HD 4870 (buy now or wait?)

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mjohn1378

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jun 11, 2002
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I am about to purchase a Powercolor HD 4870 or HD 4850 from newegg but from some threads on here I read that the HD 4870 x2 will be out next Tuesday.

Does anyone think the prices on the HD 4850 / HD 4870 will drop when the HD 4870 x2 is released?
 
Probably not by any significant amount. However, the X2 is coming out in two days, so you may as well just wait it out in case there are price drops.
 
Don't forget that nVidia looks to be releasing the 55nm GT 200b based cards on August 25, the first day of nVision 08. If you are can wait you might want to see how this product effects the market.
 
heatlesssun said:
Don't forget that nVidia looks to be releasing the 55nm GT 200b based cards on August 25, the first day of nVision 08. If you are can wait you might want to see how this product effects the market.
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thats like two weeks away, man. two weeks
 
is there a game out right now that you need the cards to play?

if not, wait.
 
Zero82z said:
Should be affects.

/pet peeve ;)
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actually if you search for "affects the market" or "effects the market" you will see that effects is much more common. if you look at the definitions of both they are almost the same anyway so theres nothing wrong with what he said.

effect 1.Something brought about by a cause or agent; a result.
2.The power to produce an outcome or achieve a result; influence: The drug had an immediate effect on the pain. The government's action had no effect on the trade imbalance.

affect 1.To have an influence on or effect a change in: Inflation affects the buying power of the dollar.
2.To act on the emotions of; touch or move.
3.To attack or infect, as a disease: Rheumatic fever can affect the heart.
 
Grammatically speaking, "affect" is the verb version of "effect" ("effect" is the noun version of "affect).

If you care to be grammatical, Zero is correct.
 
Alai said:
Grammatically speaking, "affect" is the verb version of "effect" ("effect" is the noun version of "affect).

If you care to be grammatical, Zero is correct.
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this is correct...

if the OP had said this "If you are can wait you might want to see the effect this product has on the market", he would've been correct...
 
cannondale06 said:
actually if you search for "affects the market" or "effects the market" you will see that effects is much more common. if you look at the definitions of both they are almost the same anyway so theres nothing wrong with what he said.

effect 1.Something brought about by a cause or agent; a result.
2.The power to produce an outcome or achieve a result; influence: The drug had an immediate effect on the pain. The government's action had no effect on the trade imbalance.

affect 1.To have an influence on or effect a change in: Inflation affects the buying power of the dollar.
2.To act on the emotions of; touch or move.
3.To attack or infect, as a disease: Rheumatic fever can affect the heart.
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Effect is the noun, affect is the verb. The verb 'effect' has a different meaning.
 
Zero82z said:
Effect is the noun, affect is the verb. The verb 'effect' has a different meaning.
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yes I see what your saying but even the verb says this

To bring into existence.
To produce as a result.
To bring about

Its a little confusing at least to me. lol
 
Getting away from the grammar discussion for a moment, if the last couple of months have taught us anything, it's that buying a video card a couple weeks before the competition releases a new product is probably not a great idea.
 
I'm not expecting the GT200b to do any wonders, the difference of going from 65 to 55 nm is incremental.
 
Kind of in same boat as you. I really do like 4870; however GTX 260 is not far behind. If you were to buy from newegg, you can get GTX 260 for $30-50 less than HD4870.

From another standpoint, the Nvidia Physx thing sounds pretty cool. It will allow you to take advantage of an older/low end Nvidia card to process Physx and offload some pressure off your new nvidia card.

In either case, the 55nm Nvidia refresh should force the prices down some on their cards. As far as release of HD 4870x2 goes, I do not think it will effect the prices much on HD4870. Why? Well, DDR5 is still pretty expensive, I really do not thin it will help the prices any.
 
aFive said:
Kind of in same boat as you. I really do like 4870; however GTX 260 is not far behind. If you were to buy from newegg, you can get GTX 260 for $30-50 less than HD4870.

From another standpoint, the Nvidia Physx thing sounds pretty cool. It will allow you to take advantage of an older/low end Nvidia card to process Physx and offload some pressure off your new nvidia card.

