Worth upgrading from Radeon 4870 to Nvidia 460GTX?

[guskline]

Since it is so new, has anyone upgraded from a Radeon 4870 to a Nvidia 460GTX and if so is it worth it?

 

[Ika]

what resolution do you play at and what games do you normally play?

generally, probably not - the 4870 jump to the 460 is not a very big jump, and unless you are having trouble with the 4870 it should run most modern games just fine.

 

[Wreckage]

The GTX460 is at least 20-30% faster than a 4870 while offering DX11, 3D, CUDA, PhysX, etc.

So it would be a pretty good upgrade, especially for newer games and the growing amount of PhysX titles.

http://www.techreport.com/articles.x/19242/10

 

[Alienwho]

I am also thinking about this since I have the 512MB 4870. My 4870 still seems to give me great performance on every game that I throw at it, and I don't see any games coming out for the rest of the year that could change that. So until I encounter a game that forces me to upgrade I am going to try to keep the upgrade itch out of my mind. I hope to have the strength to wait for the next generation of cards.

 

[Grooveriding]

The difference is not that great, about 15 to 20% between the two. Depending on your resolution, particularly if you are playing at say 1920x1080 or 1920x1200 you may see some improvements when you use AA in certain games due to the 460 having 1GB of ram. This is assuming you have a 512MB 4870, not the 1GB version.

Because of the 460 just recently being released and where it falls in the performance spectrum, it is likely going to catalyze price drops on the the ATI 5850, which is a faster card.

If you are in the market to buy now/soon, give it a few weeks and see how far the 5850 drops in price, if it comes down to a similar price, that would be a better bet, and give you a bigger performance increase over your 4870.

It's important when you ask these questions to mention the resolution you play at and what games you play/plan on playing, as this influences what is a suitable choice.

 

[cusideabelincoln]

Not worth it. Just hold on until faster cards get cheaper. I would consider a worthy upgrade anything faster than a 5870 or 470.

And ITT: Obvious shill is obvious. Needs to be taken care of, IMO.

 

[DaveSimmons]

The GTX460 is at least 20-30% faster than a 4870 while offering DX11, 3D, CUDA, PhysX, etc.

So it would be a pretty good upgrade, especially for newer games and the growing amount of PhysX titles.

http://www.techreport.com/articles.x/19242/10

From your link:
"We didn't enable advanced PhysX effects in our tests, though, since we wanted to do a direct comparison to the new Radeons."

30-45 fps at 16x10 without the PhysX effects, so it doesn't look like the GTX 460 is fast enough to run 3D and PhysX on the same card for those upcoming PhysX titles.

 

[toyota]

Not worth it. Just hold on until faster cards get cheaper. I would consider a worthy upgrade anything faster than a 5870 or 470.

And ITT: Obvious shill is obvious. Needs to be taken care of, IMO.

agree. that would be a miniscule overall upgrade and it would need to be a gtx470/5850 or better to be worth it. hopefully Wreckage will get a perma ban soon. lol

 

[Wreckage]

From your link:
"We didn't enable advanced PhysX effects in our tests, though, since we wanted to do a direct comparison to the new Radeons."

30-45 fps at 16x10 without the PhysX effects, so it doesn't look like the GTX 460 is fast enough to run 3D and PhysX on the same card for those upcoming PhysX titles.

Granted that was with 4x AA plus tessellation and it was faster than a 5870.

Other physx titles like Batman: AA don't use tessellation. So you should have no problem playing that in all it's 3D glory.

 

[Grooveriding]

From your link:
"We didn't enable advanced PhysX effects in our tests, though, since we wanted to do a direct comparison to the new Radeons."

30-45 fps at 16x10 without the PhysX effects, so it doesn't look like the GTX 460 is fast enough to run 3D and PhysX on the same card for those upcoming PhysX titles.

Not only that, if you look at that entire review, what is linked is the sole benchmark where the 460 pulls ahead, apart from that 5850 is faster, 5870 is quite a bit faster.

