Most powerful gfx card?

[SmackAHobo]

Hey guys,
I'm sorry if this question has been asked a thousand times but i'm in a bit of a rush atm. So, i was just wondering what the most powerful gfx card is at the moment?
I recently had a 9800Gx2 1Gb, but i want to go even better now (its been a while since i upgraded).
So whats the most powerful gaming card available at this time?

Thanks

 

[dguy6789]

Geforce GTX 295

 

[Jacen]

^^ That it is. There are single PCB versions of it coming soon though.

 

[SmackAHobo]

That card looks preeeetty awesome! I heard that there was a 2Gb gfx card out, but i'm not sure about the brand. Know anything about that?

 

[Dkcode]

nm

 

[SlowSpyder]

http://www.hardwarezone.com/ne...iew.php?id=13775&cid=5

Asus is building that card, but I hear it'll be very limited and most likely it'll cost quite a bit. It's not an Nvidia design as far as I know, this is an Asus thing.

If you are looking to upgrade now there is certainly some nice hardware out there, but if your GX2 is doing ok you can wait until end of year and the next gen stuff should start to show up.

 

[CoinOperatedBoy]

Unless you have something that is truly taxing your 9800GX2 or you're planning to get a bigger monitor, I'm not sure why you'd upgrade... It's still a plenty viable card.

 

[TemjinGold]

Originally posted by: SlowSpyder
http://www.hardwarezone.com/ne...iew.php?id=13775&cid=5

Asus is building that card, but I hear it'll be very limited and most likely it'll cost quite a bit. It's not an Nvidia design as far as I know, this is an Asus thing.

If you are looking to upgrade now there is certainly some nice hardware out there, but if your GX2 is doing ok you can wait until end of year and the next gen stuff should start to show up.

$1000 each and production limited to 1000 units is what I heard.

 

[SmackAHobo]

So there isn't a 2gb card out atm? There was a card that i read about that apparently puts out 2.5Teraflops of GPU power. Know anything about that?

Thanks again

 

[geoffry]

Originally posted by: SmackAHobo
So there isn't a 2gb card out atm? There was a card that i read about that apparently puts out 2.5Teraflops of GPU power. Know anything about that?

Thanks again

The 4870 x2 and one of the 4850 X2's have 2 GB of onboard memory (1GB per GPU, its not shared)

But I agree, the GTX 295 is faster than these.

 

[geoffry]

Also, I have a 9800GX2 as well.

I sometimes think about upgrading but I've decided on waiting for the next gen cards to come out and decide then.

Sure it isn't the best in far cry 2 and probably some other games I don't play due to poor driver support nowadays, but I am in no hurry...I've got stuff to do that doesn't involve gaming and when I have time I'll get a solid DX11 card and be able to max the games out and as an added bonus they will be cheaper at that time.

But I do feel the 512MB x2 is starting to be a problem at my 1920X1200 resolution in some current titles.

 

[Elfear]

Originally posted by: geoffry

Originally posted by: SmackAHobo
So there isn't a 2gb card out atm? There was a card that i read about that apparently puts out 2.5Teraflops of GPU power. Know anything about that?

Thanks again

The 4870 x2 and one of the 4850 X2's have 2 GB of onboard memory (1GB per GPU, its not shared)

But I agree, the GTX 295 is faster than these.

The GTX 295 really isn't that much faster than the 4870x2 though. When I compared 3-4 review sites, it lead by ~5% on average at 1920x1200 and 2560x1600. The 4870x2 is a much better buy at the moment because of the large price descrepency. Just my .02.

 

[Denithor]

Most powerful - GTX 295
Best value at top end - 4870X2

Could also consider a pair of 4890 or GTX 285 cards if you've got a crossfire/sli motherboard. Power consumption/heat generation a bit higher than the cards above but also higher performance.

And if you really just want lots of memory: EVGA GTX 275 1792MB. Try a pair of those in SLI and you'll have nearly 3.6GB of just video RAM. Wowsers.

 

[OCGuy]

295

 

[geoffry]

Originally posted by: Elfear

Originally posted by: geoffry

Originally posted by: SmackAHobo
So there isn't a 2gb card out atm? There was a card that i read about that apparently puts out 2.5Teraflops of GPU power. Know anything about that?

Thanks again

The 4870 x2 and one of the 4850 X2's have 2 GB of onboard memory (1GB per GPU, its not shared)

But I agree, the GTX 295 is faster than these.

The GTX 295 really isn't that much faster than the 4870x2 though. When I compared 3-4 review sites, it lead by ~5% on average at 1920x1200 and 2560x1600. The 4870x2 is a much better buy at the moment because of the large price descrepency. Just my .02.

Agreed.

If my card died now and I wanted killer performance I would get the 4870 x2 or the 4850 x2 due to the very nice performance / dollar they represent. I don't mind having a minor 2nd best if it saves me a bunch of money.

But he asked for absolute fastest, which currently is the 295.

