anyone go from 4870 X2 to GTX285?

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crawlgsx

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I know its not a smart move monitarily, however I haven't really been happy with my X2. It's a fast card, no question. I am tired of dealing with games/simulators that don't support GPU scaling, along with the heat generated by the card so I am considering going with a GTX285 single GPU solution.

Was just curious if anyone else made this move or similar and their opinions.
 
I'm doing that exact thing right now. I have another thread in the AMD section about the Tri-Fan model not being able to run 2560X1600 on both DVI ports. So I am getting a GTX285 instead and I'll let you know how it goes.

I've never liked the dual GPU setup, it's always been a pain. Also, the software I use for work can't take advantage of both GPUs anyway. I'll be getting my card by Monday hopefully.
 
crawlgsx said:
I know its not a smart move monitarily, however I haven't really been happy with my X2. It's a fast card, no question. I am tired of dealing with games/simulators that don't support GPU scaling, along with the heat generated by the card so I am considering going with a GTX285 single GPU solution.

Was just curious if anyone else made this move or similar and their opinions.
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I went from two 4870 X2 cards to two GTX 260s...

I don't regret it one bit.
 
I went from an ASUS 4870X2 to an EVGA GTX 285 SC and I somewhat regret it.
The 4870X2 is generally faster and noisier but the GTX 285 is more energy friendly.
Of course, the games you play should be factored in the decision process and a GTX 285 may be better for you.
 
I have a 4870 X2. About a month ago I was thinking about selling my 4870 X2 and buying GTX 285 to hold me over until the next generation Nvidia cards.

My 4870 X2 is water cooled, so noise and heat are not an issue. Though I would certainly like for my temporary hold over card to not be too noise since I won't buy a water block for a card I will only use a few months.

I really dislike ATI's drivers and that's my motivation to try to get rid of my 4870 X2 while it might still be worth a little something on eBay.

So I tried the GTX 285. I was really impressed with how cool and quiet this card is. Wow. Unfortunately with my 30 inch monitor and use of AA, even in non-Crossfire supported games I found my 4870 X2 to still be quite faster.

Though the GTX 285 would have been fast enough, I had a second problem where is seems the older MMO I was playing just didn't render character correctly with Nvidia cards and looked so much better on my ATI card (odd for a "TWIMTBP" game I thought).

I even tried a 4890 card. This thing is a noisey hot SOB.

If you are looking for something that is quieter and cooler, I don't think you can go wrong with the GTX 285. This extremely impressed me. But it could be a step down if you play at very high resolutions I suspect.
 
I went from an OC'd GTX280 to the 4870x2. It was a mixed bag. For the most part it's better for my 2560x1600 monitor but there are a few games that really only utilize one GPU and in that situation there are several cards that are faster with the GTX285 being the fastest single GPU.

Interestingly, while I thought switching back to the GTX28x series, I realized one of my problems was being CPU bound. I play a fair amount of TF2 and was having problems with low fps dips on 32 man servers. I switched from an OC'd to Q6600 to an i7 920 and saw a 50-100% improvement in fps.
 
yes. i am using 2560x1600 resolution with the old ATi X1950pro.
it really suck when i play the game like "ANNO 1404", so i plan to buy a new card. As same as above comment, i dont like ATi driver nor the hot GPU. i consider to buy 285 but not sure whether it can push my 30inch LCD to play game more faster.
any good suggestion from you? thanks a lot.
 
The 4870X2 is loud, hot and loud.

The gtx board are quiet and cool. I love them. Will most likely "step up" with eVGA when I sell my 4870x2 cards.
 
My 4890 runs cool when idle and if the game is not that graphically intensive then I can keep it at 40%. Even if you need to up the fan to 60% then that should be fine when gaming because your game should be louder than your pc anyways. Also, if you game with headphones then you'll be fine.
 
Got my GTX 285 today and I am surprised to say that the GTX 285 runs faster than my 4870X2 in COD4 and Crysis Warhead. I figured it would run faster in Crysis, but not COD4. It also runs Microstation V8i better as well, but that's just because V8i doesn't support crossfire. However, the squealing is considerably louder on the GTX 285 than the 4870X2. Or maybe it's that the fan is quieter on the GTX 285.. i don't know. I run 2560X1600 incase you were wondering.
 
