Which GFX card and why

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hashbrown99

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Advice required please :o

From this list, which GFX card would you buy and why?

  • XFX Geforce GTX285 XXX Edition 1GB DDR3, 512Bit (Dual DVI) PCI Express 2.0 (Graphics Plus and With Cuda)
  • ASUS Nvidia Geforce GTX470, 1280MB DDR5, 320bit (2x DVI+ HDMI (via Mini HDMI to HDMI Adaptor )+ VGA (via DVI to VGA adaptor)) PCIExpress
  • XFX Geforce 9800GTX Black Edition 512MB DDR3, 256Bit (Dual DVI,HDMI, SLI Ready) PCI Express 2.0 + Assassin's Creed (Graphics Plus with Cuda)
  • GIGABYTE NVIDIA GTX 465 1GB DDR5 GRAPHICS
  • GIGABYTE ATI RADEON 5850 1GB GRAPHICS CARD


Ta:D
 
I'd go for the 5850, cause I'm an ATI fanboy (Up to R500 difference). But the GTX 460/470 1Gb is better in performance as far as I take it - given my specific MAX budget. So I would compare the price of both and if the 460/470 is ~R500 cheaper I'd go for that. But I'm not you, and neither is my budget.

Edit: I might be a tad bit confused between the 460/470. You must take into account power usage of these cards and how much you could boost the cards by overclocking them. 5850 can take a bit of a punch as far as I've seen in the wild.
 
Last edited:
ld13 said:
I'd go for the 5850, cause I'm an ATI fanboy (Up to R500 difference). But the GTX470 1Gb is better in performance as far as I take it - given my specific MAX budget. So I would compare the price of both and if the 470 is ~R500 cheaper I'd go for that. But I'm not you, and neither is my budget.
Click to expand...

Budget is around R3k - pref. less
 
For ~R3000 you should be able to get a 5850 overclocked or even a 460 1GB.
For <R200 more you could even get a 470 1280mb. Oooh. Compare the 470 1280 vs 5850 1Gb imo...

Edit:
5850
Pros: Seems to overclockable to a great extent.
Cons: ?

470
Pros: Somewhat stronger than 5850?
Cons: Power Hog/Heat
 
Last edited:
GTX 460 1gb OR 5850.

I'm loving my GTX 460, much better at forcing AA/AF in games that don't support it natively, which was a pain and mostly didn't work with my 4870/4890. I hate not being able to set AA/AF.
 
I love my GTX460 too. Overclocked to 830/4000 easily (I still need to take it further with volt increases)! Runs cool, stable and low noise! I wouldn't touch a 470 - not efficient at all. I dislike heat!
 
5850. Has more grunt than a 460, and is way more efficient and quieter than a 470.
 
Praeses said:
I love my GTX460 too. Overclocked to 830/4000 easily (I still need to take it further with volt increases)! Runs cool, stable and low noise! I wouldn't touch a 470 - not efficient at all. I dislike heat!
Click to expand...

What kinda temps are you getting there mate? ..and at what fan speeds?

*Warning to GTX 460 buyers, when going stock cooling, get either the original reference heatsink design, or MSI Cyclone, or Gigabyte dual-fan.. the green PCB cards mostly use a cut-down design with a noisy fan as it has to run at higher speeds.

GTX 465: most pointless release of the year candidate..
 
dudewotevr said:
*Warning to GTX 460 buyers, when going stock cooling, get either the original reference heatsink design, or MSI Cyclone, or Gigabyte dual-fan.. the green PCB cards mostly use a cut-down design with a noisy fan as it has to run at higher speeds.
Click to expand...
Yup! I can testify for that! I bought 2x Inno3D GTX460's and the second one I got was a non-reference heatsink and fan.
To give you an idea: the reference fan runs at 1600rpm and the non-reference on runs at 2850rpm - both set at 40% fan speed!!!
And I've just heard today by a fellow user that a BIOS upgrade can't fix the fan speed issue either, so I'm stuck with a very noisy card till Inno3D is going to replace mine.
 
5850 at esquire is R1999 so if you include vat it is R2278.86. That's a very good price.
 
dudewotevr said:
What kinda temps are you getting there mate? ..and at what fan speeds?
Click to expand...

I'm running the MSI Cyclone. Was 76C or so with OCCT's GPU test. Fan goes up to 75% and it remains quite silent. The Cyclone cooler is really nice. Even though I can hear the fan, it's not a whiny noise or anything. When my CPU heats up (QX6850 with a Zalman 9700) I can't hear the GPU's fan :p
 
Since it's cool this morning and I felt like doing it, I managed to OC to 870/1740/4000 at max volts. The fan does become rather noisy but I can't hear it while playing music (not loud at all).

GTX460_OC.jpg
 
I'd say look at what price you can get each for
460 1GB
5850
470

Depending on the prices..
if 5850 <= R2.5k Get it hands down!
if it's R3k the I'd get 460 as they around R2.5k or if you want put a bit in for the 470 as they like R3.2k

But also look at the available space in your case as cards are different sizes. What kind of air flow do you have in your case if it's poor you should only look at 460/5850 as 470 is quite hot!

What size power supply you got?

EDIT: Also what screen res are you using?
 
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Archer said:
5850. Has more grunt than a 460, and is way more efficient and quieter than a 470.
Click to expand...

If you compare an OC'ed 460 to a 5850, the 5850 isn't worth the buck, which is why I went with the 460. I guess it depends on whether you don't mind OC'ing a bit. The 460 really OC's easily.
 
Praeses said:
If you compare an OC'ed 460 to a 5850, the 5850 isn't worth the buck, which is why I went with the 460. I guess it depends on whether you don't mind OC'ing a bit. The 460 really OC's easily.
Click to expand...

If you compare a OC'd 5850 to a OC'd 460 then... you're back at square one where the 5850 has more grunt.
 
Praeses said:
I'm running the MSI Cyclone. Was 76C or so with OCCT's GPU test. Fan goes up to 75% and it remains quite silent. The Cyclone cooler is really nice. Even though I can hear the fan, it's not a whiny noise or anything. When my CPU heats up (QX6850 with a Zalman 9700) I can't hear the GPU's fan :p
Click to expand...

Nice!

Although I'd probably leave it at 830 for 24/7 and enjoy the quietness! :)
 
Archer said:
If you compare a OC'd 5850 to a OC'd 460 then... you're back at square one where the 5850 has more grunt.
Click to expand...

What he tried to say is, that a OC GTX 460 = 5850 in price, with better performance going to the GTX460. If you take an OCed 5850, the price difference will bring you back to the GTX 460, cause it is cheaper.

GTX460 1GB < 5850 < GTX 460 1GB OC < 5850 OC
 
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