Buying GTX 480 / 470? Post Review poll

[Funky]

So, the reviews are out. We have read it. We have the idea about performance and power consumption.
Cards are up for preorder at various stores for MSRP and even less than MSRP.

So anyone pulling the trigger after reading the reviews? And if yes, select best possible option from the poll.

[Sushi Warrior]

Probably gonna get a GTX470 eventually. I may wait for the 460...

[dengyong]

I'm not buying this one. I'll wait for better performance with much less heat and power draw.

[snoro]

will wait to see f@h performance and see if gpu3 make the ati card useful for f@h or gpugrid or wcg. The one i will get must have 3 thing: good benching card, good gaming card and good gpgpu card. Heat and power draw is not a problem since i will only get one and watercool it with a mcr220 and a blackice pro 120 rad. I will just wait for every number to come up.

[SoulsCollective]

Nope, passing on this round.
Power draw. Almost 300W for the 480? Urgh. As a corollary, 94C under load? Hell, no.
Noise. 65dBA under load for the 480? Hell, no.
Performance. In most things, performance gap between 5870 and GTX480 is around 10%, and that lead decreases as you up the resolution. I'm tempted by the higher minimum framerate of the GTX480, but not enough to warrant the extra cost, noise, heat output and powerdraw. I'm also not convinced that we'll see enough titles with the kind of extreme tesselation (and more to the point, scalable tesselation levels to take advantage of the 480's headroom in this area) released before ATi comes up with an RV870 refresh to make purchasing a GTX480 worth it.
I might be a little more tempted if I folded, but I get my DC jollies on through WCG instead.

[lowfat]

GTX480 is $130 more than an HD5870 w/ current pricing here. That definitely isn't worth it IMO. Don't like the fact that Nvidia decided to skimp on a DisplayPort connector. Therefore tying my hands on what card to buy. Now as for F@H, it consumes more power than an overclocked i7, more expensive, and will almost for surely make lower PPD.

[xman01]

if the ratio was what the g80/g92 were to the 38xx series , then i'd be tempted
hell the sh.it that was the 3870 nearly made me buy a 9800gtx

[Chrono Detector]

Even the 5870 looks more attractive. The thing that really bothers me about the GTX 480 that is draws a lot of power and generates a lot of heat. NVIDIA really messed up here. I think I may have to wait for a refresh or either get a 5870.

[railer]

Going to wait for the shrink to lower node. 80 less wats and I'm there.

[pr@$r1g]

Yeah this the Single GPU fastest card in universe ,BUT i will think twice before buying into
GTX480/470 ,with these power hungry beasts our electricity bill will jump over our estimation ................ double that of 5870

Gotta save ................ EARTH man!

Just for gaming ............... I will wait for may be GF104

Or 2gb versions of 58xx

[BobyTT]

I dont give a cr@p for the electric bill. Ill get 2 for gaming. But after i see some lifetime warranty. If all of them are 1 year only. Ill get just one.

[Funky]

I dont give a cr@p for the electric bill. Ill get 2 for gaming. But after i see some lifetime warranty. If all of them are 1 year only. Ill get just one.

eVGA and PNY are already confirmed to have Limited Lifetime after registration.

Look at the part numbers.
EVGA has PART NUMBER: 015-P3-1480-AR.

And this is quote from evga warranty page



Limited Lifetime:
The EVGA limited lifetime warranty is only eligible for part numbers ending in:
-A1, -A2, -A3, -A4, -AR, -AX, -CR, -CX, -DX, -FR, -FX, -SG, -SX. (with product registration 30 days from purchase)

[NaMcO]

Not pulling the trigger, i have decided before and voted "not buying for sure" as i am fine with the 5970 for quite some time now ;)

[BobyTT]

eVGA and PNY are already confirmed to have Limited Lifetime after registration.

Look at the part numbers.
EVGA has PART NUMBER: 015-P3-1480-AR.

And this is quote from evga warranty page

Thanks man , eVGA aways have been my first choice of brand for VGAs 'cos their customer service. Thats make it easier for me.I cant wait to get 2 of those. In fact ill buy 3 but one is for my buddie. Unfortunately my PSU is only 1000W so i wont be able to try 3-SLI ( i have eVGA 3SLI mobo.... ) and i am not buy bigger PSU just for a test :)

[ovan febriawan]

I would like to waiting the 512Sp version :p

[Helloworld_98]

I feel left out that I'm the only one that's going to buy 470 SLI.

[werdwerdus]

going to wait for the lower price fermis, they called GF104? want to spend around $250 or less.

[zalbard]

Not buying.
Can't afford watercooling, and it's pointless without.

[[XC] Oj101]

I'll grab whichever I can afford at the time for crunching and gaming. First I need a new PSU though.

[[XC] Oj101]

If I want to upgrade, my only options are GTX275/GTX285/GTX295/GTX470/GTX480. It doesn't make sense going for the first three unless I get a killer price :shrug:

[Helloworld_98]

going to wait for the lower price fermis, they called GF104? want to spend around $250 or less.

GF108 and I thought they were only 80 shaders or something like that

[Intratech]

The power draw and the noise scare me... and I already have two HD 5870.

