An ideal upgrade from HD 5870??

[exar333]

If you only play games with heavy tessellation load then yes its a quite a big increase in speed from a 5870. Otherwise its closer to 30%. OC isn't a good reason though as its not garanteed. Some cannot go past 950mhz on the 7950 overclocking thread.

Still waiting here. 2 generations and we get 30-50%. Yay!!

I still say wait for Kepler and get the best AMD/NV option for <$400 after the prices shake-out.

 

[kalrith]

I still say wait for Kepler and get the best AMD/NV option for <$400 after the prices shake-out.

That's the way I'm leaning. I'm going to wait until at least July to upgrade, so I might as well wait a bit longer for everything to get hashed out between the two companies.

 

[Axon]

OP, I had a similar issue with my friend's system - he felt his 6850 wasn't really cutting it, so we threw another 6850 in there (rather than pay $500 for a 7970). Nice upgrade for him for $110. I imagine a 5870 in CF would be even better.

 

[thejunglegod]

As i mentioned in my Original Post, i play with AA off. Even though its on my 27" screen. A tiny little edge smoothening is not worth the drop in framerates.
Also, although a 7970 may gimme enough performance boost, id rather be waiting till july when the Kepler and the next gen ATi cards will release.

I need to replace my Thermal Paste on my 5870 though. About a week back, i had opened up my fan+heatsink on my Sapphire 5870 and saw that the thermal paste felt llike a Plaster of Paris Job. That definitely is not good. Need to reapply the thermal paste, cos my temps on the GPU hovers around 59°C at idle. Im guessing that is not good at all.

 

[Makaveli]

As i mentioned in my Original Post, i play with AA off. Even though its on my 27" screen. A tiny little edge smoothening is not worth the drop in framerates.
Also, although a 7970 may gimme enough performance boost, id rather be waiting till july when the Kepler and the next gen ATi cards will release.

I need to replace my Thermal Paste on my 5870 though. About a week back, i had opened up my fan+heatsink on my Sapphire 5870 and saw that the thermal paste felt llike a Plaster of Paris Job. That definitely is not good. Need to reapply the thermal paste, cos my temps on the GPU hovers around 59°C at idle. Im guessing that is not good at all.

The 7970 was the next gen card.

The next card from ati will be a refresh of this card.

You won't see a new gen until jan of next year most likely.