And of course it is in Metro, one of the heavily nvidia funded marketing games, a lot like Batman was. I've played Metro, that benchmark is using the normal settings, not even high, let alone very high.

Metro is pretty underwhelming on normal settings, there is not much '3d glory' to be had in that game on normal. There are very few setups that can actually have that game playable on high or very high settings. I believe only 5870CF and 480SLI can.

 

[toyota]

Not only that, if you look at that entire review, what is linked is the sole benchmark where the 460 pulls ahead, apart from that 5850 is faster, 5870 is quite a bit faster.

And of course it is in Metro, one of the heavily nvidia funded marketing games, a lot like Batman was. I've played Metro, that benchmark is using the normal settings, not even high, let alone very high.

Metro is pretty underwhelming on normal settings, there is not much '3d glory' to be had in that game on normal. There are very few setups that can actually have that game playable on high or very high settings. I believe only 5870CF and 480SLI can.

it doesnt take anywhere near 480 sli for Metro 2033 to be playbale on very high by itself. heck although high and probably even normal would be more appropriate for a gtx260, I am actually playing in on very high at 1920x1080 and only a few times has it been noticeably sluggish. its turning on advanced dof, tessellation and especially 4x AA while using DX11 very high that kicks any video cards ass.

 

[OCGuy]

Nope

 

[Grooveriding]

its turning on advanced dof, tessellation and especially 4x AA while using DX11 very high that kicks any video cards ass.

As I said, high and very high settings require a lot of horsepower.

 

[nyker96]

I think you might see 25% boost in fps maybe more on DX11 titles of the future but since you are planning upgrading now you probably won't get as much benefit in this upgrade unless you upgrading your monitor as well.

 

[toyota]

As I said, high and very high settings require a lot of horsepower.

do you even read what I just said? high or very high by itself do NOT require all that much power to be playable so saying you need 480 sli is not even remotely true. again its only using advanced dof, tessellation and especially 4x AA that do.

 

[Leyawiin]

If you have a HD 4870 512MB a GTX 460 1GB would be a decent enough upgrade, especially given the degree you can overclock it.

 

[MagickMan]

Since it is so new, has anyone upgraded from a Radeon 4870 to a Nvidia 460GTX and if so is it worth it?

Unless you need DX11 features wait for the next gen. Real world differences will be minimal.

 

[dust]

If you have a HD 4870 512MB a GTX 460 1GB would be a decent enough upgrade, especially given the degree you can overclock it.

Unless his 4870 is oc too. Granted, the scaling for the 460 is better once overclocked, but the difference(from stock460) is not that significant, at best 3-4 fps in most titles.

IMO the 460 1 GB could be considered as an upgrade from your current card only if you game @ 1900/1080 and higher. The 4870 should have most of the games playable @ 1680/1050 on DX10/10.1 already so the 460 won't add much for you @ that res.

I have the same 512(Gigabyte), both of them and the only problem so far is Crysis Warhead on Enthusiast and max AA, without AA and motion blur it runs just fine( the cf doesn't scale at all on it so I'm using only one card anyway)

 

[taltamir]

So it would be a pretty good upgrade, especially for newer games and the growing amount of PhysX titles.

what physX titles?
I know of exactly one and a half where physX makes a difference... batman arkham asylum...
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/batman-arkham-asylum,2465-2.html
And the UT3 physX mod map tornado (the "and a half)...

oh sure, you have things like mirror edge, but it makes no difference there... just slightly more fragments when shattering a window. meh.

anyways, nvidia had a chance to really push forward with it... but they seem to have been confused, and tried to milk their monopoly status before it hatched... that is, their behavior with physX that turns off customers and developers should have occurred AFTER the majority of games on the market ran hardware physX, not before.

 

[Wreckage]

what physX titles?
I know of exactly one and a half where physX makes a difference... batman arkham asylum...

Mirrors Edge
Cryostasis
Sacred 2
Metro 2033
Just Cause 2 *(Uses CUDA for physics)
etc.

Plus upcoming games like Mafia II.

Not to mention that games like Just Cause 2 are also using CUDA to add effects.

