New GPU/s desicion...

What's the best budget/performance for a 24" 1920*1200 Monitor up to 300$?

  • Crossfire Sapphire HD4830 1GB

    Votes: 1 1.0%

  • Crossfire Sapphire HD4850 1GB

    Votes: 7 7.0%

  • Sapphire/Gigabyte HD4890 1GB

    Votes: 52 52.0%

  • BFG/EVGA/Gigabyte Nvidia GTX275 896MB

    Votes: 22 22.0%

  • Sapphire VaporX/Toxic HD4870 1GB

    Votes: 3 3.0%

  • BFG/EVGA/Gigabyte Nvidia GTX260 216SP 55nm 896MB

    Votes: 15 15.0%
  • Total voters
    100
A

altcon

Guest
I bought a 24" Samsung T240 since my Viewsonic's DVI connection died.
In order to play games at eye candy settings I need a new GPU solution.:cool:
I've narrowed it down to the options I think are suitable.
My budget ends at $300 so anything exceeding that isn't really an option.
M rig supports Crossfire, so that's the only Multi GPU option for me (and I'm not really sure it's where I want to go).
I've listed the options I've considered, if you have any other options please chime in.
Thanx in advance for your help and opinions.

EDIT:
Maybe things I should Add are- I play mostly FPS games and some racing Games. Examples of things currently installed are: GTAIV , Grid, FlatOut Ultimate Carnage, Fallout 3, Sin Episodes Emergence, Painkiller OverDose and Left 4 Dead.
My PSU can manage any of the poll configurations, and up to a single GTX285, and I'm not planning on upgrading....
And I want to game at nAtive res for this monitor 1920*1200.
 
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Crossfire 4870s would probably be your best bet. Should be able to pick a couple up cheap (150ish AR) with the 4890 coming out. Not sure if your PSU can handel that.
 
Most probably my PSU won't handle two 4870's and I'm looking at models with more than 512mb of ram so that option kind of cancels itself out. I'm pretty sure it lacks the connctions for that (Corsair VX550).
Also, looking at performance numbers, I'm not sure the 4870 1GB XFire setup yields better performance than a 4850 1GB Xfire by a significant enough amount to warrant an extra 60-70$ per card and another 100$ for a solid 750W PSU.
 
altcon said:
Most probably my PSU won't handle two 4870's and I'm looking at models with more than 512mb of ram so that option kind of cancels itself out. I'm pretty sure it lacks the connctions for that (Corsair VX550).
Also, looking at performance numbers, I'm not sure the 4870 1GB XFire setup yields better performance than a 4850 1GB Xfire by a significant enough amount to warrant an extra 60-70$ per card and another 100$ for a solid 750W PSU.
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Yeah, you can't do it with a 550. You could probably do it with a 650, but you don't have that.

I'd go with a single Core 216 260 and see if your happy. You'll probably get 4X AA and 60FPS in most games on that. Of the games you listed, should be fine for everything, might have to back the AA down to 2x on Fallout 3 depending on if you feel 60 fps or 30 fps is playable, I prefer to average closer to 60.

Frankly the 4850x2 or crossfire solutions have had problems with low frame rate dips, too much for me to recommend them. And there are a few deals around for 150 or 165$ AR 260s, it's pretty hard to beat.
 
If you went with an nvidia card you would lose teh cf option.
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I agree that you do, but IMHO I'm don't think 230$ vs 165$ for 10% more preformance and the ability to add CF after you upgrade your PSU down the road is worth it.
 
4850X2 2GB. $280 shipped, $265 AR.

What PSU do you have? It could potentially draw too much. If your PSU can't handle a 4850X2, a 4890 is probably your next best option.
 
out of curiosity what is your cpu? unless I am blind I dont see that listed in your sig.
 
silent-circuit said:
4850X2 2GB. $280 shipped, $265 AR.

What PSU do you have? It could potentially draw too much. If your PSU can't handle a 4850X2, a 4890 is probably your next best option.
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My PSU can take it but I won't. I need my system to stay quiet and since it's a custom Sapphire Exclusive product, driver support has been pretty shoddy at best (from what I've read around the forums).
 
theman7233 said:
amd has always had the better price / performance since i have been building computers
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Eh. Not by much, even now. Once there are cheaper LGA1366 boards Phenom II will make very little sense for all but the most budget focused. An i7 920 (there have been deals down in the the ~$220 range at Microcenter on these, $200 once even if I remember right) destroys the top end Phenom IIs.

