You probably won't find a much better deal than this one at the moment, an MSi HD 7850 OC 1GB card for £130 with 3 games. Given the insane overclocking ability of the 7850, you should be able to overclock to 1050 MHz or perhaps even >1150 Mhz (I have mine running at 1100MHz/5500MHz with 1.075 volts). That kind of OC would put it toe-to-toe with a GTX 580. Even at stock, it offers up 570 performance in a much more power efficient package (This MSi card has a 40MHz OC over the one in the graph and the new drivers have improved 7850 performance more than the comparison shows). The 1GB wouldn't be limiting at your resolution. I think you would have to go to resolutions of greater than 1920x1200 before running into the 1GB barrier. This really seems to be the bang-for-buck card of the 28-nanometre GPUs from both the red and green team.
Think I'd prefer to go for new, rather than play the Ebay lottery. The 7850 looks good. Anyone know how quiet that MSI card is likely to be?
I have an MSi 7850 with two fans. For me, at stock is next to silent. When the card is stressed, it becomes perceptible but never intrusively so. I haven't experienced the fan going over 56% (custom Afterburner curve) with a heavy overclock of 1100MHz/5500MHz and the processor tops out at about 75º while stress testing on a hot day. The two things to keep in mind are: - this card has one fan so it will quieter than mine although the GPU may end up a degree or two warmer but almost certainly sub-80º. - Look at my case! I represent an absolute worse case scenario. I only have one 92mm rear exhast fan. No airflow to the graphics card at all and it still stays quiet. My previous graphics card, an XFX 5770, was idling in the mid-60ºs in this case whereas this 7850 idles at 35º with fans at 33%. Finally, I know it shouldn't be an ultimate factor in choosing a graphics but this card is seriously efficient. My system idle wattage from the wall dropped from 95W to 65W with the 7850 and peak power is 230W which is the same as my old 5770 while offering twice the performance. MSi non-reference cards tend to be very high quality so that card should be quiet and offer great performance.
Cheers buddy. Agree with you that MSI cards are decent - my recently deceased 8800GT was an MSI Zilent and it was awesome
Sorry to resurrect an old thread, but I need some more advice I still haven't got round to buying a new GPU, but my monitor is about to be replaced so I want to make sure that the new monitor and graphics card are a good match. I'm going for a Dell U2412M, so need something that'll be happy at 1920 x 1200. Would a 1gb 7850 still be ok, or should I be pushing to 2gb at this resolution? If I'm going to 2gb, would a 660 be better than a 7850, or is there an other alternative out there that I'm missing? Budget for the GPU is £120 to £150, and can't really be stretched much further as the Dell has already stretched things
I hear ya bro, when mine packed in a wee while ago I was sad, though not too sad to replace it with a 560Ti, and to say that I was impressed is an understatement. Like you I game at 1900x1200, sometimes over 2 screens, and I never run out of grunt even at max settings. I opted for the Palit 2GB version and clocked it with MSI Afterburner per my sig. Never looked back.
Thanks for the replies. I'm leaning towards the 7850, but still not sure whether 1Gb or 2Gb would be best at 1920 x 1200. It doesn't help that prices seem to be fluctuating quite a bit, which makes decisions difficult
