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Hardware Radeon HD 4890 vs GeForce GTX 275

Discussion in 'Article Discussion' started by Tim S, 3 Apr 2009.

  1. thehippoz

    thehippoz What's a Dremel?

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    using nibitor, I found that my 260 can run oc'd on lower than stock volts- the temps are really really low like this too around 50C loaded but you can't push it too far.. there was occasional artifacts in game up around 725 core 1512 shader which seems to be the limit, any higher and you would black screen (and the errors were like white spots once in a while- really didn't mess with it too much after seeing this, but it might be something someone would like to try at a lower core/shader)

    but that's pretty good considering stock volts load around 7-8C higher.. you could probably run the fan really low like this and still have a decent gaming experience
     
  2. Turbotab

    Turbotab I don't touch type, I tard type

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    Good article. A couple of points to clear up.
    P7 - "the HD 4890 is firmly in the shade of the GTS 275" (GTX)

    P18 - "Either that, or it'll have to look into a re-vamped HD 4850 X2 card based on a pair of RV790 GPUs" Does that signify that any 4890 X2 will not be an official ATI product?

    P.. Is the What Hardware article out soon:)
     
  3. wolfticket

    wolfticket Downwind from the bloodhounds

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    Nothing against your (excellent) article, but someone wake me up when we have some new cards to looks at.
     
  4. Nicb

    Nicb Let's discuss among ourselves

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    I don't want to repeat all the compliments to this article that have been made. So, well done, I did not feel like I was left hanging on any information. I loved it! :D

    I forgot what it was like to use IE, but if your using Firefox there are several EASY options. :duh:
    If you just click on (File then Print Preview) you will have a clean page layout with no ADs and can even increase font or arrange to print layout.
    If you install the addon "Web to PDF" from: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/?application=firefox
    you can have a PDF format. It will include Ads. Bit-Tech might prefer this option.
    Cut and paste works. :thumb: Simple amature stuff. Should not have a problem.
     
  5. pizan

    pizan that's n00b-tastic

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    No single gpu card tops my slightly ridiculous eVGA HydroCopper GTX 285
     
  6. biebiep

    biebiep What's a Dremel?

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    According to the recently released ATi specsheet, the RV790 also has burst memory read/writes as opposed to the 4870 and 4850.

    Apparently, that didn't do much? :/
     
  7. wyx087

    wyx087 Homeworld 3 is happening!!

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    nVidia is trying very hard to NOT loose this round, they've priced this too aggressively, surely there's some cooperate law on this?

    very nice card, that gtx275. anyone interested in a gtx260 maxcore? ;)
     
  8. Boz82

    Boz82 What's a Dremel?

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    Some of the elements of this review wreak of Nvidia bias. Let me qualify:

    1. "...which is a shame for ATI considering that its card costs the same, but is louder and produces considerably more heat."
    The article portrays the 4890 as loud before any sort of qualification - of which there is none. There are no sound results posted, only the brief mention of the fan speeds on the Thermal Performance page. It's noted that the GTX 275 fan spins up to 55% under load while the 4890 fan spins up to only 36%, which they refer to as "very noisy" without any actual qualification. Considering that both reference coolers use the same size fan, one would have to conclude that the higher speed would be louder. Furthermore, the early assertion that it produces "considerably more heat" is totally contradictory to the actual results which show that the 4890 runs 26 degrees cooler at load with the fan spinning 19% slower.

    2. "the HD 4890 is firmly in the shade of the GTS 275" - At the highest playable setting in Crysis (1920x1200 0xAA) the 275 leads the 4890 by only 1 FPS (Minimum). I would hardly call that overshadowing, in fact it is within the margin of testing error. Worse yet, further on in the article they try to play off a similar FPS lead in Racedriver:GRID by the 4890 as immaterial - "Both the HD 4890 and the GTX 275 were capable of playing the game at 2,560 x 1,600 with 4x AA, and the performance difference is marginal, so you're not losing anything in GRID by choosing one card over the other."

    3. "The Radeon HD 4890 is consistently a few fps slower than the Nvidia card, which is a shame for ATI considering that its card costs the same" At the time of this writing that is incorrect. The GTX 275 is priced at $259 on Newegg and is not yet available. The 4890 has been available all week on Newegg at $249 with a $20 rebate. That is a $30 price difference already.

    4. On the Overclocking results page, this comment is made about the 4890 - "This isn't a bad effort from the 850MHz stock speed, but a bit disappointing" 850->965MHz represents a 14% core overclock. Then this comment was made about the GTX 275 - "...our GTX 275 was massively overclockable" 633-745MHz represents a 17% core overclock. I'm not sure how 14% is disappointing but 17% is massive. A 3% difference in overclocking is easily less than the standard deviation will be from one batch of cards to the next. For example, HardOCP was able to overclock their Asus 4890 sample to 985MHz, a 16% improvement, and to 1GHz with a bump on voltage, a record-setting number for a GPU core.
     
  9. chrisb2e9

    chrisb2e9 Dont do that...

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    I feel the same way. Cant wait to see the next generation. Not the same generation redone.
     
  10. lp1988

    lp1988 Minimodder

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    me too, got one last summer and the price has pretty mutch stayed the same..
     
  11. Rocket_Knight64

    Rocket_Knight64 Minimodder

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    Very good article. But now i'm really confused. There are alot of conflicting reviews out there for some reason and i dont know what to think (not that i dont trust your results). :worried:

    But all in all compitition is always good for us. :thumb:

    But this is certain, not quite enough to make me swap my 4870 + AC S1.
     
  12. Turbotab

    Turbotab I don't touch type, I tard type

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    Probably to do with the driver issue mentioned in the article.
     
  13. Action_Parsnip

    Action_Parsnip What's a Dremel?