Even a C2Q is faster in most cases, and you can pick up an 8 series quad and board pretty damn cheap anymore. The only real benefit from AMD in that price range right now is that AM2+ / AM3 have an open upgrade path, whereas LGA775 is a dead socket.

AMD may be able to compete with regard to price right now... but they can't touch Intel for performance. Not even close.

The situation with Nvidia / ATI is a least a little more interesting, but in the end very similar, and the GTX 260 216 is very well priced at the moment...
 
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HD 4890 is going to suck at GTA IV. Trust me on this, I switched from 8800 Ultra to HD 4890 and even with a massive overclock I can barely play at 1920x1200. 1680x1050 plays wonderfully with fps 40-50 most of the time with everything high and 50 / 50 / 75 / 1.

But it will shine in every other game.


theman7233 said:
amd has always had the better price / performance since i have been building computers
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Haha, you must not remember the x2 4800+ days.
 
DeadSkull said:
Haha, you must not remember the x2 4800+ days.
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no kidding. that chip retailed for more than $800 us dollars when it launched. of course it was also one of the fastest consumer level processors at the time. the x2 4400 was nearly $600 usd. amd is competitively priced because it has to be not because it wants to be.
 
DeadSkull said:
HD 4890 is going to suck at GTA IV. Trust me on this, I switched from 8800 Ultra to HD 4890 and even with a massive overclock I can barely play at 1920x1200. 1680x1050 plays wonderfully with fps 40-50 most of the time with everything high and 50 / 50 / 75 / 1.
But it will shine in every other game.
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AFAIK GTA IV is a poorely coded port. I can make this assumption dude to the fact that many people with KILLER systems still managed to complain about it.
It's only since the last patch that it's even barely playable.....
Did you have a better experience using the 8800 ULTRA? Cause that would be amazing in my eyes.
I'm currently playing at 1680*1050 (or something very similar) with massive lagging and EXTREMELY LOW FPS. But anything below that makes the game look like a turd.....
 
altcon said:
AFAIK GTA IV is a poorely coded port. I can make this assumption dude to the fact that many people with KILLER systems still managed to complain about it.
It's only since the last patch that it's even barely playable.....
Did you have a better experience using the 8800 ULTRA? Cause that would be amazing in my eyes.
I'm currently playing at 1680*1050 (or something very similar) with massive lagging and EXTREMELY LOW FPS. But anything below that makes the game look like a turd.....
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Actually with 8800 Ultra I could max all the settings at 1680x1050 and still get playable minimum and average fps. With HD 4890 whenever I try to max all the settings I get these constant rapid dips into lows 20s which render the game nearly unplayable.I don't really care much about GTA IV eye candy wise but seriosly wtf is going on with this game ATI.

HD 4890 when overclocked is more then twice as powerful as 8800 Ultra ( or should be) in Crysis / Warhead yet it struggles in GTA IV?

I wouldnt go as far as to say that GTA IV is a poorly coded port...its probably the most system intensive game out there, cpu/ram/gpu wise.
 
DeadSkull said:
I wouldnt go as far as to say that GTA IV is a poorly coded port...its probably the most system intensive game out there, cpu/ram/gpu wise.
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It's CPU intensive because the game is making your system emulate a console. Most people would call this "poorly coded".
 
vengence said:
It's CPU intensive because the game is making your system emulate a console. Most people would call this "poorly coded".
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Meh...basically has to generate and compute the waypoints for thousands of AI. I'd say thats fairly efficient. Also most people know jack shit about optimized scripts/codes so w/e.
 
DeadSkull said:
Meh...basically has to generate and compute the waypoints for thousands of AI. I'd say thats fairly efficient. Also most people know jack shit about optimized scripts/codes so w/e.
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This is an old topic that has already been churned to death but....
This is not the first game to do this, and you have better AI examples out there.
This games AI is no better then previous versions, only the physics aspect of the game and the graphics have been improved.
Now I have never coded a project of this magnitude, but judging by the other games that manage large scale non-loading worlds with AI and physics with BETTER graphics, this is a badly coded port. It's also a damn fun game, which is it's only strong point, seeing as it's not bleeding edge graphics or anything else.
Anyway I want it to run better than it currently does on my rig but I'm guessing it's more of a CPU thing than anything else.
Another point, any game where 8800 Ultra > HD4890 should also tell you who helped make the game appear on PC...
 
vengence said:
It's CPU intensive because the game is making your system emulate a console. Most people would call this "poorly coded".
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I never thought of it that way, if this is the actual truth about GTA IV then I'm even more disappointed in RockStar then before.
 
