[Grinsa]

I just pulled up some videos for new video card. I mean it sounds crazy and blazing fast. Best and fastest video card on the market supposedly. The 1GB DDR3 memory built in this thing and its SLI ready. I've heard different opinions about it and would like suggestions if this is the video card to buy or not. I am thinking about upgrading my whole system and this card looks like the way to go under my Asus SLI ready motherboard. Am I right?

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What's your monitors resolution? Can you list your entire system specs.
James

Edited by james_8970, 26 July 2008 - 08:46 AM.

[james_8970]

What's your monitors resolution? Can you list your entire system specs.
James

Edited by james_8970, 26 July 2008 - 08:46 AM.

[stettybet0]

Since you already have an SLI motherboard, it would be much more economical choice to go with 2 8800GTs, which can be had for $260 after mail-in rebate (compared to $450 for the GTX 280). They can perform pretty close to the GTX 280 in most cases.

[Grinsa]

I have heard that about the 8800GT's and that on different games its top end performance is better than the 280. I meant to upgrade to the SLI motherboard because my current ASUS motherboard is a lower class and I'm just going to build a whole new system. I currently don't have an SLI ready motherboard though. Sorry if their was confusion to whether I did...I meant that I was going to upgrade to a SLI ready motherboard. Currently I have an Abit IP-95 Socket 775.

Edited by Grinsa, 25 July 2008 - 04:26 PM.

[james_8970]

What is your monitors resolution?
James

[Grinsa]

1680x1050.

[james_8970]

Personally I don't find the GTX280 worth the price.
If you see this by the end of the day, the EVGA GTX260 is going for $244 till the end of tonight! If you are looking for a video card, I think this is the one you should get.
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16814130372
James

[09mlb86]

I have a BFG GTX 280 oc2 (core is overclocked to 650mhz and a slight memory factory overclock) and I would recomend not getting a GTX 280, I liked my 8800GTX in SLI ALOT better!

I play call of duty 4 and I use Adobe Premiere Pro, as well as folding at home....and I can't notice a difference at 1080i between my old 2 8800GTX and my new single GTX 280

If u haven't bought a motherboard yet, look at the ATI 4870, I have put this in my other rig that I use for LAN's and I like the picture quality better.

If u want to see what I mean, look up X-box 360 images vs PS3 (X-box uses ATI and Sony Uses NVIDIA)

Just some thoughts,

also, the ATI cards are smaller, more efficient (55nm vs 65nm)

One more thing to consider, NVIDIA has a driver issue with scaling to certain LCD and PLASMA TV's, not sure what you have but thought I would mention it.

I am in the army and, being the "geek" of my unit, i have seen just about every thing, i have had far less problems with ATI and I cant wait till my GTX 280 sucks so i can change my system back to ATI my self.

[stettybet0]

Despite the fact that this topic is dead, I thought I might clear up some things in case another user reads this.

Of course you won't notice a difference between a 8800GTX SLI setup and a GTX 280 with your uses. Call of Duty 4 can be easily maxed with both setups, and Adobe Premiere Pro and Folding@Home are less dependent on the GPU (visually at least, as Folding@Home does do plenty of behind-the-scenes calculations on the GPU from what I understand).

The picture quality of NVIDIA and ATI cards is virtually identical these days. Any difference you see in your other rig is probably the result of the display being used, not the GPU.

Bringing up X-Box 360 vs PS3 is irrelevant, as they don't use PC parts. The X-Box 360 has a second graphics processor that allows for anti-aliasing to be applied with no performance hit, which is why it looks better in some cases.

The 9800GTX+ is a 55nm NVIDIA card, and 55nm versions of the GTX 2x0 series are coming shortly, as well. This is not to say that they (or 55nm ATI cards) are any "smaller". They are some of the biggest desktop graphics cards ever made! The difference is that since a smaller fabrication process is being used, more transistors can be fit into the same space.

The scaling issue is typically with the widescreen TV, not the drivers. My 1080p TV won't properly display many non-widescreen resolutions without the help of NVIDIA drivers (whose "resize desktop" feature works wonderfully). And no matter how hard I try, with NVIDIA or ATI, it won't properly display 640x480 (so no Starcraft or Diablo... ).

Despite all of this, I agree with you the HD4870 is the way to go (or the HD4870x2 if you need the best of the best and have money to burn). However, this is solely due to the performance/price it offers (or in the HD4870x2's case... sheer performance). Of course, back when this topic was being actively discussed, the HD4870 didn't exist, which is why it wasn't recommended.

Edited by stettybet0, 14 October 2008 - 08:30 PM.