Would you buy 2 470's for $200?

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thilanliyan

Lifer
Jun 21, 2005
11,875
2,079
126
lol with that 6100 you might as well stick to one, cause bottleneck.

Hahaha I know...my lowly 6100...even at 4.4GHz probably is a bottleneck for 2x6950s. I disable XFire and only game on one though so it's okay (and have the other bitcoin mining). Thank goodness for all the console ports, otherwise I might actually have to get a faster CPU.
 

BallaTheFeared

Diamond Member
Nov 15, 2010
8,115
0
71
:thumbsup:

No I was going to get the Extreme6 but then you mentioned the GD65 so now I need to research :(


I can put one on air if you want, it does 885 core on air though, the other will do 900.
 

Don Karnage

Platinum Member
Oct 11, 2011
2,865
0
0
:thumbsup:

No I was going to get the Extreme6 but then you mentioned the GD65 so now I need to research :(


I can put one on air if you want, it does 885 core on air though, the other will do 900.

That GD65 is a sweet looking board. If the GD80 was available i probably would have went with it
 

Smoblikat

Diamond Member
Nov 19, 2011
5,184
107
106
815 isn't too bad, what voltage and temps is he hitting?

Are they gpu only blocks, or full cover blocks?

815Mhz 470s would be above GTX 570 SLI stock performance, and a shade under 580 SLI performance in most titles.

My 470 does 850 on stock air :p, im assuming thats between a 570 and 580.
 

BallaTheFeared

Diamond Member
Nov 15, 2010
8,115
0
71
That GD65 is a sweet looking board. If the GD80 was available i probably would have went with it

I found this for you Don...

797 > 875

c737660d.png


GPU: 5728

a2f55e30.png


GPU: 6230

75Mhz gave me about 500 points, add the memory overclock for a couple more points and you'd be looking at 6800/6900 gpu score probably for 950/2275 for a single 470.


For the OP I'd figure out what his cards will do with reference air, mine were great on reference air, others can be dogs though. I would figure that out before I made a decision on them.
 

Don Karnage

Platinum Member
Oct 11, 2011
2,865
0
0
I found this for you Don...

797 > 875

c737660d.png


GPU: 5728

a2f55e30.png


GPU: 6230

75Mhz gave me about 500 points, add the memory overclock for a couple more points and you'd be looking at 6800/6900 gpu score probably for 950/2275 for a single 470.


For the OP I'd figure out what his cards will do with reference air, mine were great on reference air, others can be dogs though. I would figure that out before I made a decision on them.

Puts it on par with a 1100 core 7850

1100.png
 

BallaTheFeared

Diamond Member
Nov 15, 2010
8,115
0
71
Not bad, I was looking through some older uploads on my photobucket account, around page 87 I came across some old BFBC2 MP uploads.

Basically in the summer on my second card with a 9800 GT below it I was able to run 800Mhz at 70C max temp, or 850MHz 79C max temp in SLI during prolonged gaming. I'd get around 70-160 fps in BFBC2 MP with these cards at 1080p.

Again though 470s can very wildly between samples, and it sounded like ones the OP was talking about ran pretty hot on water. I dunno what kind of loop the guy had though, but I'd definitely figure out how well they operate on reference air before I bought them. Not because at $100 they'd be bad, but ideally you want to stick to the better 470s since $100 isn't that much lower than what you can get good ones for.
 

Rifter

Lifer
Oct 9, 1999
11,522
751
126
OP sufficiently vague as to make it hard to recommend stuff. Doesn't say what resolution or if he'll upgrade to a higher one that will need more VRAM. There are multiple ways to split up or not split up the 470s, with or without water, and multiple different cards he could sell including selling one or more of his old cards or one of the 470s. I think it's ok if he buys both even if he's not sure what to do with them, because he can probably resell them for at least as much as he paid for.

Sorry, one will be in a system thats 1080p and will not change anytime soon. The other system, a htpc is hooked up to a 720p tv now but will be upgraded to 1080P. I will also purchase an upgraded air cooler for that system to run larger quiter fans, if the stock cooler is to loud.

Im not purchasing these for my main gaming rig, unless i invest in a watercooling system to obtain a large overclock its not going to be a noticable difference from my heavily clocked 460's.
 

Rifter

Lifer
Oct 9, 1999
11,522
751
126
Not bad, I was looking through some older uploads on my photobucket account, around page 87 I came across some old BFBC2 MP uploads.

Basically in the summer on my second card with a 9800 GT below it I was able to run 800Mhz at 70C max temp, or 850MHz 79C max temp in SLI during prolonged gaming. I'd get around 70-160 fps in BFBC2 MP with these cards at 1080p.

Again though 470s can very wildly between samples, and it sounded like ones the OP was talking about ran pretty hot on water. I dunno what kind of loop the guy had though, but I'd definitely figure out how well they operate on reference air before I bought them. Not because at $100 they'd be bad, but ideally you want to stick to the better 470s since $100 isn't that much lower than what you can get good ones for.

Im heading over to his place tomorrow to do just that. His loop was less than ideal, both cards and CPU(a heavily clocked i7 920) on one large rad, I tried to convince him to install a 2nd rad between the GPU's and CPU's, or run complete separate loops for GPU/CPU but he didnt go for it.
 

Insomniator

Diamond Member
Oct 23, 2002
6,294
171
106
On the off chance they are galaxy 470s with the flip down fan... I can tell you they (at least 1 at a time) run about ~10C cooler than ref. Very quiet too :thumbsup:
 

Rifter

Lifer
Oct 9, 1999
11,522
751
126
Ok they hit 750 on air, and thats getting to withing 5c of throttling, so i might have to settle for 725 as a 24/7 OC for the one im putting in the girlfriends system, the one in ther htpc i think i'll leave stock speeds till i upgrade to a 1080p TV then will see if it needs the extra boost of a overclock at that time. I got them both for $180.

Just though i would point out now that i actually own a few fermi's personally that people who complain about the stock cooler being loud are not kidding, not at all, they sound like jet engines. Although the blower style fan on my XFX 4890 i had a few years ago was almost as loud TBH.

FWIW it also almost doubled the framerate of the girlfriends computer in most games coming from a slightly overclocked 4870, even she noticed the difference right away and she is usually totally oblivious to computer performance. In her own words it was "way more smooth and less jerky", although she does try to play newer games with higher settings than the old tired Phenom II/4870 was up to, no matter how much i try and tell her not to run such high settings.
 

BallaTheFeared

Diamond Member
Nov 15, 2010
8,115
0
71
Ha, glad she at least noticed :)

Good deal too, $90 per card is pretty hard to beat from a price/perf perspective.


All blowers style cards get loud as they get turned up, the biggest problem with the 470/480 is that the copper slab and aluminum fins are pretty poor solutions for products that can draw 160-220w, the vapor chambers on GF110 are worlds better than what GF100 got.

As always though, more performance and less noisy cooling can be had with aftermarket solutions :)