upgrade from 8800 GTS (g2) to ?? 6870? gtx 460?

[you2]

I currently run windows xp sp3 32 bit with 8800 GTS (monitor is 20inch 1680x1050). For the most part this graphics card is fine @ this resolution but I will upgrade to windows 7 64 bit in a couple of minutes as a few games now require it (will probably regret giving up windows xp) and dx 11.

It seems that the 6870 and 5850 are nearly identical in cost, power consumption and performance and both are more than adequate for 20 or 24 inch monitor (I thinkt he 5850 has hardware support for FP64 that some software will use but the 6870 does not; not sure here).

Anyways is there a clear advantage between any of these cards (5850, 6870, gtx 460) or should I just pick the one that is least expensive at time of purchase (vaguely i remember there being an issue with phys-x and some games so maybe that is something to consider) or maybe I should just keep the 8800 GTS (g2) 512MB since it seems to be doing just fine so far?
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Recently games played include king bounty legend series; deep space, borderlands, red gur, fallout 3, king arthur, total war, ..
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Games I'm considering depending on sales during black friday-christmas period:
fallout vegas, darksider, amnesia: dark descent, starcraft 2, lionheart

 

[DominionSeraph]

Depends on how you feel about rebates.

Right now the 6850 and 6870 are priced well without rebates. The 5850 is priced higher than its stock performance warrants, but there's a MSI with a $50 rebate and the 5850 seems to be a much better overclocker than the 6870.
The 1GB GTX 460's seem to be priced at $200 with $20 rebate, so they need that rebate to match the price of the 6850 which it trades blows with performance-wise. But it looks like the GTX 460 has the edge in overclocking headroom. I'd call it a dead heat.

The 768MB GTX 460's have been flirting with $130 AR in the last few weeks, and at that point they're a really good deal. But right now they're sitting closer to $150 AR, which is just too damned close to the rebateless $180 6850.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

I'm in the same position as you, OP. I have the 8800 GTS (g92) and was originally targetting the 6970/6950 but then decided to give the 6870 a good look. I'm still debating trying to decide which one to settle for and since prices on Amazon for the 6870 are still too high (I need to get it from there because of reward points), I'm going to try to hold out a little longer and see what the 6950/6970 look like.

 

[Arkadrel]

The 6870 uses 103 watts less than a 470, if you measure at the wall.
They performance almost equally, with the 6870 a tiny bit slower.

Id get a 6870 over a stock 460 anyday. Even if you got lucky with a card that could overclock well, itd still use as much power when overclocked as the 470 and maybe only be a tiny bit faster than the 6870 at stock core/mem.

Ive heard people use 1.2volt to go over 1000mhz core on the 6870. It takes like 1.45volt to reach 1200 mhz core (which most probably wont get running stable with a 6870).

Also most 6850-6870 seem to be able to OC memory well, and some say that has bigger returns. The 6870s from what Ive read seem to go up to about 1180 mhz, so 4700+ mhz ram should doable on most cards.

the 6850 comes with 4ghz mem, and the 6870 4,2 ghz, so being able to reach 4,7 ghz doesnt seem so bad with mem oc.

granted this requires abit more juice (volts) to the card.

 

[you2]

I'm not going to purchase today; probably sometime between black friday and early jan so todays price is not that critical. IT does sound like from what folks said that I should be looking at the 6870 or 5850 (with those two being more or less equal). Is that accurate ? Is there a huge difference here (if we ignore dx 11 support) between these cards and 8800 GTS (g92) esp when we consider 20/24 inch monitors ?

 

[spdfreak]

I'm in the same boat... I have an old 9600 GSO 384 which has been fine for most of the games I play at 16x12 with no AA but I know I will need to upgrade eventually. Currently using the integrated video on the 785GM board with a 1075T cpu to replay Deus Ex (awesome old game). I could stick the 9600 GSO in there, but I think I will wait and see if there are any good deals on the 6850 as we get closer to the holidays- but if a killer deal came along on a 460, I would jump on it.

 

[Arkadrel]

@you2,

the 6870 is faster than the 5850... by a tiny bit in most things. In directx11 it might be a little bit faster. The 6870 also has some improvements over the 5xxx cards, such as much better crossfire scaleing and MUCH stronger tesselation.

at 2-7x tesselation factors the 6800 series is about twice as fast as the 58xx series. Which might be a good reason to pick that over the 5850. I wouldnt recammend anyone to buy a 5850 or 5870 right now because Id feel like id be cheating the person. IF you already own a 5850 or a 5870, then adding another for Crossfire would be a good option. IF you dont, your better off going with the 6870s.

spdfreak a 460 1gb stock version would be a downgrade compaired to a 6850. IF you get a EVGA 460 FTW then thats probably faster than a 6850 though.... though you *could* just overclock the 6850 to ->1,000 mhz core and ->1150 mhz memory(4600+ mhz ram). That should put it above the EVGA.

 

[happy medium]

I'm not going to purchase today; probably sometime between black friday and early jan so todays price is not that critical. IT does sound like from what folks said that I should be looking at the 6870 or 5850 (with those two being more or less equal). Is that accurate ? Is there a huge difference here (if we ignore dx 11 support) between these cards and 8800 GTS (g92) esp when we consider 20/24 inch monitors ?

