Once upon a time, TomsHardware had Price/Performance ratio charts which were of great value to me, because they were excellent for comparison. They have since disappeared. What do YOU guys use to determine such information these days?
Basically, I just read a lot of reviews. Price/performance ratio is relative to each individual person anyways.
Thats a pretty crude way of obtaining what is good value for money. There are a lot of different features and things which matter to the individual buyer.
read Bit-tech reviews, if it's featured in their monthly buy guide and/or been given a recommended icon.
Seconded, bit-tech is very conscientious of the wallet/performance demands. And they really give unbiased information. Bit wont steer you wrong! (un-official pumper of bit-tech)
Is this for GPUs? Hexus does a comparison and with them including the prices you can recalculate. Techpowerup does a nother one but without the prices included its nigh on impossible to recaculate.
Theres really no need to look at charts and ratios, just use your brain. Decide your budget, and check the reviews of cards around that budget in the games that your currently playing. Its really that simple. Price/performance charts can be a tad irrelevant because they are only done in certain games that you do not play and telling someone with a £300 budget that a 8800GT is best value for money is pretty pointless.
Agreed however the price performance ratio is literally price to performance; not most expensive card that fits into a budget. You should be able to assess if you are spending 50% more on a card which only contributes 20% extra performance.
Expanding on this, it's a good idea to determine a price range and record what cards fall into it. I like to check reviews to gather as many benchmarks from games/3Dmark/furmark etc and see the average percentage of performance increase over your current card (if you can get applicable benches for it) or from one of the cards in your selection (usually the cheapest). Once you have percentages for price difference and performance difference you subtract the price % from the performance % and the highest value wins. Example: Card A scores 100, Card B scores 120, Card C scores 130. 20% for Card B, 30% for Card C. Card A costs 100, Card B costs 110, Card C costs 140. 10% for Card B, 40% for Card C. Card A total = 0. Card B total = (20%-10%) = 10. Card C total = (30%-40%) = -10. Card B has the highest number! For the 100 to 140 cost range it is the best.