[Taskforce]

Nope! what for? 10% increases in crappy ports with nothing on the horizon for PC gamers.

[doxology83]

I dont give a cr@p for the electric bill. Ill get 2 for gaming. But after i see some lifetime warranty. If all of them are 1 year only. Ill get just one.

well from the reviews I have seen with two cards they get really hot. for me the power draw is to much. two cards running at full power need like almost 800 watts from the reviews i have seen. also with two cards installed the reviewers have said that the gpu's are running at 99 degrees and nvidia supposedly said that they are safe to run up to 105 degrees. thats not much room. also when reading reviews make sure that the reviewer is using up to date ati drivers because the sites that used the 10.3 drivers show things closer than older drivers have. ati has been pumping out great performance increases through drivers the last few months.

i really don't see a reason to go nvidia with these new cards. unless you want cuda or physx. physx won't do anything for you if you are a online gamer only. cuda will help if you encode a lot but there are other solutions out there for that type of thing like the solutions that use the cell processors like the Leadtek HD Transcoding Cards.

[Starage]

Nope not getting this card. Nvidia has come short in this card, too much money for the power it used. ATI is still better and uses less power. Just not a must have card.

[Taskforce]

Almost a year late to the game, heat, power and price, i'm not even tempted one bit, i'm a AMD hater but admittedly the grass looks a lot greener on their side.

[Rattle]

Pass

[Sushi Warrior]

There's no "maybe" option.... I think I fit in that category best.

[Penryn]

Gtx 4** Series Bad Cards.

[MrDiaz]

As most of the people in here I ain't buying nVidia this time around either. Very dissappointed with the results I've seen, waiting on new ATI's refresh now. Hopefully by Q4 2010

[Frag Maniac]

Nowhere in there was an option for those of us considering waiting out another die shrink. Seems to me Fermi would have been much better suited to a 32nm process. So while I like the features and performance is OK for the price charged, a 200 TDP or less would have been much more acceptable and may not have required noise cancelling headphones just to play with the fan at 100%. Seems Nvidia needs help from those die shrinking wizards at Intel. To bad they make poor bedfellows.

[H2O]

I'm skipping this round also (for now). My current build will probably use CF HD5850s or 2GB HD5870s. Maybe if I ever have the case and cooling capacity to handle the GTX480 (think MM case with 3x 360 rads), I'll pull the trigger on 2 or 3 GTX480s/485s.

[GTSRboy]

i Currently have a GTX 285, i see no reason at all to upgrade. All my games, including Crysis on Very high run smooth as butter...and IF i need something faster, i still have a second GPU slot. Seems like GPUs are moving faster than the gaming industry

[doxology83]

i Currently have a GTX 285, i see no reason at all to upgrade. All my games, including Crysis on Very high run smooth as butter...and IF i need something faster, i still have a second GPU slot. Seems like GPUs are moving faster than the gaming industry

it seems that way to me a lot of times. i upgraded my little brothers computer and bought an ati 4650 for $50 on newegg with 512mb of DDR3 ram and was blown away at what that little $50 video card could do. I have never spent over $200 for a video card for myself. I guess I am more of a bang for buck kind of guy. I would rather save $150 and miss out on those 3 frames per second. I am being sarcastic but it often feels that way.

one of the things that surprised me after reading more reviews of these nvidia cards is that the ati cards actually do better against the nvidia cards at higher resolutions. the main reason i have often found these days for the more expensive gpu's is that they run the high end games better at higher resolutions. it is the main reason to me that these new cards seem way overpriced especially if you are running the really high resolutions.

[Nomadsoul]

I have pulled the trigger, to satisfy my curiosity !

[BobyTT]

I have pulled the trigger, to satisfy my curiosity !

Are u live in US? From where did u ordered the card?

[Alien Grey]

I voted not buying after seeing the reviews. The performance/powerconsumption is really bad. These cards aren't worth the money.

I already new that when I saw the first pictures of a GTX 480 it was just waiting for the reviews to confirm it.

[R_1]

Already bought HD5870 six months ago for 380$. So, will skip GF100. It is lot more expensive, power hungry and noisy for my liking.

[ajaidev]

GTX 480 is too expensive, GTX 470 looks good only when OCed but then again it will get hotter and eat more.

So the real options are 5870 2gb and GTX 470 factory overclocked "If its not very hot or hungry"

[Andrea deluxe]

from hardware canucks:

In our tests, thermal throttling usually set in at around 105°C on the GF100 cards while complete thermal shutdown happens around 112-125°C


is real???

[R_1]

Don't know, but my guess is that Nvidia driver will cause Windows TDR event before GPU starts to throttle. Those temps are not linear and gradient. You can get 10 or more °C jump in a split second, when GPU is rising load from 30 to 99% and your monitoring software won't even register it. What you will get is only a message "Driver stopped responding and was successfully recovered". So, no need for high overclocking hopes before real tests with retail cards appears.

[ajaidev]

GTX 480 is too expensive, GTX 470 looks good only when OCed but then again it will get hotter and eat more.

So the real options are 5870 2gb and GTX 470 factory overclocked "If its not very hot or hungry"

scratch that going with 5870 2GB, i was told that the factory OCed GTX 470 will not be by much and will carry a power increase so its what i did not want. On top of that they will use the stock heat sink for the OCed model how retarded is that.

