Switched back to Nvidia

[bryanW1995]

here's a link to sunnyd's post in hot deals: http://forums.anandtech.com/me...=2285765&enterthread=y

this deal was just too good to pass up. with that factory oc on it I might even make it more than 12 months before upgrading next time...

 

[MTDEW]

Yeah GPU horsepower has definately been out pacing game rquirements lately.
(except Crysis of course)
I feel my GTX 280 isnt being utilized to its fullest in 99% of the titles i play.

So i'd consider the GTX 260 the sweet spot right now cuz any more card than that , you're just paying for better benchmarks.

If i needed a card now, i'd consider that some darn impressive performance for such a low price. :thumbsup:

 

[thilanliyan]

Shoot if the 260 was so low when I bought my 4870, I would have definitely got that. The 260 c216 went down to $210 CAD a week ago (told my friend to get that rather than the 4870 512mb he was gonna buy). I bought my 4870 for $295 CAD about 2 months ago.

 

[roid450]

Heavily OCd? pffft

rofl

Nice buy tho.

 

[MustangSVT]

would it be too much to try to run a gtx260 with antec earthwatts 430? with c2d e2160 @ 3ghz.

 

[MarcVenice]

Should be doable, you'd prolly be looking at a 300w load.

 

[bryanW1995]

Originally posted by: MarcVenice
Should be doable, you'd prolly be looking at a 300w load.

yeah, earthwatts 430 is a great psu. as long as you don't oc the heck out of it you'll be fine.

 

[bryanW1995]

Originally posted by: roid450
Heavily OCd? pffft

rofl

Nice buy tho.

655 core vs 576 stock is, um, (79/576)*100 = 13.7% oc. not bad when you're coming out of an ati gpu!

 

[dug777]

Originally posted by: bryanW1995

Originally posted by: roid450
Heavily OCd? pffft

rofl

Nice buy tho.

655 core vs 576 stock is, um, (79/576)*100 = 13.7% oc. not bad when you're coming out of an ati gpu!

?

My 4850 does 800 from 625, not a bad OC from an ATI GPU

28% oc, y'all

Stock voltages.

 

[Modular]

Nice dug, but mine started crashing with anything over a 25mhz increase on the ram and also started artifacting at anything higher than 680 on the gpu. This is with heatsinks on everything: RAM/MOSFETS/Accelero S1/120mm fan mod.

 

[bryanW1995]

The general consensus seems to be that good oc's are easier on nvidia hardware. How many ati gpus come from the factory with a 13+ % oc? maybe the toxic, but I'm hard-pressed to think of any others. evga, bfg, xfx, msi, etc all have nice stong factory oc's for their nvidia cards.

 

[SickBeast]

Originally posted by: bryanW1995
The general consensus seems to be that good oc's are easier on nvidia hardware. How many ati gpus come from the factory with a 13+ % oc? maybe the toxic, but I'm hard-pressed to think of any others. evga, bfg, xfx, msi, etc all have nice stong factory oc's for their nvidia cards.

In my experience, NV cards have typically overclocked more than ATI ones. NV must be more fussy with their yields and the temps they expect from their cards.

I've actually never had an ATI card that was a monster overclocker, but I have had a few NV cards that would give me close to a 25% overclock.

 

[SSChevy2001]

Lots of 4850 seems to have a nice amount of head room as dug777 pointed out, but the 4870 does seem to lack a nice OC head room. ATi really needs to have a way to separately clock shaders and the core.

Right now the GTX260 prices great. Hopefully if they keep this way the 4870 1GB will drop so I can buy another for some CF action.

 

[roid450]

Originally posted by: bryanW1995

Originally posted by: roid450
Heavily OCd? pffft

rofl

Nice buy tho.

655 core vs 576 stock is, um, (79/576)*100 = 13.7% oc. not bad when you're coming out of an ati gpu!

That's ok but i wouldn't call that HEAVY OC.

Heavy would be 700+ IMO
I've got mine at 730, 1600, 2450 :thumbsup:

 

[kmmatney]

My HD4830 overclocks from 575 to about 725. The RAM overlocks from 1800 to 2140 as well, and this took very little effort (moving a slider). Not bad for less than $90.

The 260 (216) is a good deal at $159, though

 

[SlowSpyder]

Originally posted by: bryanW1995
The general consensus seems to be that good oc's are easier on nvidia hardware. How many ati gpus come from the factory with a 13+ % oc? maybe the toxic, but I'm hard-pressed to think of any others. evga, bfg, xfx, msi, etc all have nice stong factory oc's for their nvidia cards.

~10% here over reference on my Toxic. My memory has a full effective 1GHz over reference too.

