Radeon vs. Nvidia

[Nomel]

Hello guys,

I haven't concerned myself with video cards for some time now, but right now I'm thinking of upgrading my current graphics card. I have googled a lot lately and looked over several forums/benchmarks, but I can't quite get to a result, which graphics card I should buy. Currently I'm using a Geforce 7800GT, and I'm not sure what new card I should get. At first I looked at the Geforce 9600 but I have come to the decision to prefer the Geforce 8800GT (512 MB) over the 9600. Then, I noticed the Radeon HD 3870 and found out that it has better specs on paper. So now, I'm pretty much confused on which is the better card and which one I should get. I'm looking forward to get a powerful card for gaming (Crysis and so on) maybe some computer animating stuff and a one that has a good future.

Right now I'm looking at these cards:

8800GT:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814127329
or
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814130318
or
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814261012
or
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814130319
maybe even this one:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814130335

HD 3870:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814127315
or
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814102732


Of course I'm looking for low budget prices.
My current system looks like this:

Mobo: XFX nForce 680iLTSli
CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E6600
Memory: 2GB DDR2 GSKILL
Video: Geforce 7800GT 265MB
PSU: XION 600Watt

In a nutshell, I want to know which is the better card with the most performance and fits best into my system.

I hope somebody can help me out on this problem.
Thanks in advance.

 

[Jax Omen]

the 3870 performs almost identically to the 9600GT in most games.

My personal vote is the MSI 8800GTS. It's (slightly) faster than the 8800GT, and it has a dual-slot cooler that pushes hot air out of the case, and it costs as much as the 8800GT Akimbo you linked to.

Alternately, since you DO have an SLI mobo, you could go for 9600GT SLI. the 9600's scale really well in SLI, I hear.

 

[sgrinavi]

If you look around you'll find an 8800GTS (g92) for around $200.... it's worth the extra $40 or so. Select your manufacturer by warranty and reputation, most of the cards perform about the same.

 

[ther00kie16]

If you can wait awhile longer, new cards are coming out from nVidia and ATi which will drive all prices down. If you have to have one now, a g92 is the way to go for gaming. You can't really go wrong with 9600gt, 8800gt or 8800gts in terms of bang for the buck. IMO, an 8800gt with a good cooler is the best deal because you can get a 25% overclock. However, one thing to consider would be that Radeons are generally better for animation.

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: ther00kie16
If you can wait awhile longer, new cards are coming out from nVidia and ATi which will drive all prices down. If you have to have one now, a g92 is the way to go for gaming. You can't really go wrong with 9600gt, 8800gt or 8800gts in terms of bang for the buck. IMO, an 8800gt with a good cooler is the best deal because you can get a 25% overclock. However, one thing to consider would be that Radeons are generally better for animation.

I doubt they'll drive prices down much, if at all. The release of new cards usually causes the older cards to be phased out pretty fast these days.

However, I'd still hold off a while longer, you could probably get a faster card for the same amount of money. Perhaps a card that can actually render DX10 at playable frame rates.

 

[JACKDRUID]

8800GT is 10-20% faster than 3870. no contest.

get the cheapest 8800GT (evga) for $159

it also has the best warrenty / upgrade option.

 

[ther00kie16]

Originally posted by: JACKDRUID
8800GT is 10-20% faster than 3870. no contest.

That's only true for games and op mentioned animation

 

[hans007]

if the games are shader heavy the radeon is quite a bit faster than the 9600gt

 

[Pelu]

plus ATI update drivers more often... lol... but I am wondering why everyone is ignoring the 9800... is that card pure crap or something????

 

[Wreckage]

9800GTX>8800GTS(G92)>8800GT>9600GT>3870>3850
http://www.techreport.com/articles.x/14168

 

[Wreckage]

Originally posted by: Pelu
plus ATI update drivers more often... lol... but I am wondering why everyone is ignoring the 9800... is that card pure crap or something????

Price maybe, if the OP has $350 to drop instead of around $200 then the 9800 would be a good option. But as noted the GTS512 is pretty close and cheaper.

 

[nanaki333]

Originally posted by: Pelu
plus ATI update drivers more often... lol... but I am wondering why everyone is ignoring the 9800... is that card pure crap or something????

cause it's not much faster than a GTS G92. not worth the price premium.