In either case, the 55nm Nvidia refresh should force the prices down some on their cards. As far as release of HD 4870x2 goes, I do not think it will effect the prices much on HD4870. Why? Well, DDR5 is still pretty expensive, I really do not thin it will help the prices any.
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30-50 dollars behind? Show me those prices... 30 dollars behind for the MSI GTX 260 maybe... The other brands are around 300-270 USD....more expensive than most HD 4870s. If you watch for the deals, you can get an HD 4870 for 240 or less. Most of them are going for around 270.


Having owned both, I would say the GTX 260 is the better card for Crysis..about on par for most other games...if you can get one that isn't defective, that is, which at least one out of three GTX series cards is bound to be.


I love my HD 4870 with 512 MB of VRAM, though. I use a 32-bit OS...I need all the system RAM I can get without the GTX series hogging it up.
 
Ogilvy said:
30-50 dollars behind? Show me those prices... 30 dollars behind for the MSI GTX 260 maybe... The other brands are around 300-270 USD....more expensive than most HD 4870s. If you watch for the deals, you can get an HD 4870 for 240 or less. Most of them are going for around 270.


Having owned both, I would say the GTX 260 is the better card for Crysis..about on par for most other games...if you can get one that isn't defective, that is, which at least one out of three GTX series cards is bound to be.


I love my HD 4870 with 512 MB of VRAM, though. I use a 32-bit OS...I need all the system RAM I can get without the GTX series hogging it up.
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Yea the MSI, link to $240 HD4870?

I have had 4870 and it was pretty cool, I have yet to see one below 274.
Honestly though, GTX 260 is more attractive now I think; since you can use a second lesser card for Physx processing.
 
aFive said:
Yea the MSI, link to $240 HD4870?

I have had 4870 and it was pretty cool, I have yet to see one below 274.
Honestly though, GTX 260 is more attractive now I think; since you can use a second lesser card for Physx processing.
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Well, here's one I posted last week..but the price went up.


http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1332490


Here's one for 245...but it's OOS.

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10008783&prodlist=celebros


The deals are there...you just have to be vigilant. ;)


I never cared much for PhysX...but I guess it's nice to have. nV could win me back if they packed most of that 260 power with less vram.
 
Ogilvy said:
Well, here's one I posted last week..but the price went up.


http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1332490


Here's one for 245...but it's OOS.

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10008783&prodlist=celebros


The deals are there...you just have to be vigilant. ;)


I never cared much for PhysX...but I guess it's nice to have. nV could win me back if they packed most of that 260 power with less vram.
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Well, according to Guru3d that Physx can really help to offload some from your main GPU. I don't know, while 4870 is pretty dang good; isn't ocied GTX 260 better?
 
aFive said:
Well, according to Guru3d that Physx can really help to offload some from your main GPU. I don't know, while 4870 is pretty dang good; isn't ocied GTX 260 better?
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I would say it is...


I had the MSI 260 and it benched higher in Crysis...ran about the same in other games I play.

But it was defective. It had the overheating issue common in many GTX 280s. I had to RMA it and it cost me 60 bucks.

I picked up a PNY GTX 280 for 375 and it was pure joy...and thankfully not defective. But when you're running a 32-bit OS, the 1 GB framebuffer eats into your system RAM available for applications. If you play games like Supreme Commander...you need all the RAM you can get.

I refuse to spend another $100 for 64-bit Vista after spending money on Vista 32-bit, so the HD 4870 is the perfect compromise for me. If that's not an issue for you, I would go with a GTX 260...but be prepared to get a lemon. Some people have had to RMA two and three times to get a good card.
 
Ogilvy said:
I would say it is...


I had the MSI 260 and it benched higher in Crysis...ran about the same in other games I play.

But it was defective. It had the overheating issue common in many GTX 280s. I had to RMA it and it cost me 60 bucks.

I picked up a PNY GTX 280 for 375 and it was pure joy...and thankfully not defective. But when you're running a 32-bit OS, the 1 GB framebuffer eats into your system RAM available for applications. If you play games like Supreme Commander...you need all the RAM you can get.

I refuse to spend another $100 for 64-bit Vista after spending money on Vista 32-bit, so the HD 4870 is the perfect compromise for me. If that's not an issue for you, I would go with a GTX 260...but be prepared to get a lemon. Some people have had to RMA two and three times to get a good card.
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How much better would you say? I have picked up 4870 at BB that I have returned, just wanted to try it. I got futuremark score of 8600 I believe; I saw that GTX 260 gets around 9600?
Either way, the thing that is throwing me off is the fact that it only has 512mb ram and I would not be able to use an older Nvidia card to process Physx.

