Marius Fett Posted December 14, 2008 Share Posted December 14, 2008 As with the Intel vs AMD thread, I realise this has the potential to start a war, so try and keep it calm please. The New Year draws ever closer, and i'm constantly changing my mind about the parts for this new rig. Until now, i've been set on the GeForce 9800, but i've been thinking about going ATI too. (More specifically, the Radeon HD 4850) I'm assuming there are users of both brands here, so I was hoping I could get some of your opinions on the Pros and Cons of each brand? Cheers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Astrotoy7 Posted December 15, 2008 Share Posted December 15, 2008 Ive noticed the whole nvidia v ati fanboywar has died down. People are happy to go with 'whatever does what they need to do' That being said, nvidia has been quiet for a long time, and ATI has been allowed to have the limelight with their GDDR5 touting cards. nvfanboys are in anticipation of the GTX295 benchies which should be coming out early Jan at latest. The next gen of ATI and nv cards will hit us next year too no doubt, but available details are scant. The fact of teh matter is, apart from clowns with 1600p monitors(), most people are doing great with their 9800GTs and 4850/70 playing at up to 1600x1200 on even newer games. Right now, the 4870X2 is 'the most powerful card' but is of course a dual GPU and reportedly a bit hotter and noiser that nvidia's top dog, the single GPU GTX280. There are 4 factors affecting what card you should get 1. Budget > the 48xx seem to give great bang for buck. Check the 'tech news' thread for discussion and reviews 2. Performance >> what games do you play, what rez?? 3. Fave colour of PCB ATI cards are often a pretty red Though they deny it, this is why most girlz Ive met have ATI cards [/prepares to duck] 4. folding@home: if you are devoted to folding, having an nvidia card will always give you much joy, as the nvidia GPU clients and CUDA functionality allow you to cut through work units like a hot silicone knife through e-butter mtfbwya Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M@RS Posted December 15, 2008 Share Posted December 15, 2008 Personally I prefer Nvidia... But ATI is a very good second... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth333 Posted December 15, 2008 Share Posted December 15, 2008 Both are good. Look at the titles you like to play and how the cards perform. Sometimes Ati has the edge, sometimes it`s nVidia. The Radeon 4850 offers good value for the money. However, I don't know which nVidia 9800 card you are referring to: 9800gt, gtx, gtx+ ? The 4850 beats the first two cards in terms of performance. It is more comparable to the 9800gtx+ (if you intend to chose between those two cards, then look at how they perform in the games you intend to play). ...most people are doing great with their 9800GTs and 4850/70 playing at up to 1600x1200 on even newer games. Save for perhaps the 9800gt when it comes to new power hungry games, I'd say up to 1920x1200, especially for the 4870 which currently allows me to comfortably use very high settings for just about anything at that resolution. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jrrtoken Posted December 15, 2008 Share Posted December 15, 2008 Truthfully, I've always liked ATi, but the only reason for that is that I've been using them since '94. I didn't get them because I preferred ATi over other brands, but that I just got them because they were the most convenient things around. So far, they've always served me well and are always reliable. I've never tried nVIDIA, but that might change, since I've spotted an inexpensive 9800GT on sale at Newegg. Either way, I hope its of good quality. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted December 15, 2008 Author Share Posted December 15, 2008 Well, I play games like KotOR, JA and EaW, but I also play new(er) titles like Mass Effect. I'm really looking to get into playing PC games again, so i'll be picking up alot of new games like Crysis, Call of Duty, etc. I want a card that will last me while, and not start to struggle with newer games on high(ish) settings straight away. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Q Posted December 15, 2008 Share Posted December 15, 2008 To me it's always a question of what offers the most bang for the buck at the moment of purchase rather than brand loyalty. I don't know what's going on in the UK or the EU right now, but here in the states the best value ATM would be the outgoing 192-shader GTX260 or the 512MB HD 4870, both of which can be had for ~$175.00. At that price you can forget about the 9800 series and the 4850, as you'd be getting a much better card than either for not much more $$$. These two cards are so close in performance that you really couldn't go wrong with either one, IMO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted December 15, 2008 Author Share Posted December 15, 2008 Hmm, i'll look into those, I think. See how much the prices between the 9800 GTX260 differ between here in the UK. Hopefully, they're not that much more expensive... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth333 Posted December 15, 2008 Share Posted December 15, 2008 If you can get them at +- $175...they are really worth it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted December 15, 2008 Author Share Posted December 15, 2008 Absolutely. If it's not that much of a difference, i'll definitely do it, but if it's like WAY out, I won't bother. Here's to hoping though! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Q Posted December 16, 2008 Share Posted December 16, 2008 Well, it's definitely worth looking into. Like I said, I have no idea what's going on across the pond, but over here the competition between ATI and Nvidia is so fierce ATM that the prices are just insane, and they keep getting moreso every day. The sale price of the 512MB 4870 is now approaching half of it's original MSRP and the GTX260 is past that point. Gotta love competition. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stingerhs Posted December 18, 2008 Share Posted December 18, 2008 by tradition, i'll go with ATI over Nvidia. this has a lot more to do with me having a good history with ATI cards in several of my rigs than anything else. my best example was me ol' Athlon XP 3200 rig paired with a Radeon 9700 Pro. believe it or not, i was running Oblivion on that rig, and performance actually wasn't all that bad. the game could at least run on medium settings @ 1024x728, and the only drawback was that i was missing out on SM 3.0 effects (ooooh, pretty water....). that's not to say that there isn't some good stuff from Nvidia, though. in fact, there's always been some top notch stuff from Nvidia, and i've gone with Nvidia on a number of occasions because they had the best card for my situation. heck, my current system is evidence of this given that my motherboard is an SLI capable board (the original plan was to have 2x 8800 GTS 640MB cards). but, if the chips are down, and performance is neck and neck inside of a current price range, i'll pick ATI every time. and, once again, recent history is evidence of that given my current choice of a graphics card. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Negative Sun Posted December 21, 2008 Share Posted December 21, 2008 Voodoo! No real bias either way, as long as the bargain's there Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Astrotoy7 Posted December 22, 2008 Share Posted December 22, 2008 Voodoo! No real bias either way, as long as the bargain's there lolz... what makes me giggle is when I think back almost a decade ago..... I was looking at an uber upgrade... an 32MB matrox AGP card, they only cost back then $280(AUD) Im sure in 10 years time we can scan many pages back on the tech news thread and laugh at the excitement generated by the 4870X2, GTX295, 300 etc... *waves fist at Moore's Law* Still, 32Mb isnt hugely irrelevant these days for just 'surf n work' pcs. I have an integrated nvidia 32M in my tablet pc and it runs vista for the basic stuff with no gripes whatsoever, even media playback(exc hi bitrate 1080p stuff) Im sure it could run some older games but its hardly conducive to prolonging battery life when on the go mtfbwya Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.