Griff805 said:
Got my GTX 285 today and I am surprised to say that the GTX 285 runs faster than my 4870X2 in COD4 and Crysis Warhead. I figured it would run faster in Crysis, but not COD4. It also runs Microstation V8i better as well, but that's just because V8i doesn't support crossfire. However, the squealing is considerably louder on the GTX 285 than the 4870X2. Or maybe it's that the fan is quieter on the GTX 285.. i don't know. I run 2560X1600 incase you were wondering.
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yea i dunno how it runs cod4 better... IIRC, the 4870x2 had twice the performance of the gtx280 in that game.
 
I'm about two weeks from pulling the trigger on a GTX 295, but I find myself looking at the 4870x2 models. Is there a problem with dual GPU card's and drivers/software that makes them harder or more finiky to deal with? I like the 295, but I'm starting to wonder if a 285 might be a better option. I have no desire to do SLI, so I was looking for a single card solution.

I'm a real set it and forget it guy, so I don't want to screw with drivers all the time.
 
I'm thinking of getting a nvidia card instead of my 4870x2 for these reasons:

* There are some games that i like that doesnt support AA on ATI while it supports it on nvidia (Gothic3, Dead Space, the new Batman game + another title which i have forgotten now..).. It's not THAT big of a deal, but im also a huge fan of AA and these games so..

* The noise level of the 4870x2 is almost unbearable, i sometimes skip gaming when i just think about how loud the fan is, its like its not worth playing because of the noise. I was thinking about getting the Accelero cooler, but its quite expensive + its always a risk to do these mods.

Questions:

I will be using 1920x1080 resolution on my 24" LCD and another 50" (Plasma) will be connected using HDMI and the same resolution as the LCD. Will this work good in clone mode? Is HDMI/sound possible (i've never tested this, i dont really know how it works on ATI either.. just got the plasma..)? Its important that it works good with 2 outputs like this, i dont know if nvidia is a better or worse choice.

Will i regret it? Hah :p maybe i should get the cooler.. i guess the price difference would be the same as if i sold the card and got a nvidia instead.. its about the same amount of "problem" for both (ok maybe a little easier buying the accellero cooler and mod the card then selling/buying a new card..).

Which nvidia card should i get (which is the fastest, im kind of lost when it comes to their models)?

Thanks.
 
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I swear. Sometimes I wonder if we're all a bunch of whiners around here. Skipping playing because your video card fan is too loud? Really? Don't get me wrong, quieter and cooler is the way to go, but if I skip playing it's because of something that matters, like time with the gf or kids, a nice day to ride my bike or hang out with my friends.
 
vurt said:
I will be using 1920x1080 resolution on my 24" LCD and another 50" (Plasma) will be connected using HDMI and the same resolution as the LCD. Will this work good in clone mode? Is HDMI/sound possible (i've never tested this, i dont really know how it works on ATI either.. just got the plasma..)? Its important that it works good with 2 outputs like this, i dont know if nvidia is a better or worse choice.
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I have a gtx 275 and I was able to connect my computer to both my 21" 1080p monitor and my 1080p 52" TV with only one slight problem. I could play a game on one and use a browser on another, or even two games at once. I didn't even use the nvidia control panel or any other software, I just plugged them both in. The small problem was, the TV initially didn't like the output. I think this was because the resolution would become smaller with the new unknown display (TV) when the TV only supported 1080p. This was easily solved, though. All I had to do was connect the monitor as the primary display, then tell it to make both displays at 1080p through the windows display properties. Anyway, the gtx 275 supports dual displays at 1080p with very little hassle, even if one's a monitor and the other's a TV.
 
vurt said:
I'm thinking of getting a nvidia card instead of my 4870x2 for these reasons:

* There are some games that i like that doesnt support AA on ATI while it supports it on nvidia (Gothic3, Dead Space, the new Batman game + another title which i have forgotten now..).. It's not THAT big of a deal, but im also a huge fan of AA and these games so..

