rig.

Listen to the gurus here. What is your budget ? His CPU is fast enough to handle the top model 5xxx for about 380 to 400 bucks. If you are waiting for nVidia I say don't because their Fermi is 679.99. 5xxx top model and nVidia Fermi 480 top model. One is 350 dollars less and they both perform about the same.

 

[blanketyblank]

I can play dragon age at 1920x1080 with everything maxed including vsync and buffering (if that makes any difference) with a 5770 at stock. In denerim marketplace the game can go below 30 fps like 24 or so for a few seconds as you run around. A small OC to something like 900/1300 makes the problem hard to reproduce so after running around for a while there maybe a quick flash at 28 fps. At that point my CPU is probably to blame for any slow down though since my results look a lot like this e8400 at 3.6:
http://www.pcgameshardware.com/aid,...rks-75-percent-boost-for-quad-cores/Practice/

Either way the game is still very smooth and if you don't have FRAPs running you probably wouldn't notice it. Also since you're going to do a slightly lower resolution the OC may not even be necessary.

As for the OS, I'd actually say the 4870 is better since it has mature drivers. With the 5770 they are still putting out driver updates that can change things drastically, and there is a 2d acceleration problem in Win 7 they are still in the middle of fixing. Make sure you pay attention to the amount of memory on the card though as there are 512 MB variants.

 

[jtisgeek]

All the cards will do good in 64 bit now cause that's what everyone is pretty much using. 4860's are a good option some times you can find them for like 120.