After rebuilding my wife's PC yesterday, after what I thought was a motherboard failure... it turns out it was her GPU causing the problem. No worries.. the old S939 system was struggling, and was very old, and the DFI motherboard refused to work with more than 2GB in it... so good riddance. The new PhenomII 550BE system is sweet for the minuscule amount of money it cost, but unfortunately, it now also needs a new GPU. I've read reviews, and done research, but I want to hear from people who actually own cards to see what they think. I'm considering a 8800 card, not sure whether it will be GT, GTX, or one of the pre overclocked ones. Good choice? Considering the HD4770 also as per Bit's recommendation. She will be using it for Photoshop, Quark, some light video editing, WoW, and EVE online. No heavy gaming... WoW and EVE is as hard as it gets.... but want a little headroom just in case.
Apparently according to the CPC benchmarks from last Issue the HD4770 is a fair bit ahead of the 9800GT in terms of performance (which is of course the 8800GT bar a few fancies). But I'm not sure now an 8800GTX would scale up against it, as it was a much more powerful card. Personally I would go for whichever is cheapest, because both will do what you want it to do. But with the 4770 its new and therefore you don't need to ask if the previous owner of the 8800GTX looked after it, e.g. did it overheat alot? Plus you'll get a warranty with the 4770. So I'd say the 4770.
I would go for a 4770 purely because of its newer architecture, which is smaller and leads to lower power consumption. Otherwise, you could go for the 4850, which is around the same price as a 4770. Also - the GTS250 is a rebranded 9800GTX+, which is almost a 8800GT. In short the three options would be a 4770, a 4850 or a GTS250. Personally I would go for the 4770.
+1 Especially two of them in CF.... I've got two 8800GTs and now I'm on a 32" LCD Monitor (or tv ) they're starting to show their age so I'm looking to upgrade. I'll wait for the DX11 cards but if they're rubbish I'll settle for something else nearer the time. But yeh with the 4770 its younger so the driver support should be good for another couple of years (so he says!).
It is.. I thought the DFI had blown it's little head off, but it turned out the GTX7800 is causing the problem, so I have a DFI NF4 board with a FX60 and 2 gig of nice corsair RAM just being used as a paperweight now. I can't see my having a use for it, as I also have a spare 754 board and chip (the rig I built when I first joined Bit in 2004 ) so that would make a better choice as a fileserver if I ever decide to do that.... the FX60 is a bit power hungry for a server. Thanks for replies peeps! I'll go with either GTS250 or HD4770... depending on which one comes back in stock at Scan 1st.
HD4770 sounds like a safe bet, especially if you can get hold of the "reviewer's edition". Otherwise I'd factor in a 3rd party cooler, which doesn't need a 3-pin fan header to run quietly (yes, the 3-pin fan header was *so* expensive they had to go for a 2-pin fan header on the retail cards). The AC Accelero S1 or S2 would be nice, but I'm not sure either one fits.
So chances are the retails ones have a 2 pin header, and the fan is full blast all teh time? That's stupid. I'll get the GTS250 then LOL
not too sure... It's a similar price to the 4770, and hopefully doesn't have a stupid 2pin fan connector... and performance is pretty much the same.
No, it's the 9800GTX+, which is roughly equivalent to the 4850 in the performance stakes, and generally a bit faster than the 4770.
Either the HD4850 or the GTS250, the GTS250 if you want slightly faster performance but you'll have to pay a bit more. I've seen HIS ICE-Q4 HD4850s for less than the typical GTS250.
just to re-iterate... the gts 250 is the 9800 gtx+, newer 55 nm chip. it outperforms the 4770 handily, and over here in the usa it is cheaper than the 4770 because of all the demand for the 4770. so, if that holds true where you are, i would definitely get a gts 250.
It's between the GTS250 and 4770. Both cards are out of stock in most places at the moment, so I'm just going wait for Scan to get them back in and see which is cheaper at the time. It will probably end up being the 4770, as A. She's not a hard core gamer, and B. only has a 1280x1024 monitor, so either card will actually be slight overkill. Whichever is cheapest, or first to come back in stock gets my money She's on the onboard GPU at the moment, and that sucks even for her (10fps in WoW), so I need to do something before she castrates me LOL
take the stang out for a spin and let her play WoW on your machine, that way you can keep your balls!
Hell no! If she see's mine running Vsynced at 60fps in Dalaran with everything on max she'll be wanting a GTX295 or some crazy crossfire set up! LOL Plus... it's raining... The 'Stang is locked away
