Graphics cards for PC.

Hi all,

Another geeky post I'm afraid. Been doing some research as to what card I should buy for my PC next. Currently have an 8800GTX Ultra 768Mb and have managed to OC that quite nicely. Manages to run Crysis at Very high at 1440x900 with 2xAA quite nicely. I've had the card for about a year and a half an want to upgrade it to a PCI-Express 2.0 solution (I will also need a new mtherboard).

So, my choices are:

ATI Radeon HD4870 X2
Nvidia 280GTX OCX
Nvidia 9800GTX 2

They are all about the same price (£350+) all give about the same performance give or take......any one got any of these, if so how do they perform and what are the rest of your specs? Mine are below:

CPU: Intel Core2Quad Q6600 OC'd to 3.4Ghz air cooling
Mobo: Asus P5W Deluxe wifi
RAM: 4Gb DDR2 800Mhz
GFX: 8800GTX Ultra OCX 768Mb

Thanks,

My new system arrived last week. I plumped for the Nvidia260GTX..... then bought 2 of them and run them SLI.

Only been messing around so far, but with no OC it runs Crysis at 1900x1200 at High with 4xAA without a problem.... should get better when I start fiddling/breaking it

You must be serious about games I take it?

Ive got two g33k machines:-

1)
-E6600 (been OC to 3.6GHz for ages but I decided the extra heat wasnt worth 5% FPS!)
-Mobo Asus P5W DH deluxe
-2GB PC 6400
-9800GTX

2)
-Q6600 (again been OC'd but cant see the point any more...)
-Asus P5E
-2GB PC5400
-Crossfire 3870's

In my opinion id stick with what you have mate! Your GFX is still a beast even today. If you must go for one then I think a HD4870. Dont go for SLi or Crossfire, trust me a PAIN IN THE AR$E a lot of the time and the 280 is soooo over priced it takes the Michael!

If you must the best value for money of those 3 is the 4870x2... most powerful card atm. I had Crossfire issues between my P5W and my 3870's for some reason, so swapped it all about so it all works fine now.^^ So even though PCIx2 is pretty much pointless id say get a new mobo. X38/x48 are the best atm. My x38 is nice (P5E) its the basic model but tbh most of the extra's the others give are pointless!

The thing is there wont be another game like Crysis now, even the follow ons have been heavily reworked not to kill machines! Far Cry 2 looks great (if trailers are anything to go by) but wont kill the machine apparently.

Stick with what you have! Reinstall windows and itll be a flyer again!

Doesn't matter what you buy it will be out of date within a week.

Buy a 360. The games don't care how many gogoflops your card can produce.


#sits back and awaits geek flaming#

Don't do it Dan! Never blow £350 on the BEST gfx cards, yours is still very good and you need that money to pay mortgages! I have an ATI 1900 xtx and I am still not going to upgrade, or if I do, it'll be to the now £78 NVIDIA 9800 GT. I still happiliy played Crysis, and when Crysis addon comes throughs on (preordered it ) I'm sure it will be fine on that too.

Sam my geek mate says: Don't bother upgrading, there is nothing that will need it for a while. If you want to, the 4870X2 is the fastest. The new Crysis is optimised to run better, Far Cry 2 should run better, and there is nothing else in the pipeline that would need it.

Originally Posted by Warthog

Sam my geek mate says: Don't bother upgrading, there is nothing that will need it for a while. If you want to, the 4870X2 is the fastest. The new Crysis is optimised to run better, Far Cry 2 should run better, and there is nothing else in the pipeline that would need it.

I already beat you to it You and the mate is right though. No point!

Originally Posted by ThEGr33k

The thing is there wont be another game like Crysis now, even the follow ons have been heavily reworked not to kill machines! Far Cry 2 looks great (if trailers are anything to go by) but wont kill the machine apparently.

Stick with what you have! Reinstall windows and itll be a flyer again!

Crysis Warhead got 9/10, I am excited about it!

Originally Posted by Dave The Rave

You must be serious about games I take it?

Yes. But I also use it for 3d modelling. I wouldn't do it just for games as consoles are much better value (and at least the games will definately work).

I also have the 360 and PS3 but most PC games are much better visually (they should be, £400 for a gfx card ffs!).

Anyway, after doing more homework I'm going to stick with what I have for now. The new cards are nice but not all that much better than my 8800GTX ultra. Perhaps if something comes out in 6 months that is way above what I have I can look again but dropping £400 for an extra 10 fps is pointless.

Oh and.......Crysis Warhead is out today, wooot!