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    Hello Bit-tech! been a long time reader of the site and avid fan for about just over a year. Nice articles, nice writing, nice layout, just warm and fuzzy all round. Been intending to register for ages but this article finally prompted me to do it. Namely the conclusion seemed a bit.. well, 'off'.

    Like 'Boz82' said, but in diffrerent words, it does seem as if the office fell in love with the GTX275 but didnt take to the 4890. The GTX came away with a rather glowing review but the 4890 got a bit of a thumb-up-the-bum-hole with just the slimest of performance margins seperating the two.

    Three points really ive been itching to make:

    1 - You said the 4890 was 'hot and loud' but your figures dont show it being hot at all really. Its #cooler# than the 4870 and consumes quite a bit #less# power at load than the GTX275, itself a #scorching# hot card! Where was this temp. and power info. in the conclusion?

    2 - and on the subject of 'loud', i tried putting my 4870's at the same fan speed as you said it was running at, at "a very noisy 36 percent (2,422 RPM)" (which for those sad enough to care lolz is equivalent to 37% on the 512mb 4870 according to rivatuner) and it was bit whiney/audible but some way off being 'loud'. I know the coolers are not identical but they do look very very similar so my own experience cant be that invalid.

    3 - CRYSIS, is it time to dump it soon for Warhead? I know its interesting to see it very very gradually get conquered by hardware, it should be maxable at 1900x1200 with 4xaa in DX10 when the top DX11 cards come out, and a refresh of #that# generation is likely to have a single GPU card capable of doing it, but surely its time to drop it for Warhead? Ive played both the original and warhead ALOT and recently did a playthrough of them both with the Catalyst 9.3 driver set, and it opened my eyes a bit as to the performance difference, namely: Vanilla Crysis has got some real optimisation issues but Warhead has not. The expansion pack pushes better graphics with better performance, and doesnt bizzarely drop frames when rendering structures and paved roads (The Harbour level im looking squarely at you here). Warhead doesnt suffer from this (the harbour section around the North Korean sub in Warhead im now looking at you) and in general is simply smoother and faster.

    Furthermore the SDK for Wars is out, some single player front-end mods have appeared already to make single player maps work, and quite soon the decent Crysis mods and maps will get a port over. So the original game's relevance is seriously on the wane.



    Honestly was a super article just let down by a conclusion that doesnt really sum up the items on test as much as beam love for one and indifference to another.

    Many thanks,

    Action_Man's understudy
     
  14. Action_Parsnip

    Action_Parsnip What's a Dremel?

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    Sorry forgot to say, Boz82 this point here:

    '4. On the Overclocking results page, this comment is made about the 4890 - "This isn't a bad effort from the 850MHz stock speed, but a bit disappointing" 850->965MHz represents a 14% core overclock. Then this comment was made about the GTX 275 - "...our GTX 275 was massively overclockable" 633-745MHz represents a 17% core overclock. I'm not sure how 14% is disappointing but 17% is massive. A 3% difference in overclocking is easily less than the standard deviation will be from one batch of cards to the next. For example, HardOCP was able to overclock their Asus 4890 sample to 985MHz, a 16% improvement, and to 1GHz with a bump on voltage, a record-setting number for a GPU core.'

    spot on. For the Nvidia and ATI, those are BOTH damned fine overclocks! Odd reporting of it though.
     
  15. tank_rider

    tank_rider What's a Dremel?

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    I guess the problem and point of the overclocking was that ati had set an expectation that the cards would hit 1GHz and then failed to live up to the hype, whereas nvidia hadn't claimed anything so decent overclocking performance was more of a suprise. I'm just looking forward to see what decent custom cooling solutions can allow on both GPUs.
     
  16. naokaji

    naokaji whatever

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    And yet again we have to wait monthes for custom cooling solutions / pcbs / clocks.... seriously, it's starting to get boring, each time a new card comes out it's always the same boring reference design and once others come out the next generation is almost launched.

    Sorry, just had to rant.

    Anyway, nice review.
     
  17. Turbotab

    Turbotab I don't touch type, I tard type

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    The Palit GTX 275 is a custom cooled part, that is currently available.
     
  18. Horizon

    Horizon Dremel Worthy

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    kudos to you, for giving him a response, I pegged him for a retard. The card runs 2 degrees warmer idle and 26 degrees cooler under load, BUT since it eats more power on a smaller die, how much of that power is transferred to heat is my concern and why I'm going to pass.
     
  19. wiak

    wiak What's a Dremel?

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    blaming ATI for bad Crysis performance when NVIDIA was in bed with Crysis Developers :p
    reading the review concludes to ATI being competitive exept NVIDIA's Crysis

    am sure ati catalyst 9.4 will make 4890 better

    anyway its good to see atleast the graphics industry is at it again, cant wait for teh next generation :p
     
  20. Combatus

    Combatus Bit-tech Modding + hardware reviews Lover of bit-tech Super Moderator

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    @Boz82
    "Considering that both reference coolers use the same size fan"

    So your effectively saying the reference coolers on the GTX275 and the HD 4890 are identical? Hmmm. 120mm fans are all the same size but there can be a big difference in noise between each, even if they're running at the same RPM.

    The percentage we give for the fan speed is only comparible to that particular card. In addition, the coolers more than likely perform differently too so saying one cooler spins '19% slower' will possibly lead to an innacurate conclusion.

    As for noise, well we tested with open systems with each graphics card a few feet away from our ears. If we say one card is noisy compared to another, well you'll just have to take our word on it because were only reporting our observations in the absence of accurate sound measuring equipment! But rest assured our ears work perfectly well, and the HD 4890 was by far the loudest under load. However, given that it runs much cooler than other graphics cards on test, is an indication that its cooler is actually very effective, which is another reason why we were slightly dissapointed with the overclocking result.
     
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