I am getting either of the follow depending on several factors :D :

Asrock X58 Extreme3
Intel i7 930
3GB DDR3 kit "G.Skill"
2*500GB hdd "dual RAID0 arrays"
2*5870 2GB

or

Asrock 890GX Extreme3
AMD 1055T
2*2GB DDR3 kit "OCZ"
2*500GB hdd "dual RAID0 arrays"
2*5870 2GB

[audioave10]

I'm just keeping my GTX 260 & GTX 275 for now. I'd like a 470 but like others
here, I'd wait for a die shrink. This makes the 5850 more tempting.

[pr@$r1g]

scratch that going with 5870 2GB, i was told that the factory OCed GTX 470 will not be by much and will carry a power increase so its what i did not want. On top of that they will use the stock heat sink for the OCed model how retarded is that.

I am getting either of the follow depending on several factors :D :

Asrock X58 Extreme3
Intel i7 930
3GB DDR3 kit "G.Skill"
2*500GB hdd "dual RAID0 arrays"
2*5870 2GB

or

Asrock 890GX Extreme3
AMD 1055T
2*2GB DDR3 kit "OCZ"
2*500GB hdd "dual RAID0 arrays"
2*5870 2GB

that's what i was thinking :),GTX 4xx's are power hogs ... 5870 2gb can do away with that ... :up:

But hey anything new , im also interested in buying one ... :D,i will wait for the market to be spiced UP^

Any reason on choosing this > Asrock X58 Extreme3 ???

[Blacklash]

Getting a second 5870 to go with the one I already own instead.

GTX 480 SLi is solid and I don't feel like spending 1k on it.

[ajaidev]

that's what i was thinking :),GTX 4xx's are power hogs ... 5870 2gb can do away with that ... :up:

But hey anything new , im also interested in buying one ... :D,i will wait for the market to be spiced UP^

Any reason on choosing this > Asrock X58 Extreme3 ???

Well it has USB 3.0 and SATA3 6.0 Gb/s and is available in India for pre order :D

Its not very expensive also, i looked at Biostar x58 from local shop it was for Rs.17000 :mad:

Oh ya did you sell your 9400/9500 on techenclave?

[bfar]

Normally get the next-gen Nvidia cards at launch, but not this time. Performance is there, but price is too high, and heat/power consumption really put me off.

[Frag Maniac]

from hardware canucks:

In our tests, thermal throttling usually set in at around 105°C on the GF100 cards while complete thermal shutdown happens around 112-125°C


is real???Mark at Bjorn3D confirms the throttling at 105c. Don't know about the actual shut down temp, but if it throttles down at 105c, you're likely never going to experience shut down if it takes 112c or more to happen. He's also one of the only ones having done a separate tesselation test AND tested with a bump in chipset voltage, which he said improved performance a bit. He's got a few more tests to run, but his benches on those he did run show a bit better result for the 480 over the 5870. Note that Mark is wary of the temps too though and doesn't recommend extended folding with a 480 without aftermarket cooling.

Two sites also confirm that bumping fan speed from the stock 60% to 70% yields a much more acceptable 80c load temp vs 95c while staying within reasonable noise levels (Guru3D & OverclockersClub). Also a nod to TechPowerUp for their excellent Pci-Ex scaling review on the GTX 480. I really wanted to know by what margin the GTX 480 would exceed an 8x Pci-Ex slot. Turns out it's exactly that of a 5870, exceeding it by a mere 2%. The example they gave is 63.2 FPS vs. 62.1 FPS, at 2560 x 1600 in DiRT 2. A mere 1 frame drop on 8x.

So despite the 480 requiring a fair bit of power and putting out a lot of heat, it isn't any more bandwidth hungry than a 5870, yet averages around 18% better performance at 1920x1200. It can do quite well on the P55 chipset, and may in some ways be better suited there considering there's more room on a P55 board to separate cards in SLI and less heat due to no northbridge chip.

So it's not all that bad, I'd just like to see a more thermally efficient chip. Imagine if you so much as have a cable stuffed in the back of your MB compartment somehow spring forward and touch the 480 heatpipes. "Hmmm, what's that nasty smell?...OMG, my PC is on fire!" Needless to say careful cable management is a must. The guys at Bjorn are saying a 32nm version may come late fall to early winter time frame. So I may gamble come July on a lower priced EVGA card to get me by (275 or something), in hopes to make use of their upgrade program to the 32nm GPU.

[pr@$r1g]

I guess " 32nm's GPU's are for 2011 summer time frame " or may be 28nm

Hell yeah reviews @ TPU are awesome I never miss a article !!!

[LiquidReactor]

I have no reason to jump ATM even for folding. My GTX 285 SLI is somewhere inbetween HD 5970 - HD 5870 CF and I have no DX 11 itch. Maybe if nVidia releases a Fermi revision with 512 cores and drastically ramped up core speeds I'll consider it but otherwise no.

[=SOC= Admiral]

Im getting one for now for gaming and folding but will get another for what I would call HMG Hydra Multi GPU. I want to see how they hydra handles the 480s.

