Conclusion
Conclusion
As we are slowly getting to know the GTX 500-series, it’s becoming quite obvious that NVIDIA is absolutely hell bent on covering the high end market with refreshed cards before AMD can fire off their answering salvo. The ironic thing about this is everyone and his dog was expected it to be the HD 6900-series leading the way into 2010’s holiday season. Instead, we see brand new GeForce cards making a huge impact upon the landscape.
While the GTX 580 made a relatively large splash in the upper end price bracket and surprised quite a few people, the GTX 570 is like a thermonuclear bomb going off. This $350 card completely obliterates the GTX 470 and manages to run neck and neck with a GTX 480 in the vast majority of games while consuming significantly less power. Its performance was simply awe-inspiring for a product that costs less than $400.
Taking a step back from the NVIDIA side of the fence, AMD’s own $400 HD 5870 is in a world of trouble when compared against this new Fermi powerhouse. It gets trounced at every resolution; especially the all-important 1920 x 1200 setting which is currently the “sweet spot” for many enthusiasts. If any of AMD’s upcoming HD 6900-series cards are priced at the $350 mark, they now need to outperform the HD 5870 by at least 30% with AA enabled to have any hope of competing against the GTX 570.
For whatever reason, we do tend to see NVIDIA's cards loosing some ground to AMD's offerings at 2560 x 1600 with image quality settings set to max. The HD 5870 still can't beat the GTX 570 here but this has been a trend since Fermi's inception and for some reason, there hasn't been a solution offered up in any of NVIDIA's long list of driver releases. Granted, extreme resolutions isn't an area which the GTX 570 is meant to compete in but it is nonetheless something to take into account if you plan on splurging on an uber expensive 27 or 30 inch monitor anytime soon.
Temperatures and acoustics are two areas where the GF110 absolutely excels and the GTX 570 continues this trend. NVIDIA has shown us that lower temperatures brought about by a high end vapor chamber heatsink have a profound effect upon the power consumption of Fermi-based products as well. The result is a quantum leap in performance per watt when compared to the 400-series products.
This isn’t business as usual in the GPU business folks; the GTX 570 is without a doubt an exciting and completely enticing graphics card. What we have here is a near perfect mix of performance with a mouth-watering pricing structure. It’s a thrown gauntlet and we’re anxious to see if AMD answers the challenge.