DeadSkull said:
Meh...basically has to generate and compute the waypoints for thousands of AI. I'd say thats fairly efficient. Also most people know jack shit about optimized scripts/codes so w/e.
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would "poorly ported to the PC platform" suit you better? the game itself may be well optimized elsewhere but it does not make efficient use of the horsepower of the PC platform.
 
i say the 4890. the only other one is the 275. go see a review about both.
 
hossdaddy said:
In this review the 4890 performed the best out of all the cards in the review(4890 1gb, gtx 2851gb, gtx 275 896mb, 4870 1gb and the gtx 260) Although it only did 4 fps better than the 4890. Over all the 4890 seems to get about 5 fps more than the 48701gb. This might be your best way to go, ASUS EAH4870 DK/HTDI/1GD5 Radeon HD 4870 1GB $224.99 -$25mir
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Talk about HD 4890 getting some magic results...

HD4890-52.jpg


I wish my HD 4890 ran the game with 36 minimum fps.
 
btw, does anybody know if Corsair 550w power supply can distribute enough power to an GTX275? Thanks, i appreciate it.
 
mhd said:
btw, does anybody know if Corsair 550w power supply can distribute enough power to an GTX275? Thanks, i appreciate it.
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you dont power just a video card so the rest of your specs would need to be known for an accurate answer. that psu is plenty strong though so any normal system with a gtx275 will be just fine.
 
oh sorry bout that, my system is e8400, 2gb, hd 250gb sata, 111gb ide. dvd/rw soundblaster live
 
ar09 said:
i say the 4890. the only other one is the 275. go see a review about both.
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I've read reviews about all the setups and options in the poll, I'm looking for USER input now to complete the professional reviews and help me make up my mind.
 
altcon said:
This is an old topic that has already been churned to death but....
This is not the first game to do this, and you have better AI examples out there.
This games AI is no better then previous versions, only the physics aspect of the game and the graphics have been improved.
Now I have never coded a project of this magnitude, but judging by the other games that manage large scale non-loading worlds with AI and physics with BETTER graphics, this is a badly coded port. It's also a damn fun game, which is it's only strong point, seeing as it's not bleeding edge graphics or anything else.
Anyway I want it to run better than it currently does on my rig but I'm guessing it's more of a CPU thing than anything else.
Another point, any game where 8800 Ultra > HD4890 should also tell you who helped make the game appear on PC...
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actually as a side note other games do better on the 8800GTX/ultra as well, usually ones with older graphic engines, notably some flight simulators (engine was coded for DX7 I believe) will actually perform better on a 8800GTX then a GTX280 (I was was surprised to say the least)
 
Valset said:
actually as a side note other games do better on the 8800GTX/ultra as well, usually ones with older graphic engines, notably some flight simulators (engine was coded for DX7 I believe) will actually perform better on a 8800GTX then a GTX280 (I was was surprised to say the least)
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That makes sense (sort of)..
I'm guessing the newer GPU's ignore older titles and functionality or emulate it at best.
I'm guessing it runs smooth enough with both though.
 
altcon said:
That makes sense (sort of)..
I'm guessing the newer GPU's ignore older titles and functionality or emulate it at best.
I'm guessing it runs smooth enough with both though.
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well I can't give you an exact reason (I am not sure of it) but no it did not run as well or smoothly enough, when I say better I mean the difference between playable and not. it benches about the same from what I remeber but it was playable at my friends settings on the 8800GTX and not on the GTX280 (my recommendation, felt like an ass too)
 
Valset said:
well I can't give you an exact reason (I am not sure of it) but no it did not run as well or smoothly enough, when I say better I mean the difference between playable and not. it benches about the same from what I remeber but it was playable at my friends settings on the 8800GTX and not on the GTX280 (my recommendation, felt like an ass too)
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Seriously!!?!?
A DX7 that can't run properly on a GTX280?!?!
Sounds freakish...
 
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