[LarsMarkelson]

Depending on its performance and temps with a Prolimatech MK-13 and near-silent 800-900RPM fans...

[ReverendMaynard]

pre-ordered an ASUS 480 strictly for benching.

[NOFX]

Nope!
5870 is a best choice for me

[cubemaster27]

hopefully the release of these cards will make the price of the 5970 cards come down. It seems that their 480 card is being compared to the 5870, which means ATI still has the advantage :up:

check out the frame rates: http://www.gamespot.com/news/6254281.html?om_act=convert&om_clk=picks&tag=picks;title;2

[CobraXP]

Wow looks like Nvidia dropped the ball on this one. The 5870 is not too far behind and as most of us know the 5870 overclocks very well. I doubt the 480/470 cards are going to be great oc'ers on air.

[ChinStrap]

i'll pass.

my 5850 @ 1GHz core is working out just fine :)

[fiskov]

Have it on order so.. Buying the 480.

I mainly play FSX, nvidia have proven to be the best option for this, and according to the benchmarks it's also the top performer in GTA 4.. And i'm anxiously awaiting the Ballard of Gay Tony.

Although your buying a card with only a 10-15% boost over the 5870, possibly in future drivers it could be 15-25% boost..
I also think this card is almost guaranteed to fail during its warranty period, so hopefully when it's time to RMA the card your be getting the fixed/improved refresh.

Overall, it's an enjoy now, enjoy more later card.

[SS_FireHawk]

Considering both of my gtx 280's failed this past month and are out of warranty, I'm inclined to pick something up... The only way ther performance per watt is going to get any better is water cooling it and then oc'n the crap out of it. Sure there sill be slightly more power draw, but the voltage values aren't going to automagically change from whats programmed unless someone physically tweaks it.
It would have been much more amazing if the card did come with a full 512 cores as opposed to the neutered 480. In my own personal opinion they should have come out with a three tier system ie; gtx 460 with 448 sp, gtx 470 with 480 sp, and gtx 480 with 512 sp. I feel that even with limited numbers with the full 512, there is enough people complaining about the price of the current gtx 480, far fewer would have purchased an even hotter and more expensive card. But hey, at least my epeen would be larger than everyone else s :P

I would pay extra to have a card that would have blown away the competition to the point where it is deemed irrelevant. How many of us bought the 8800 gtx when they were the baddest thing on the block? How much was it again? $600?, $700? Hell I bought two 8800 ultra's and threw water blocks on them when they were $800+. Call me stupid, but I sure felt like John Holmes.

[leszy]

I don't know where market target for this chip is. Not for home gaming (with sleeping at night family, with this annoying sound and pumping so much heat to environment). Not for XS - under LNC 5870 can be OC-ed 300MHz higher, with WC probably comparably. Not for scientific purposes - 5000xFermi/Tesla cluster is too expensive for cooling and powering. Then...?

[damstr]

I may buy 2 just for benchmarking purposes. I will buy waterblocks for both then see if I really need them and will be happy with my 5970. I'm thinking I'll be happy with my 5970.

[Frag Maniac]

Depending on its performance and temps with a Prolimatech MK-13 and near-silent 800-900RPM fans...The MK-13 is an interesting cooler, but so far I've only seen it reviewed on a 9800 with two 120mm fans under it. Since I was planning on leaving dual SLI as an option, the MK-13 is just not feasible unless you can run just 2 fans total for both cards and have them facing the MB vs the card. Another problem you'd run into even with that scenario is you'd need a MB with the top and 4th slot being Pci-Ex, and very few are made that way, and the ones that are would require a PCI vs Pci-Ex sound card.

I like the idea of each card only occupying two slots. For that reason alone I may wait for a die shrink on the 400s because despite what some sites say about the noise/temps being acceptable with a 10% fan speed bump, I gotta think with two running in SLI it would be fairly hot or loud depending on case used.

[TurboDiv]

I think i may also pull the trigger on one of those GTX 480. I'm just waiting for the thread "GTX480/470 overclocking results" where we can observe actual (average) consumers posting results with all kinds of systems. ;)

[LarsMarkelson]

The MK-13 is an interesting cooler, but so far I've only seen it reviewed on a 9800 with two 120mm fans under it. Since I was planning on leaving dual SLI as an option, the MK-13 is just not feasible unless you can run just 2 fans total for both cards and have them facing the MB vs the card. Another problem you'd run into even with that scenario is you'd need a MB with the top and 4th slot being Pci-Ex, and very few are made that way, and the ones that are would require a PCI vs Pci-Ex sound card.

I like the idea of each card only occupying two slots. For that reason alone I may wait for a die shrink on the 400s because despite what some sites say about the noise/temps being acceptable with a 10% fan speed bump, I gotta think with two running in SLI it would be fairly hot or loud depending on case used.

The good news about running the fans that way (facing the MB) is that it is supposed to be the optimal way to cool the MK-13 anyways, well according to that one review I read :)

[570091D]

Wow looks like Nvidia dropped the ball on this one. The 5870 is not too far behind and as most of us know the 5870 overclocks very well. I doubt the 480/470 cards are going to be great oc'ers on air.

hahaha... most reviewers have this card at 800mhz on air. the wide channels provide excellent overclocking, combined with cards from asus and gigabyte with voltage adjustment.... you get the picture. Bx versions of the chip will probably have higher stock clocks with less overclocking headroom. if you're into benching, now is the time to find yourself a gtx480.