Then just wait for the gtx560 then. it should be releasing in DEC.


http://www.fudzilla.com/graphics/item/20588-geforce-„475“-is-gf114-based

 

[Grooveriding]

6870 would be your best bet. Unless you want to wait for a 6950 or 6970 next month, those will be a good deal more expensive though. Nvidia has nothing solid coming anytime soon, just the same rumors from the past six months.

 

[Arkadrel]

lmao Grooveiding, these arnt like the fermi launch, there wont be endless delays.

But yes 560 will be out a month or two behinde the 6900 series launch.

 

[RussianSensation]

I am going against the recommendations in this thread for an HD6870. Based on the games you listed, even an HD4890/GTX275 will easily max all of them out at 1680x1050. So why spend $240 for a graphics card??? You yourself said your 8800GTS is running fast enough. HD6870 is probably 2.5x faster!

Personally, for 1680x1050, GTX460 768mb is the best bang for the buck at $140. Another awesome card for that resolution is the HD6850 for $180.

Honestly, 1680x1050 may even be CPU limited at times (what CPU do you have?)

 

[Seero]

The 6xxx series is good, generally better FPS compare to 460. However, 460 support PhysX and 3D, and when it gets old, it can serve as a PhysX card just like your current 8800. Both cards supports Dx11 and are equally good at it.

 

[Grooveriding]

lmao Grooveiding, these arnt like the fermi launch, there wont be endless delays.

But yes 560 will be out a month or two behinde the 6900 series launch.

Hehe. There is no 'launch' man. A fud piece on fudzilla/= a launch. When you see an engineering sample, an announcement from somewhere credible or something beyond a blurb to get page hits, let me know.

When new video cards are within a month, sometimes even a month and a half from a launch, they can't hide them. When these cards are being produced and assembled in preparation for a launch, one of the happy employees involved at said facility will make sure to let the internet know Same story with every launch. Look at the 6870/6850 launch and back to the GTX 470/480 launch. We saw pics of the cards around 2 months before they hit the shelves.

 

[Arkadrel]

yes.. thats true and nvidia usually leak stuff long before amd does.

Maybe nvidia took a page out of amds book and are being more secretive and the 580 is right around the corner? I have no doubt the 580s will be out after the 69xx series but probably not that long there after.

 

[toyota]

might be helpful if you listed the rest of your specs. if they are as old as that Windows XP then a video card may not be all you need.

 

[Attic]

Good advice here. I'd add that you should buy the fastest you can afford so that down the road you have the speed to play the more demanding games.

The best values to me under $200 are the gtx460 768mb and the 6850

 

[crisium]

I echo the GTX 460 768MB recommendations. It's a good fit for 1680x1050. Because most games don't use more than 768MB of VRAM, the only disadvantage it has over the 1GB version is 25% less bandwidth and texture units (or whatever). At lower resolutions, that only means its 5-10% slower at the most. For the big price difference, it's the smarter choice.

Plus you are on 32-bit, so why not have a little more system memory to go around.

 

[you2]

Not interested in the 560 for the following reasons: likely to be very poor with regards to price/performance; the 6870 should be plenty for 20" and eventual 24" monitor; power consumption and heat will likley be >>> on the 560.

Then just wait for the gtx560 then. it should be releasing in DEC.


http://www.fudzilla.com/graphics/item/20588-geforce-„475“-is-gf114-based

 

[you2]

E8400 at stock speed on dfi mother board. As I noted I would upgrade to windows 7 64bit when I upgrade the video card; I *think* this cpu is fast enough for most current games so I see little reasons to upgrade to an I5/I7 at this time but perhaps I am mistaken. The system has 4GB of ram; obviously win xp 32 does not use all of it.

might be helpful if you listed the rest of your specs. if they are as old as that Windows XP then a video card may not be all you need.

 

[toyota]

E8400 at stock speed on dfi mother board. As I noted I would upgrade to windows 7 64bit when I upgrade the video card; I *think* this cpu is fast enough for most current games so I see little reasons to upgrade to an I5/I7 at this time but perhaps I am mistaken. The system has 4GB of ram; obviously win xp 32 does not use all of it.

I would oc the E8400 to 3.6 since it is really simple. as for gpu I would go with with a 6850 or gtx460 1gb and oc which ever one you get.

 

[tyl998]

To be honest, you can get some 460 1gb cards for under $200 now too. I got TWO of them for $354 after tax and shipping and rebates.

 

[Arkadrel]

you could get 2x 6850 for the same Tyl998, with same performance or better, same oc ability (the 6850 oc pretty well, its the 6870 that are volt limited).

 

[RussianSensation]

you could get 2x 6850 for the same Tyl998

Monitor is 20inch 1680x1050 At that resolution with 4AA, an HD6850 is only 2% faster than the GTX460 768mb that costs $130-140, and an HD6870 is only 9% faster than a GTX460. Doesn't seem like $360+ videocard setup is a good "bang for the buck" for 1680x1050.

 

[blastingcap]

1680x1050

At that resolution with 4AA, an HD6850 is only 2% faster than the GTX460 768mb

*cough* I think you were the only one in that other thread who didn't think I was crazy for getting a GTX460-768 (with plans to oc it, of course) for a 1680x1050 screen. :thumbsup: *cough*

 

[betasub]

Nasty cough you got there, blastingcap. Hope you are not choking