Time to save for a new Video Card

[_dangtx_]

well if you want to keep your card for a long long time? check which co is better fit to last that time.

[technix]

Originally Posted by _dangtx_

well if you want to keep your card for a long long time? check which co is better fit to last that time.

I bet they're all cutting corners nowadays. If you are willing to pay more for a warranty or plan on overclocking the crap out of your card, by all means, pay for the warranty.... anyway, just imho...

Btw, why do you recommend the Gigabyte over the Sapphire cards? I would be inclined to go with a Sapphire card if you go with ATI. One reason, is that is all they make and two, I don't particularly care for the design of these Gigabyte cards. Heck, it doesn't look any different than a GTS 450 or GTX 460 card with the dual fans. It seems like they just get the parts from either Nvidia and/or ATI and stick fans on them. But, then, if there is some reason or there's been tests on these Gigabyte cards, I'm perfectly willing to accept any assertions they're good cards. ;) I know their motherboards are good but I tend to favor companies who STICK to one hardware component or process (although, I feel they all cut corners no matter the company).

IMHO, don't look at a HD5850, look at one of the new ones...they rarely make a fire sale to get rid of old models...they leave them on the shelves for the "lesser-informed" customers to buy without knowing better...

For a 1GB HD 6850, $180 is awfully tempting. Just don't know if I can get up to that price affordability, though. ;) I don't know if I prefer Nvidia or ATI either. Nvidia looks like it still holds the higher power consumption generally and Linux drivers for Nvidia seem to be a bit problematic right now allowing ATI to close the gap even though those drivers aren't that great, either. For Windows, I guess it's a toss up? Although, I read the odd post about how some ATI owners are a bit frustrated.

[jcmaz]

I would get the Gigabyte card instead. I mean it does have a custom cooler on it... and I thought that Gigabyte's customer service is better.

And honestly, ATI drivers aren't the best. Most of them are hit or miss types... Nvidia are better in my opinion. Before you guys bash me about it, I do own both an ATI and Nvidia card.

[lKashl]

Originally Posted by jcmaz

I would get the Gigabyte card instead. I mean it does have a custom cooler on it... and I thought that Gigabyte's customer service is better.

And honestly, ATI drivers aren't the best. Most of them are hit or miss types... Nvidia are better in my opinion. Before you guys bash me about it, I do own both an ATI and Nvidia card.

Pretty much all of the companies have custom coolers, its just that Gigabyte is the only one with with dual fans. That said you would think XFX with their huge heatsink or sapphire with their vapor x would run just as cool.

LOL! Are you serious? Last time I had an NVIDIA card it literally took 6-8 seconds just to switch between options in the NV control panel! Maybe they've changed it now, but from my experience I would go with the ATI drivers, CCC may look ugly but it does the job (Y)

[grifter11]

I decided I'm going to save up for the MSI HD 6870.