[jazkat]

hopefully the release of these cards will make the price of the 5970 cards come down. It seems that their 480 card is being compared to the 5870, which means ATI still has the advantage :up:

check out the frame rates: http://www.gamespot.com/news/6254281.html?om_act=convert&om_clk=picks&tag=picks;title;2

did you read the bit-tech review dam they were harsh on both cards

quotes:

the GTX 480 is unable to conclusively claim the title as fastest single GPU graphics card.


The HD 5870 remains a far better choice if you're a gamer; while we've yet to see how the GTX 480 performs with CUDA apps and Folding, at this stage Fermi looks like a flop

im pretty gutted cos i wanted prices to come down for the 5870 as here in uk they are £300+

[GoldenTiger]

I pre-ordered an eVGA GTX 470 for gaming and (maybe) folding.

[doxology83]

its interesting to note that xfx seems to see enough issues with this card to not be releasing ferni cards at this point. they are well known for their double lifetime warranty. http://www.legitreviews.com/news/7707/

the comments they make also make it sound like ATI has something big in store. They made this comment:
GTX480 and GTX470 are upon us, but perhaps the time has come to Ferm up who really has the big Guns.

[lowfat]

its interesting to note that xfx seems to see enough issues with this card to not be releasing ferni cards at this point. they are well known for their double lifetime warranty. http://www.legitreviews.com/news/7707/

the comments they make also make it sound like ATI has something big in store. They made this comment:

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=248442
This is what they meant by big guns.

[bomberboysk]

Myself, i will prolly go for a 5850 or 5870, GTX 4X0 need too much power, make too much heat, and cost too much for my likings.

[OldChap]

I'll be waiting on both availability and Fah/Grid performance ...what is gaming exactly?

[LiquidFiction]

Picking up a 5850. Wouldn't waste my money on that Fermfail

[=SOC= Admiral]

The VRMs are Volterra again like the original 200 series. This means they can be software volt moded on stock with RT.

[MrDiaz]

nope

[ShadowFox19]

I'm buying the GTX480 for one reason mainly, Adobe Premiere Pro CS5's Mercury Playback Engine.

[bt_medic04]

nope, not buying one. this thing draws more power than an HD5970, yet only offers about 10% more performance over an HD5870. with that difference and knowing how well the 5870's overclock, amd can easily release a higher clocked 2gb version, call it a 5890 and be done with it.

nvidia, ive used your cards in the past and they rocked, however fermi bears too much of a resemblance of the FX series of yore in regards to power consumption, heat and noise

[Frag Maniac]

The good news about running the fans that way (facing the MB) is that it is supposed to be the optimal way to cool the MK-13 anyways, well according to that one review I read :)Can you provide a link to that review? The only case in which I've seen them mounted that way is in conjunction with one or more fans on top of the HS facing downward.

[pentium777]

nope, not buying one. this thing draws more power than an HD5970, yet only offers about 10% more performance over an HD5870. with that difference and knowing how well the 5870's overclock, amd can easily release a higher clocked 2gb version, call it a 5890 and be done with it.

nvidia, ive used your cards in the past and they rocked, however fermi bears too much of a resemblance of the FX series of yore in regards to power consumption, heat and noise

Good! hopefully more like you and it'll ensure I get 2xGTX 480 HC FTWs immediately, heat? 50'C full load on water, noise ZERO, power consumption $1 extra per month compared to ATI.

Overclock? Ya I'll post my 800-900 core clock numbers here and see how that HD5870 CF or HD5970 compares :-) Let them release the 5890 2GB even with 2560x1600 isn't fully utilized and won't for a long while.

[roki977]

No doubts that Femi will be grat card one day,great potential.Tody Femi is just unfinished product that was forced to market because Nvidia is in deep sh.. . So i wont by it for sure.

[Donnie27]

No doubts that Femi will be grat card one day,great ponetial.Tody Femi is just unfinished product that was forced to market because Nvidia is in deep sh.. . So i wont by it for sure.

QFT! Beat me to it.:up: But some will love it anyway.

[bt_medic04]

Good! hopefully more like you and it'll ensure I get 2xGTX 480 HC FTWs immediately, heat? 50'C full load on water, noise ZERO, power consumption $1 extra per month compared to ATI.

Overclock? Ya I'll post my 800-900 core clock numbers here and see how that HD5870 CF or HD5970 compares :-) Let them release the 5890 2GB even with 2560x1600 isn't fully utilized and won't for a long while.

water cooling is the exception, not the standard and i still stand by my comment earlier. too hot, too loud, too much power. coupled with the fact that the 480 10% faster than a 5870 on average but costs $100 more? $450 would have been a better release day price, but until it drops (and i suspect that it eventually will once yields improve to meet demand) its not worth it. now on the other hand the GTX470 is right where it needs to be pricing wise (given amd's current pricing on the 58xx series)

also, does anyone have any idea what kind of power supply wattage we're looking at for a SLI setup for the GTX480?

had these been released back in september or even october, my views might be different, but nvidia was too late to the party and plenty of us didnt want to wait around

[H2O]

also, does anyone have any idea what kind of power supply wattage we're looking at for a SLI setup for the GTX480?