 

[yh125d]

Originally posted by: Denithor
Most powerful - GTX 295
Best value at top end - 4870X2

Could also consider a pair of 4890 or GTX 285 cards if you've got a crossfire/sli motherboard. Power consumption/heat generation a bit higher than the cards above but also higher performance.

And if you really just want lots of memory: EVGA GTX 275 1792MB. Try a pair of those in SLI and you'll have nearly 3.6GB of just video RAM. Wowsers.

but still only 1792mb per GPU, which technically is over 3gb VRAM it doesn't really work like that (disclaimer: unless SLI has changed since I last paid attention)

 

[Keysplayr]

Originally posted by: yh125d

Originally posted by: Denithor
Most powerful - GTX 295
Best value at top end - 4870X2

Could also consider a pair of 4890 or GTX 285 cards if you've got a crossfire/sli motherboard. Power consumption/heat generation a bit higher than the cards above but also higher performance.

And if you really just want lots of memory: EVGA GTX 275 1792MB. Try a pair of those in SLI and you'll have nearly 3.6GB of just video RAM. Wowsers.

but still only 1792mb per GPU, which technically is over 3gb VRAM it doesn't really work like that (disclaimer: unless SLI has changed since I last paid attention)

No, its still 896 per GPU. And they all have the same thing in each memory buffer for each core.

 

[yh125d]

Each GPU would have 1792mb to itself, isolated from the rest. Only a maximum of 1792mb worth of textures/pixels/frames would be able to fit in the VRAM at any one instant, right?

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: yh125d
Each GPU would have 1792mb to itself, isolated from the rest. Only a maximum of 1792mb worth of textures/pixels/frames would be able to fit in the VRAM at any one instant, right?

If you're talking about the GTX 295, then no. If you are talking about two GTX 275 1792MB then yes.

The fastest gaming graphics card to ever grace e-tailer web sites (like Newegg and Tiger Direct) was the BFG GTX 295 H2OC with a 99MHz core, 216MHz shader and 216MHz memory overclock above and beyond the stock GTX 295.

Other companies announced such products and made a lot of noise about them, but AFAIK the BFG card was the only one (somewhat) widely available for sale. Alas, stock has dried up on these.

Of course there will be faster graphics cards in the future. I just wanted to point out the fastest so far (not including end-user overclocks).

 

[SmackAHobo]

Thanks guys! Some awesome info.
I thought i'd check out the price compared to performance ratio and see if it was worth it.
I went to an Australian store and the Nvidia GTX295 is $739 and is exactly the same as the ATI 4870x2.

So, i think i'll go for the the 295.

 

[Scali]

Technically the absolute-fastest one is this one from Asus:
http://xtreview.com/addcomment...orce-GTX-295-MARS.html

It's not actually a 'real' GTX295 which is based on two GTX260-cores. Instead, this is based on two GTX285 cores. This gives you the full 240 stream processors per GPU, and 512 bit memory interface. It also has 2 GB per GPU, so 4 GB total.

However, it's a limited edition, I believe only 1000 are made.
So for mere mortals, the regular GTX295 is as good as it gets

 

[1ManArmY]

Originally posted by: Scali
Technically the absolute-fastest one is this one from Asus:
http://xtreview.com/addcomment...orce-GTX-295-MARS.html

It's not actually a 'real' GTX295 which is based on two GTX260-cores. Instead, this is based on two GTX285 cores. This gives you the full 240 stream processors per GPU, and 512 bit memory interface. It also has 2 GB per GPU, so 4 GB total.

However, it's a limited edition, I believe only 1000 are made.
So for mere mortals, the regular GTX295 is as good as it gets

I thought the GTX 295 consisted of 2 GTX 275's with slightly lower clocks?

 

[Scali]

Originally posted by: 1ManArmY
I thought the GTX 295 consisted of 2 GTX 275's with slightly lower clocks?

True... I was under the impression that the GTX295 didn't have all stream processors enabled. But it does... So it's somewhere halfway two GTX260s and two GTX275s.
GTX275 would be a bit of an anachronism though, as the GTX295 has been around longer.

 

[happy medium]

GTX 295 is the fastest avalable card.

 

[TemjinGold]

Originally posted by: 1ManArmY

Originally posted by: Scali
Technically the absolute-fastest one is this one from Asus:
http://xtreview.com/addcomment...orce-GTX-295-MARS.html

It's not actually a 'real' GTX295 which is based on two GTX260-cores. Instead, this is based on two GTX285 cores. This gives you the full 240 stream processors per GPU, and 512 bit memory interface. It also has 2 GB per GPU, so 4 GB total.

However, it's a limited edition, I believe only 1000 are made.
So for mere mortals, the regular GTX295 is as good as it gets

I thought the GTX 295 consisted of 2 GTX 275's with slightly lower clocks?

It is except THAT GTX295 is different from all others in that it's 2 285 cores.