* The noise level of the 4870x2 is almost unbearable, i sometimes skip gaming when i just think about how loud the fan is, its like its not worth playing because of the noise. I was thinking about getting the Accelero cooler, but its quite expensive + its always a risk to do these mods.

Questions:

I will be using 1920x1080 resolution on my 24" LCD and another 50" (Plasma) will be connected using HDMI and the same resolution as the LCD. Will this work good in clone mode? Is HDMI/sound possible (i've never tested this, i dont really know how it works on ATI either.. just got the plasma..)? Its important that it works good with 2 outputs like this, i dont know if nvidia is a better or worse choice.

Will i regret it? Hah :p maybe i should get the cooler.. i guess the price difference would be the same as if i sold the card and got a nvidia instead.. its about the same amount of "problem" for both (ok maybe a little easier buying the accellero cooler and mod the card then selling/buying a new card..).

Which nvidia card should i get (which is the fastest, im kind of lost when it comes to their models)?

Thanks.
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Sound can be output through the HDMI port on any 48xx series cards. It requires no internal connection and it passes it through the PCI-E bus. You may need to have additional drivers (my friend the owner of a 4870 informed me).

With nvidia cards, you need a SPDIF connection internally to your moutherboard to output sound. There is a little rubber picture of a speaker where the SPDIF goes on gtx 2xx series cards. Or you can use an optical/coax out on your motherboard.

The 285 is the fastest single GPU card Nvidia has, the 275 is fairly close. The 295 is their version of the 4870x2, dual GPU's on one board.
 
I went from an eVGA 295 to an XFX 285 after having to RMA my 295 twice. Don't know why both 295 cards failed, but when the third 295 arrived I sold it and bought a 285. I decided to go with XFX because I was tired of giving my money to eVGA for defective products. I'm loving my 285 so much that I ordered another one for SLI. :D
 
Read the reviews. It really depends on what you play and what resolution you want to run your monitor at.

Both Nvidia and ATI/AMD dual GPU cards use a second tier (step down from the top GPU) processor for these cards. The 4870x2 uses 2 4870s instead of the top AMD gpu, the 4890. The GTX295 uses a hybrid of the 260/280 cards while the top Nvidia gpu is the 285. The AMD 4870 is on par with the Nvidia GTX260 so the GTX295 is obviously going to be faster in raw power.

If you are playing (a) game(s) that will only utilize one processor then the GTX285 is an obvious choice. The AMD 4890 is on par with the Nvidia GTX270 so AMD does not have a comparable single GPU solution in the top bracket.

Memory is a wash. Even though dual GPU cards have 2GB of memory, each GPU gets half the memory and everything has to be duplicated for both GPUs. So all of the top graphics cards pretty much give each GPU 1GB of memory.

Availability. It's fairly easy to find a 4870x2. The GTX295 disappeared for quite a while. I don't know if their was a reliability problem or not but it sounds like they are releasing a revision with both gpu's on a single board like the 4870x2. The previous version used 2 boards with a fan between them.

As to noise, all of the top cards are noisy with the factory heatsink and fan. If noise bothers you, then think about a video card with an upgraded fan/heatsink or buy an aftermarket cooler and put it on. I went from a stock GTX280 to an Asus 4870x2 tri-fan (factory upgraded heatsink/fan) and it is much quieter.

Finally, find out if your game is CPU bound. I've made a lot of upgrades trying to power a 2560x1600 monitor. I found very little change in performance as I went from a GTX280 OC'd to a 4870x2. After researching, I found out that my regular game, tf2, and other valve games tend to be CPU bound. Sure enough an upgrade from a Q6600 to an i7 920 made a 50-100% improvement. I play on a 32 man server and was frustrated to find consistent dips below 30 fps on maps even at 1680x1050. I finally realized that my fps was the same whether I ran 1680x1050 or 1920x1200. The new CPU has me back at 2560x1600 with the eye candy turned up. The occasional large map with lots of action can cause a brief dip in fps but not something that effects gameplay.

Hope this info helps.
 