I'd like to know this too. I checked SLI Zone the other day and they did not have anything listed. However, there were only 4-5 PSUs that were certified for GTX295 SLI, two of them being the ST1500 and Antec 1200W. I can't imagine the requirements fot GTX480 SLI would be much different.

[the finisher]

Any high quality 1k or better PSU should work. They don't need sli cert.:up:

[Dumo]

any high quality 1k or better psu should work. They don't need sli cert.:up:qft

For $499...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125319&cm_re=gtx_480-_-14-125-319-_-Product

or

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125322

[Serpentarius]

i'm looking at >68+% not buying for sure ...

will Nvidia able to pull out from this one? their shares seems stable atm ... maybe the aftershocks is yet to reach the rest of communities

[570091D]

i'm looking at >68+% not buying for sure ...

will Nvidia able to pull out from this one? their shares seems stable atm ... maybe the aftershocks is yet to reach the rest of communities

as more games with more tesselation come to market, more and more people will begin to take notice of gf100's performance....

[Dumo]

GTX 480 for NVDA is fight for bragging rights.

The real war with ATI is brewing @ sub $200 gpu market....which NVDA doesn't have any new product

[GTSRboy]

Nothing new...but the 275 is still good bang for the buck. Not much different at all from a 285...i bought my 275 for ~160. If your a folder, then its the best bang for under 200

[pr@$r1g]

I have pre-ordered GTX470 ...... :D

I was thinking of new GPU .... my sapphire 5770 is never going to be vmoded :shakes:
Sorry i was not able to get essential VR's for vmods :shrug:

[Systemlord]

Man I need to upgrade my 8800 GTX soon, looks like Nvidia needs a better cooling solution! I will wait and see if Nvidia is able to improve their (silicon) 480 GPU with the full 512SP and bring temps down and OC headrooms up a bit, remember how hot the first 8800 GTX card ran along with the driver problems! Looks like I'll be waiting a little longer or considering an ATI product which I never thought I would do!

[Pekalion]

Man I need to upgrade my 8800 GTX soon, looks like Nvidia needs a better cooling solution! I will wait and see if Nvidia is able to improve their (silicon) 480 GPU with the full 512SP and bring temps down and OC headrooms up a bit, remember how hot the first 8800 GTX card ran along with the driver problems! Looks like I'll be waiting a little longer or considering an ATI product which I never thought I would do!

I barely doubt that they can improve the silicon even a bit, Fermi is a complex architecture that will take a long time to take something big to see improvements in the heat or power consumption. Indeed, remember that they are using 40nm manufacturation process, and they have spend like 3,3 millions of transistors in it, reducing the manufacturation process right now is quite imposible, and change something in it is a hard work.

Also, the 512SP version is quite an impressive achivement, most of the wafers have serious problems and only a few of them are useful. Furthermore, for getting those 700Mhz for the gpu they have to spend a lot of power consumption for it.

Of course they will get something to pass this bad step, or hope so, they have a bunch of people working in it. So, my advice, stay with the 88 for a while, or start looking the red side and keep your 88 for physix comp :)

[iTravis]

6 months waiting and Fermi ain't what I expected so I gotto pull a trigger on the HD5970, best part is at the same price at the GTX 480. :up: I'll wait for the next Fermi line up or redesign.

[pr@$r1g]

nVidia can never improve on GTX 4XX ,bcoz its already A3 .......... it may improve on b* revision ,Bios revision's may help :)

[INFRNL]

I want fermi for folding, but i am hearing too many bad things from you guys. guess i need to see hard facts of the card, especially for folding (my primary concern, that ATI cannot touch right now)

[grimREEFER]

i read the anandtech review, and everything looked alright.
but i started reading some of these other reviews, and they are much more harsh.

anyway, can't buy something without almost universal acclaim.
also cant buy anything with poor tessellation performance.
gotta wait for hd6000 series or something.

[CobraXP]

I think I will hold on to my set of GTX 295s a while longer. :yepp: I don't really see the difference between DX10 and DX11 anyways :shocked:

[Sushi Warrior]

anyway, can't buy something without almost universal acclaim.
also cant buy anything with poor tessellation performance.
gotta wait for hd6000 series or something.

Poor tesselation? I thought that was one of its advantages....

[CaloSIM]

I'm still confused, whether GTX470 or GTX480 which I will buy later. :shrug:

The card itself will be available in local stores next week.

I think the price is quite reasonable. $ 390 to $ 550 for GTX470 and GTX480.

[grimREEFER]

Poor tesselation? I thought that was one of its advantages....


i mean thats what stopping me from getting a 5870


hmm, if i was in desperate need of a new graphics card for some reason, and i couldn't wait for newer cards, i suppose i would reluctantly get a gtx 470.

[Pekalion]

i mean thats what stopping me from getting a 5870


hmm, if i was in desperate need of a new graphics card for some reason, and i couldn't wait for newer cards, i suppose i would reluctantly get a gtx 470.