I see good deals on the 4870's yet as well. 815MHz Asus Dark Knight for $165 AR as well as a HIS card for $155 AR. That and the GTX260 prices... just a great time to get very powerful hardware on the cheap. Between the graphics cards, DDR2 prices, and the good CPU deals floating around (PhII 940 for $200 shipped, AMD tri-cores unlocking, etc) you can put together a very decent rig for not too much money.

 

[bryanW1995]

yeah, I forgot that the memory on the 4870's does seem to oc much better. I seem to recall seeing something crazy like 4% oc on core and 22% on memory from ars or techreport or some such when they came out. iirc the average overall performance increase ended up being about the same as the 260, you just got there in a different way.

 

[error8]

Originally posted by: bryanW1995
yeah, I forgot that the memory on the 4870's does seem to oc much better. I seem to recall seeing something crazy like 4% oc on core and 22% on memory from ars or techreport or some such when they came out. iirc the average overall performance increase ended up being about the same as the 260, you just got there in a different way.

Yeah, the memory on 4870 oc like nuts. For example my Sapphire is not stable even 25mhz higher over stock 900mhz (100mhz effective).It just doesn't budge at all.

SlowSpyder seems to be much lucky then me though, 1150 mhz.

The general idea is that overclocking is not granted, even on Nvidia. All my Nvidia cards didn't reached any of the clocks I've seen on the net, in reviews and on forums. You might be unlucky, or others might inflate their clocks, or people just have no idea about what stability means and are running their cards on unstable clocks. So for me, "The general consensus seems to be that good oc's are easier on nvidia hardware" is just not working.

 

[Genx87]

So tempting to get me out from under my 4850. But I bought an AR-15 last weekend so no more buying for me until the end of Summer.

 

[OCGuy]

That is a smokin deal!

 

[SlowSpyder]

Originally posted by: error8

Originally posted by: bryanW1995
yeah, I forgot that the memory on the 4870's does seem to oc much better. I seem to recall seeing something crazy like 4% oc on core and 22% on memory from ars or techreport or some such when they came out. iirc the average overall performance increase ended up being about the same as the 260, you just got there in a different way.

Yeah, the memory on 4870 oc like nuts. For example my Sapphire is not stable even 25mhz higher over stock 900mhz (100mhz effective).It just doesn't budge at all.

SlowSpyder seems to be much lucky then me though, 1150 mhz.

The general idea is that overclocking is not granted, even on Nvidia. All my Nvidia cards didn't reached any of the clocks I've seen on the net, in reviews and on forums. You might be unlucky, or others might inflate their clocks, or people just have no idea about what stability means and are running their cards on unstable clocks. So for me, "The general consensus seems to be that good oc's are easier on nvidia hardware" is just not working.

I know exactly what you mean. I had an Nvidia 7900GS a few years back, stock speed is 450Mhz on those. It seemed like there wasn't anyone on the net who had one that wouldn't get to 600MHz. Mine wouldn't get much passed 500MHz. I even threw on a nice Zalman that kept knocked temps down by about 20C at load... I think the best that card woudl do for me was about 525MHz. Just hit or miss I guess.

 

[Denithor]

Overclocking is completely YMMV.

I have (or had, until very recently) three 8800GS/9600GSO cards, all from EVGA. One would do 702/1700+/1000 F@H stable. The second I tried at that point but it was not F@H stable (fine at those settings for gaming but not folding - go figure) so I had to turn it down, eventually settled around 650/1450/950. The third, ouch, maxed at 600/1350/900. Noticeable difference in folding ppd on the later two versus the first (F@H gains the most benefit from shader speed).

 

[nOOky]

Exactly why I never buy a gpu thinking I'll get some kind of performance boost by expecting a certain overclock. My old X1950XT was a great overclocker, my 6800 Ultra wasn't. My current 4870 1 gig and 8800GTS are both what I'd consider good overclockers. The nvidia clocks better as far as the core is concerned, my ATI cards memory oc's like crazy. Who knows...

 

[brencat]

I got in on this deal too Bryan. The AR price, FS, and free FC2 which I didn't own did it for me. Should be getting the card tomorrow. Going to crank that puppy to (hopefully) 700ish core.

Now I just need to decide if I want up upgrade my mobo to a 750i FTW considering they are ~ $115 AR shipped. Hmmm...

 

[bryanW1995]

that fc2 is what did it for me. I've never played it and had no interest in it, so I sold it for $15. Figure $1 for shipping, so now I'm in the card at $146... ~$50 to trade up from a 4850 to a core 216 with a 13% oc is a good deal in my book!