 

[Nomel]

Originally posted by: Wreckage

Originally posted by: Pelu
plus ATI update drivers more often... lol... but I am wondering why everyone is ignoring the 9800... is that card pure crap or something????

Price maybe, if the OP has $350 to drop instead of around $200 then the 9800 would be a good option. But as noted the GTS512 is pretty close and cheaper.

Yes that's exactly the case! For me the 9800 is out of reach of my budget. I'm looking for somthing around $200 or even lower.
It looks like the choice has been narrowed down between the 8800Gt and the GTS version. Now the question is which one is better. Is the the GTS worth the price difference?

Also, what should come into consideration, is noise level and temperature. Which one gets hotter and which one is more silent.

 

[Pelu]

yeah.. there is good stuff that doesnt cost that much... 9800 is kinda... gimped

 

[Lithan]

Pricerange:

$200-250 8800gts 512meg
$150-200 8800gt 512meg with AFTERMARKET COOLER
$100-150 9600gt

There's no reason to buy ATI right now for a gaming rig (unless you wanna do Xfire). Nvidia is cheaper and = or > performance. The 9600gt is really a ridiculously good card for the moneys. And before it came out 8800gt was a ridiculously good card for the moneys, and 8800gts 512's are much cheaper than you'd expect them to be right now.

When 3870's are selling for <$125 without a rebate, then ATI will be price competitive, imho.

 

[AzN]

Of course there's a reason to buy ATI. 3850 isn't a half bad card for the price, have slightly better image quality than a Nvidia card and much better SP performance than a 9600gt can dish out.

 

[Jax Omen]

But how many games do you know of that are SP-limited on the 9600GT?

 

[Lithan]

Originally posted by: Azn
Of course there's a reason to buy ATI. 3850 isn't a half bad card for the price, have slightly better image quality than a Nvidia card and much better SP performance than a 9600gt can dish out.

Better image quality based on what? And where's the proof that its SP performance is better?

 

[AzN]

Originally posted by: Jax Omen
But how many games do you know of that are SP-limited on the 9600GT?

Not currently but that day is coming sooner than you think. Fallout 3 is supposed to be very shader intensive based on updated oblivion engine.

 

[AzN]

Originally posted by: Lithan

Originally posted by: Azn
Of course there's a reason to buy ATI. 3850 isn't a half bad card for the price, have slightly better image quality than a Nvidia card and much better SP performance than a 9600gt can dish out.

Better image quality based on what? And where's the proof that its SP performance is better?

ATI tends to have better color contrast and level of detail but it's really subjective to the eye of the beholder.

3850 has peak shader of 429 GFLOPS and 9600gt does 208 GFLOPS. you do the math.

 

[Lithan]

Performance != Capability

 

[Nomel]

Well the 3870 looks nice, I mean it has GDDR4 and I think DirectX 10.1 and so on, but I'm on a SLI mobo so if I choose a Radeon card I wouldn't have the option for crossfire. After some more research I also noticed that for most benchmarks it was kinda behind the others. So right now I'm not sure if I should get the 8800 GT or GTS.

 

[AzN]

Originally posted by: Lithan
Performance != Capability

Not quite. Look at the whole Geforce 7 series. It's peak fillrate rivaling 3870 and beyond but it doesn't even get close to modern games.

 

[AzN]

Originally posted by: Nomel
Well the 3870 looks nice, I mean it has GDDR4 and I think DirectX 10.1 and so on, but I'm on a SLI mobo so if I choose a Radeon card I wouldn't have the option for crossfire. After some more research I also noticed that for most benchmarks it was kinda behind the others. So right now I'm not sure if I should get the 8800 GT or GTS.

SLI mobo? You mean broken bridge? :light:

 

[Lithan]

Originally posted by: Nomel
Well the 3870 looks nice, I mean it has GDDR4 and I think DirectX 10.1 and so on, but I'm on a SLI mobo so if I choose a Radeon card I wouldn't have the option for crossfire. After some more research I also noticed that for most benchmarks it was kinda behind the others. So right now I'm not sure if I should get the 8800 GT or GTS.

I say go for the GTS unless ya save $50+ on the gt.

Azn, != means "does not equal", I was pointing out that even though the 3850 looks better on paper, I can't think of a single benchmark it beats the 9600gt in, so capability is not the same as performance. It's more capable at shader work, but for a variety of reasons it doesn't perform better at it.