If you don't want these extra features don't waste your money on a video card, just stick with integrated graphics. Because things like AA/AF/tessellation/higher resolutions will also be wasted on you.

 

[taltamir]

If you don't want these extra features don't waste your money on a video card, just stick with integrated graphics. Because things like AA/AF/tessellation/higher resolutions will also be wasted on you.

Pah lease... what a strawman.
Tesselation looks AWESOME... AA looks awesome...
A few more pieces of glass in mirror's edge? unimpressive... I played mirrors edge with and without hardware physX (on my GTX260) and I found physX to add nothing of value (those few extra shards of glass were unimpressive)

Batman arkham asylum though has impressive additions via physX (then again, the game intentionally cripples AA in ATI cards, so for all we know the impressive physX features, which I LINKED an image of, would have been fine rendered on the CPU).

And with your list we are still looking at a VERY short list of games.

As for the games themselves:
sacred 2: terrible game... that being said, it has interesting physX effects: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JK7BkiNboRU
although the design on those is kinda ridiculous (and its the same "drop glowing dust" every time)

anyways, batman was awesome, just cause 2 and mirrors edge were ok, the rest are just crap. that of couse, is merely my opinion on those games, but the thing is, every person is going to have likes and dislikes... so for a person to like all 6 of those games is unlikely.

my big problem with those examples is that they use physX for just more particle effects... this is just fail. PhysX should be used for more complex first order physics...

 

[toyota]

Mirrors Edge
Cryostasis
Sacred 2
Metro 2033
Just Cause 2
etc.

Plus upcoming games like Mafia II.

Not to mention that games like Just Cause 2 are also using CUDA to add effects.

If you don't want these extra features don't waste your money on a video card, just stick with integrated graphics. Because things like AA/AF/tessellation/higher resolutions will also be wasted on you.

Cryostasis: very unoptimized and runs too damn sluggish with advanced physx even on high end system
Sacred 2: wow blowing leaves
Metro 2033: looks no different with adv physx effects on or off
Just Cause : does NOT even use physx
Mafia 2: if you look at the recommend requirements for physx they are not even realistic for 95% of users

the sooner you are banned from the forums the better...

 

[DaveSimmons]

Plus upcoming games like Mafia II. Not to mention that games like Just Cause 2 are also using CUDA to add effects.

If you don't want these extra features don't waste your money on a video card, just stick with integrated graphics. Because things like AA/AF/tessellation/higher resolutions will also be wasted on you.

The problem is that the GTX 460 by itself will be good enough for the 3D in upcoming games, but probably not good enough for DX11 3D and PhysX / CUDA duties at the same time.

Both the 768 and 1 GB are very good cards for the price, and the best choices for a new gaming card under $250, but you only get so much power in that price range.

 

[bryanW1995]

what physX titles?
I know of exactly one and a half where physX makes a difference... batman arkham asylum...
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/batman-arkham-asylum,2465-2.html
And the UT3 physX mod map tornado (the "and a half)...

oh sure, you have things like mirror edge, but it makes no difference there... just slightly more fragments when shattering a window. meh.

anyways, nvidia had a chance to really push forward with it... but they seem to have been confused, and tried to milk their monopoly status before it hatched... that is, their behavior with physX that turns off customers and developers should have occurred AFTER the majority of games on the market ran hardware physX, not before.

have you already forgotten the past 9 months? wreckage's favorite response was "but, but, PHYSXXXXX". now that nvidia finally has something to crow about let him have his moment.

 

[Leyawiin]

Unless his 4870 is oc too. Granted, the scaling for the 460 is better once overclocked, but the difference (from stock460) is not that significant, at best 3-4 fps in most titles.

The difference at a common resolution like 1920x1200 is greater than 3-4 FPS in almost any title, stock or OC'd for either card. More like 20-25% (which is generally a lot more than a couple FPS).

That is unless every review I've poured over the last few days is wrong. Again, this is a 512MB HD 4870 we're talking about. The 1GB HD 4870 usually pulls a 3-4 more FPS at that resolution with eyecandy on pretty high (and that's what AT has in their GTX 460 review).