TurboGLH said:
I swear. Sometimes I wonder if we're all a bunch of whiners around here. Skipping playing because your video card fan is too loud? Really? Don't get me wrong, quieter and cooler is the way to go, but if I skip playing it's because of something that matters, like time with the gf or kids, a nice day to ride my bike or hang out with my friends.
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Its like sitting next to a vaccum cleaner, its bearable for 10-15 minutes then it _really_ gets on my nerves :D I dont want to use headphones either because i have tinitus since 1½ years back, it'd suck if it got even worse. There! Even more whining - just for you! ;)

I dont know what to do really, are there any new (DX11?) graphics cards out soon?

thatsnasty2: thanks :)
 
vurt said:
Its like sitting next to a vaccum cleaner, its bearable for 10-15 minutes then it _really_ gets on my nerves :D I dont want to use headphones either because i have tinitus since 1½ years back, it'd suck if it got even worse. There! Even more whining - just for you! ;)

I dont know what to do really, are there any new (DX11?) graphics cards out soon?

thatsnasty2: thanks :)
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DirectX 11 cards :rolleyes: Who freaking cares about those right now, Win 7 is not even out yet, and by the time any new games truly uses Dx11 features we will be on the GTX-580 and ATI 7800 series. How many games really require Dx10 only cards now ?

But there are some bad ass next generation cards due out this Fall, and the word on the street is that both ATI and nVidia have some huge performance gains to be made on this next gen stuff.

So look for the ATI 5870 due out in October, and the single card will be almost as fast as the 4870x2. And nVidia will have their GTX-380 closer to holiday release, and word is it should be twice as fast as the GTX-280
 
If there are new cards coming out in october (which ofc will be dx11 - no matter if its interesting right now or not) i'll probably hold out with the 4870x2 a little longer.
 
vurt said:
If there are new cards coming out in october (which ofc will be dx11 - no matter if its interesting right now or not) i'll probably hold out with the 4870x2 a little longer.
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Same here, my 4890 (recently bought) will get me through the first wave of dx11 cards and I'll snatch the next batch of improved dx11 cards. Plus, this is my second dx10 card and I've never even used dx10 yet.
 
I just buy cards for games I play now or I know for sure coming somewhat soon. Do NOT buy a card today to play future games a ways off like id's new game RAGE, because no one truly knows when that game will release, and by the time it does we could be one or two more generations ahead.

So this year 2009, I will still be playing WoW on my 30", new games I plan to play are Borderlands that may require some beefy card to run at 2560x1600 ? Left 4 Dead 2.

Will most likely hold out for the next nVidia card the single card GTX-380, should be announced at a trade show in late September or early October, and released in November from rumors I have read. The ATI 5800 series will hit stores a month or so earlier than nVidia. Both cards looking to be beasts of like 75% + faster than the current gen they replacing, don't think they will really be twice as fast, but still quite a bit faster. November is a good month for nVidia they released their 8800GTX that time of year, and also the 8800GT the following year, so it is a good luck month
 
vurt said:
Its like sitting next to a vaccum cleaner, its bearable for 10-15 minutes then it _really_ gets on my nerves :D I dont want to use headphones either because i have tinitus since 1½ years back, it'd suck if it got even worse. There! Even more whining - just for you! ;)

I dont know what to do really, are there any new (DX11?) graphics cards out soon?

thatsnasty2: thanks :)
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Well played sir. I have to admit i was in a fairly unpleasant mood when I typed that. I guess I just accept after all these years that the analogy of "you can be fast, good or cheap, pick two" is really applicable to just about everything. Want a fast card? Probably gonna be loud and hot.
 
Get better air flow in your case or a silent aftermarket cooler.... problem solved.
 
I held off and got a 5870. No regrets :). Got a single card which fixed 99.99% of my "driver/crossfire" complaints, performance is better in most areas (for my use) or at minimum on par. it is also much cooler and much quiter. The fan doesn't jack up to 100% after 5 minutes of playing a game, woohoo!
 
crawlgsx said:
I held off and got a 5870. No regrets :). Got a single card which fixed 99.99% of my "driver/crossfire" complaints, performance is better in most areas (for my use) or at minimum on par. it is also much cooler and much quiter. The fan doesn't jack up to 100% after 5 minutes of playing a game, woohoo!
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my fan stays @ 40% while playing Crysis with 60-65c max temp on 1000/1300 OC..

its a beast I have to say..
 
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