As far as RAM goes, no biggie. I have 4gb and 64 bit OS :).
 
My opinion is that it may drop a little on price but it will be the companies final decision to drop the price or not so it sucks to not know for the public that we are. I hope for a drop in video card prices though because i would like to do crossfire with my 4870.
 
aFive said:
Well, according to Guru3d that Physx can really help to offload some from your main GPU. I don't know, while 4870 is pretty dang good; isn't ocied GTX 260 better?
Click to expand...

Most ppl dont' overclock because they are too scared to damage or void the warranty of their stuff. I would say go 4870 over GTX260 and i am no fanboy of either and i have seen both in action and the 4870 is cheaper. Mostly the 4870 keeps up with the GTX260. So if you can get something for cheaper and the same or better go with that. The best bang for the buck is the way to go.
 
Pr0n0123 said:
Most ppl dont' overclock because they are too scared to damage or void the warranty of their stuff. I would say go 4870 over GTX260 and i am no fanboy of either and i have seen both in action and the 4870 is cheaper. Mostly the 4870 keeps up with the GTX260. So if you can get something for cheaper and the same or better go with that. The best bang for the buck is the way to go.
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Well, $40 isn't a huge difference to me if I get a better product. I do not want to get HD4870 just to see it struggle in newer titles.
 
I just dont see why the 4850/4870 prices would go down because of the 4870x2. the 4850/4870 cards are already very cheap for their performance. also dropping the prices of the 4850/4870 would make the 4870x2 look like less of a deal which would mean its price would have to go down for it to seem reasonable.
 
aFive said:
How much better would you say? I have picked up 4870 at BB that I have returned, just wanted to try it. I got futuremark score of 8600 I believe; I saw that GTX 260 gets around 9600?
Either way, the thing that is throwing me off is the fact that it only has 512mb ram and I would not be able to use an older Nvidia card to process Physx.

As far as RAM goes, no biggie. I have 4gb and 64 bit OS :).
Click to expand...



It's not that much better.... I really only a saw a small difference with Crysis gameplay. A bit smoother framerates. But it sounds like that's what you want, anyway. Find a nice deal on an Evga and go with the GTX 260.
 
I am in the same boat as OP b/c i am planning to buy the 4850, though coincidence have it, i would have bought it on tuesday anyway seeing as I get paid tomorrow. (oh wait, i guess it's today... i need to go to bed)
 
Ogilvy said:
edited for brevity -
I refuse to spend another $100 for 64-bit Vista after spending money on Vista 32-bit, so the HD 4870 is the perfect compromise for me. -
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Well I've got news for you Ogilvy. You can get MS to send you a 64-bit install disk if you have any Vista license, even if you only bought it on the 32-bit medium.

...or, at least I think you can...Maybe I'm wrong lol.
 
dmonkey said:
Well I've got news for you Ogilvy. You can get MS to send you a 64-bit install disk if you have any Vista license, even if you only bought it on the 32-bit medium.

...or, at least I think you can...Maybe I'm wrong lol.
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If you have a retail version, yes. OEM version, no. :(
 
Nuker said:
I'm not expecting the GT200b to do any wonders, the difference of going from 65 to 55 nm is incremental.
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Performance increase will be incremental, but savings in manufacturing cost could be substantial. Not only will cheaper GTXs be attractive alternatives to a 4870, they will drive down the cost of 4870s and X2s as well.

I think it's well worth waiting a couple weeks to see how things shake out.
 
rls669 said:
Performance increase will be incremental, but savings in manufacturing cost could be substantial. Not only will cheaper GTXs be attractive alternatives to a 4870, they will drive down the cost of 4870s and X2s as well.

I think it's well worth waiting a couple weeks to see how things shake out.
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I would have to agree with you on this one Although, we both know that Nvidia is going after most profit; unlike ATI. That being said, even if production cost is substantially lower, I do not expect MSRP to really reflect that.

Either way, do you honestly think that 4870 prices will drop any? They are already quite low; knowing that Nvidia will probably price their new cards pretty high, why should it effect 4870?
 
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