Or you can always struggle your balls with the door when you pick up your wallet and go to buy it, that helps and a lot :p

For those how aim to wait for the next gen of Ati cards, they are going to have kind of good improvements over the Cypress. The code name for them are Southern Islands, they will include actual tech plus some quite interesting new techs, but it's said that the new and big change will be the other step, called Northern Islands.

My advice, if you are into Physix and you are a devoted Nvidia user, go for the GTX480, is a good card with some cons in it, like heat, people that buy that card doesnt care about power consumption. But, if you really hate that heat production, you are afraid that your psu will explode and just love hearing the world with your ears without needing an amplifier, go for a 5870 1GB right now or wait a little bit for the 2GB non-eyefinity edition.

Also, if you go for the 5870 and want to enable Physix in-game, you can take a 9600GT from nvidia, is a really nice card for that work.

[Systemlord]

Or you can always struggle your balls with the door when you pick up your wallet and go to buy it, that helps and a lot :p

For those how aim to wait for the next gen of Ati cards, they are going to have kind of good improvements over the Cypress. The code name for them are Southern Islands, they will include actual tech plus some quite interesting new techs, but it's said that the new and big change will be the other step, called Northern Islands.

My advice, if you are into Physix and you are a devoted Nvidia user, go for the GTX480, is a good card with some cons in it, like heat, people that buy that card doesnt care about power consumption. But, if you really hate that heat production, you are afraid that your psu will explode and just love hearing the world with your ears without needing an amplifier, go for a 5870 1GB right now or wait a little bit for the 2GB non-eyefinity edition.

Also, if you go for the 5870 and want to enable Physix in-game, you can take a 9600GT from nvidia, is a really nice card for that work.

Damn, I really need a new card now! I could water cool the GTX 480, heat non issue then along with the noise factor. I don't care if it takes 200 or 300 watts as long as my PSU can handle it which it can! When I overclocked my 8800 GTX the fan noise at 100% all of the time did sound audible on Windows desktop, so I wanted to go for water cooling anyways! I would be nice if Nvidia go get the last SMs and 512SPs like their target was originally. Do you really know for a fact that Nvidia couldn't improve the 480? Miracles do happen from time to time!

[franklin5252]

Im waiting to the new Ati comes out with the 6 series cards before i do anything.

[demo23019]

Once microcenter gets them instore...very soon. Ill be picking up 2 evga 480

[audioave10]

I might get a GTX 470 - $350 in the US. Set your fan speed to 60% and the
temps aren't that bad. 5850 would be the other consideration - $320.

[BobyTT]

Already got two 480.

[BeepBeep2]

Good! hopefully more like you and it'll ensure I get 2xGTX 480 HC FTWs immediately, heat? 50'C full load on water, noise ZERO, power consumption $1 extra per month compared to ATI.

Overclock? Ya I'll post my 800-900 core clock numbers here and see how that HD5870 CF or HD5970 compares :-) Let them release the 5890 2GB even with 2560x1600 isn't fully utilized and won't for a long while.

Umm, remember that that "$1 per month" is over the 5970, not 5870...you could run two 5970's in QuadFire and use less power than two 480's.

I love nvidia, my first DX10 card was an 8800 GTS 320MB that I got for $400. Fermi...sucks.

HD5870's are notorious for doing 1000 to 1100 on their core compared to the stock 850. Thats about a 20-25% increase. :ROTF:
Even if you get to 850 core thats a 21% increase in performance with much more power used than the 5970 and 50% less performance. Congrats :up:

If you clock it that high it puts it about 8-9% above the 5870. Remember, with 60 FPS you are getting 60 FPS while the ATI card has 55 and uses half the power :up:


In all seriousness, if fermi had lower power usage and nvidia had released mid-range cards I'd be all over them.

[Frag Maniac]

I might get a GTX 470 - $350 in the US. Set your fan speed to 60% and the
temps aren't that bad. 5850 would be the other consideration - $320.From what I've read the 480's fan is set at 60% from the factory. I assumed the 470 was too because though it's less powerful, the HS is less robust too.

Sounds like you're saying the 470's stock fan speed is less than 60%. If so, can you provide something to back that up? If I can get around 80c or less load temps at 60% on a 470, I may consider one. I am very skeptical that is possible though.

[audioave10]

Here is a quote from Rage 3d (which is an AMD/ATI forum mostly):
"thanks for the tip, I just got to get me a set for SLI, a friend of mine snagged 1 up from ebay. I went to his house to check it out and was surprised by it. 1st of all this card is not a dustbuster, It's about as loud as a gtx 285, the fan on it is very good quality, we tested in furmark, and it reached 86 degrees, and in gaming it hovers around 70-75 degrees, the fan speed was 69-70% all the time while gaming, and at that speed it's the same as a gt285 noise wise or even a bit quieter due to the high quality fan. I run my fans @ 75% on my SLI setup so I fugure a gtx 485 SLI will be the same noise while gaming or less. I went to his house thinking it was going to glow red and sound like a vacuum, but after seeing it in action I was very impressed, I'm confident that 480 SLI is going to be about the same noise and maybe a little bit hotter temp than gtx 285 SLI but not by much, most of the reviews hollering about the noise and heat are overexagerated bull**** unless if you're gonna use your gpu's to run furmark and watch fanspeed and temps. In the real world (gaming) it's very acceptable noise and heat wise, the powerdraw is really the only downside for me at this point."

