Upgrading from SLI 8800GT

[stuckinasquare3]

I have two 8800GT's in my system in SLI and I'm considering upgrading to a more powerful card (just one). Obviously all of the cards out right now are better than an 8800GT but what cards are comparable to 8800GT in SLI? I don't want to swap out two 8800GT's for a newer card that doesn't perform as well. If I could find a baseline card to compare the 8800GT's to, then I would know what improvements to expect if I got a card that was better than that given baseline.

 

[toyota]

6850 and gtx460 level cards will match your 8800gt sli setup. please list the rest of your specs including res.

 

[stuckinasquare3]

Core i7 920
6GB ram
160GB 7200RPM raptor

24" monitor, running at 1920x1200

 

[toyota]

yeah if those were 512mb model cards then a single gtx460 or 6850 will easily be faster at that res. I would wait another month on the gtx560 unless you need something now.

 

[stuckinasquare3]

Are you saying that 1 GTX460 will be >2x faster than my SLI'd 8800 GT's or just one?

 

[toyota]

Are you saying that 1 GTX460 will be >2x faster than my SLI'd 8800 GT's or just one?

sorry, I was saying a gtx460 would be more than twice as fast as a single 8800gt 512 at 1920. I edited it now to make more sense.

 

[stuckinasquare3]

Ok so a GTX 460 would be a good baseline for replacing my 8800GT's. Thanks!

 

[RavenSEAL]

If AMD is an option, you can pretty much triple your performance with a 6870CF setup. An HD6870 alone would double it for sure.

 

[stuckinasquare3]

not sure if my board supports crossfire.

 

[-Slacker-]

I was saying a gtx460 would be more than twice as fast a single 8800gt 512.

^I think they're over twice as fast as even the 1 gb model, and, given that the 8800's don't even come close to 100% scaling in sli (more like 50%), I'd say a single gtx 460 or hd 6850 would be quite a bit faster than the 8800 sli, but, maybe not fast enough to warrant an upgrade, unless you really want dx11. I'd recommend at least a hd 5870 or the upcoming gtx 560, as I'm guessing they'll be comparable in performance.

 

[lsv]

yeah if those were 512mb model cards then a single gtx460 or 6850 will easily be faster at that res. I would wait another month on the gtx560 unless you need something now.

Here's a single 8800GT vs a GTX 460. The 460 has more than 2x the performance of a single 8800GT (Except L4D(DX9). I'd go as far as say a single GTX460 is faster than your SLI 8800GT setup in general;

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/178?vs=180

Not to mention you'll use less power and have DX11 access.

 

[SickBeast]

The GTX 460 is a sweet card. I just upgraded from an 8800GTS 320mb to a 768mb 460 and the difference is *massive*. If you can get them cheap enough, grab a pair of 460's and go with SLI again. Just make sure your PSU can handle it.

My 460 overclocks to 940mhz on the core and 4400mhz on the memory. It's faster than a GTX 470! I paid $120 for mine recently, but they've been going for as little as ~$85.

Just FYI, the 460 runs way cooler when overclocked compared to the AMD cards. I'm barely hitting 60C under full load with mine.

 

[Face2Face]

Where are you finding the gtx 460 768mb for that cheap??

 

[RavenSEAL]

Where are you finding the gtx 460 768mb or that cheap??

They were going for $120 after MIR @ NewEgg

 

[stuckinasquare3]

I don't ever trust mail in rebates...no one ever seems to actually get the rebate. Also, I currently have a 600W GPU but I'm upgrading to an 850

 

[RavenSEAL]

I don't ever trust mail in rebates...no one ever seems to actually get the rebate. Also, I currently have a 600W GPU but I'm upgrading to an 850

No idea what you're talking about, i've gotten about $140 back in rebates.

 

[Termie]

I don't ever trust mail in rebates...no one ever seems to actually get the rebate. Also, I currently have a 600W GPU but I'm upgrading to an 850

Yeah, the GTX460 for $90 is at Tigerdirect, with 2 rebates totaling $60: http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2129547. Not worth the risk in my opinion. I'm struggling with two rebates right now (one on my OCZ Agility 2, one on my GTX460). I've decided never to buy anything with more than a 10% rebate. $60 on a $150 card is asking for trouble. While RavenSeal may disagree, and while rebates usually arrive, sometimes you have to fight for them.

By the way, all x58 motherboards support crossfire, so you should consider 2x6850, which should be 3x as powerful as what you have. As a baseline, consider the GTX460-768, which would at least equal your 8800gt SLI. Although it's not 2x as fast as an 8800gt in all games, due to imperfect scaling of SLI, it should be twice as fast on average compared to your setup. I upgraded from an 8800gt to the GTX460.

 

[stuckinasquare3]

really? wow. Usually I read a lot of the newegg reviews and for certain items, people complain about never getting rebates.

 

[SickBeast]

I would take a chance on that tigerdirect deal. You've got the SLI motherboard. It's a no-brainer IMO. They say that the rebate is valid on 2 cards.

Your current 600W PSU could probably handle them so long as you don't overclock.

 

[toyota]

gtx460 sli would be severally held back by only 768mb of vram. any game running settings that could utilize that much gpu power would need more vram than that.

 

[Termie]

gtx460 sli would be severally held back by only 768mb of vram. any game running settings that could utilize that much gpu power would need more vram than that.

Agreed - while I have one, I don't consider it the ideal SLI candidate.

OP - you're getting a lot of different ideas here, probably because we don't know if you actually want to see a big improvement or just want to move away from your SLI setup. If you want a noticeable improvement, you'll need to spend in the $350 range, such as 2xHD6850, or GTX570/HD6970 if you want to avoid two cards. Anything less than that could be a "sidegrade" in some cases.

 

[stuckinasquare3]

I'm looking for where to start looking haha. It's hard to find benchmarks that compare the older cards to the newer cards so by looking at a comparable card (460 vs my 8800GT's in SLI) i'll as least know that if I want an upgrade, I need to find something better than 1 460. I'm not trying to get away from SLI, I'm just thinking about what my upgrade path can look like.

I appreciate all the input

 

[lsv]

They were going for $120 after MIR @ NewEgg

He speaks the truth, I saw them at that price at a local shop here with a discount and MIR. I was really considering the purchase of one because the 460 totally destroy my 5750 and they're the same price.

 

[Termie]

I'm looking for where to start looking haha. It's hard to find benchmarks that compare the older cards to the newer cards so by looking at a comparable card (460 vs my 8800GT's in SLI) i'll as least know that if I want an upgrade, I need to find something better than 1 460. I'm not trying to get away from SLI, I'm just thinking about what my upgrade path can look like.

I appreciate all the input

Ok, well I think you have the first part of the answer here. I'd say bench against the GTX460-768. Here's a comparison to the 5870, which is probably the minimum upgrade you'd want in a single card: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/156?vs=162. You get 40%-50% better performance. It goes for about $250 right now (although it had been down to $220 for a few days).

If you want a bigger jump, your next step is to the $350 price class (the $300 6950 is too close to the 5870). There you have a single card like the GTX570 for a 60-90% jump in modern games: http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/156?vs=158 (I'm benching to the GTX480 because it's equal to a GTX570 and the 570's not in the database), or, if you're willing to go SLI, you have dual GTX460 1GB cards (for a 100%-120% jump in modern games): http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/156?vs=181.

These are slightly rough approximations, but I think this should give you enough to at least consider price classes (and whether they're worth it to you).