Opinion on video card upgrade

[Cheator]

Hey gang,

So its that time again. Let me give you the run down of what I'm running right now:

• Core i7 860
• Gigabyte P55 board with an x8 and x4 PCIE slot
• 2x 4850 Radeons

So right off the bat, I'll tell you the 4850s perform worse in this rig than they did in my x8 X x8 rig that I had (p45 board). Because of this, and the release of the 6000 series I was wondering what you guys would recommend for an upgrade. Here were my thoughts:

• 1x 5870 or 6870. Reason being is that they're pretty decent standalone cards, and eventually when I get my new mobo with more PCIE laneways, I can get a second one if need be. Plus 240 for the 6870 seems pretty reasonible given its better than a 460 and sometimes a 470. And I assume the 5870 will come down in price to be somewhat similar
• 2x 5770s. Not sure of their CF performance, but I'm willing to plop them in my current board and upgrade eventually
• 1x 460. I like the idea of CUDA and would love to have a CUDA card. Given that nvidia will take a while to respond, I reckon this is a good choice

I think that getting a single card solution would be best cause of my current board. Any thoughts? My budget is around $250.

Thanks!

[Dr_BenD_over]

6870 or GTX 460 1GB would be the way to go. No doubt CF'd 5770's will also suffer from what's stiffling your 4850's

[_dangtx_]

hey dude, which model mobo do you have?

i believe most dual pci-e boards to have the first one as 16x, the secondary anywhere from 16 to 4x.

your crossfire results are interesting. i have bookmarked a crossfire test on another site that deals with pci-e speeds, and the differences were there but not out of this worlde.


regardless, 6850 and clock it sky high. overvolt it as well, of course.

[geokilla]

Gaming resolution?? What games do you play? Given your budget, I'd say get a 6870 or GTX 470. I wouldn't think of crossfiring though if you're already suffering with the P55 motherboard that you got.

[Cheator]

Originally Posted by _dangtx_

hey dude, which model mobo do you have?

i believe most dual pci-e boards to have the first one as 16x, the secondary anywhere from 16 to 4x.

your crossfire results are interesting. i have bookmarked a crossfire test on another site that deals with pci-e speeds, and the differences were there but not out of this worlde.


regardless, 6850 and clock it sky high. overvolt it as well, of course.

I think its a P55 UD3, but I can't remember. all I know is that the second PCIE slot in CF is 4x, so thats where the problem lies.

Originally Posted by geokilla

Gaming resolution?? What games do you play? Given your budget, I'd say get a 6870 or GTX 470. I wouldn't think of crossfiring though if you're already suffering with the P55 motherboard that you got.

1680x1050, but I have 2 monitors, so I'd like to use Eyefinity. As for games: SC2, Just Cause 2, modern games only.

[GT7R]

Go for a single card. A 6870 perhaps, or as dangtx suggested, O.C. a 6850 although then better wait for a custom-cooled version.

[_dangtx_]

cool.

GA-P55-UD3 (rev. 1.0) - GIGABYTE

now unless im blind i cant find the one mobo with x8 slot, well at least the first one but you are right, the second one is x4. tarded, but ....

and as for 6850+oc : HIS Radeon HD 6850 1 GB Review - Page 31/32 | techPowerUp




thats a 6870 right there. of course, itll eat more juice because of the overvolting, but not that much more.


edit : thats a bad exemple, weakling of an es.



ASUS Radeon HD 6850 Direct CU 1 GB Review - Page 31/32 | techPowerUp

[Arinoth]

That's not comparing apples to apples Dan. If you're going to give him information on how the 6850 OCs and compare it against the 6870 thats not really fair.

If you want to accurately see which card is better EITHER:

All cards at stock comparing
OR
All cards overclocked highest stable.

Otherwise thats just comparing apples to bananas and saying which is a better apple.

To the OP: I would go with the 6870 over any of the three cards in your listing.