True user info is sketchy right now but I'm seeing a few like this where its not quite as bad as it seems. Comparing to ATI's latest is the problem since ATI did such a great job with power usage & heat. Its not too much from the norm however. If Nvidia could get the 28nm working for Fermi, it would kick-ass.
It may take a year for it to happen. Darnit!
Its borderline as far as being too much heat or not (and it does need more power). With my history of good driver support and long-lasting GPU's
from Nvidia, I still would like a GTX 470. I'll still be searching for more info.

[Systemlord]

Here is a quote from Rage 3d (which is an AMD/ATI forum mostly):
"thanks for the tip, I just got to get me a set for SLI, a friend of mine snagged 1 up from ebay. I went to his house to check it out and was surprised by it. 1st of all this card is not a dustbuster, It's about as loud as a gtx 285, the fan on it is very good quality, we tested in furmark, and it reached 86 degrees, and in gaming it hovers around 70-75 degrees, the fan speed was 69-70% all the time while gaming, and at that speed it's the same as a gt285 noise wise or even a bit quieter due to the high quality fan. I run my fans @ 75% on my SLI setup so I fugure a gtx 485 SLI will be the same noise while gaming or less. I went to his house thinking it was going to glow red and sound like a vacuum, but after seeing it in action I was very impressed, I'm confident that 480 SLI is going to be about the same noise and maybe a little bit hotter temp than gtx 285 SLI but not by much, most of the reviews hollering about the noise and heat are overexagerated bull**** unless if you're gonna use your gpu's to run furmark and watch fanspeed and temps. In the real world (gaming) it's very acceptable noise and heat wise, the powerdraw is really the only downside for me at this point."

True user info is sketchy right now but I'm seeing a few like this where its not quite as bad as it seems. Comparing to ATI's latest is the problem since ATI did such a great job with power usage & heat. Its not too much from the norm however. If Nvidia could get the 28nm working for Fermi, it would kick-ass.
It may take a year for it to happen. Darnit!
Its borderline as far as being too much heat or not (and it does need more power). With my history of good driver support and long-lasting GPU's
from Nvidia, I still would like a GTX 470. I'll still be searching for more info.

Things are being manipulated by some websites (legionhardware COUGH!), they will show you what they want you to see, ie links! Each paint a different picture about the GTX 480. Notice how the choice of what games are tested favor ATI, while the last two links favor both ATI/Nvidia which seem more balanced! You have got to know that the GTX 480 drivers really need much more work before judgement is passed, "my predictions are that Fermi yields will improve along with the drivers to the point where the GTX 480 will pass the ATI 5970". I'll eat my words if I'm wrong, words in chocolate! :D

http://www.legionhardware.com/articles_pages/nvidia_geforce_gtx_480_fermi_arrives,1.html

http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-470-480-review/

http://anandtech.com/show/2977/nvidia-s-geforce-gtx-480-and-gtx-470-6-months-late-was-it-worth-the-wait-

[Frag Maniac]

...my predictions are that Fermi yields will improve along with the drivers to the point where the GTX 480 will pass the ATI 5970...It's not just driver tweaks that will improve Fermi's results against the 5970, it's games that make much more use of DX11 than the current ones. The main problem with early adoption is always the unknown as far as how well the product will be supported. In this case though much of the support is not in the hands of Nvidia directly.

No matter how much they get out and talk to devs, it's still up to them to employ the features to make full use of the hardware. My guess is Nvidia will be busier than they have ever been before in that regard, because all the time and money spent on Fermi's success depends on it. There will no doubt be even more ATI fanatics accuse them of sabotaging games too, but you know how that goes. :rolleyes:

[Systemlord]

It's not just driver tweaks that will improve Fermi's results against the 5970, it's games that make much more use of DX11 than the current ones. The main problem with early adoption is always the unknown as far as how well the product will be supported. In this case though much of the support is not in the hands of Nvidia directly.

No matter how much they get out and talk to devs, it's still up to them to employ the features to make full use of the hardware. My guess is Nvidia will be busier than they have ever been before in that regard, because all the time and money spent on Fermi's success depends on it. There will no doubt be even more ATI fanatics accuse them of sabotaging games too, but you know how that goes. :rolleyes:

An excellent point, Nvidia did design the Fermi's architecture with features not yet used by devs and game makers. ATI made a similar guess on the future of gaming and came up short, too many Shader processors and not enough texture units when the HD2900XT came out.


My guess is Nvidia will be busier than they have ever been before in that regard, because all the time and money spent on Fermi's success depends on it. There will no doubt be even more ATI fanatics accuse them of sabotaging games too, but you know how that goes.

I have only one thing to say about this statement, "The Way It's Meant To Be Played".

[xguntherc]

the 480's fan is set to 44% at auto.. but I crank it to about 80% when I game. and can't hear anything under 72% on my system cuz my medium yates. it's not as loud as my 260's were until it gets high.

but playing Crysis warhead I did see 86c load.