4870 or 260 ?

[YukonTrooper]

My vote for the GTX 260 216SP. Performance wise, it trades blows with the HD4870 1GB, but the features the card offers are amazing. First of all, I love how the card automatically down-clocks when not in use. Not only is this good for power consumption, but my idle temperatures are at 45°C with auto fan speed. Secondly, I just started folding for SETI@Home using BOINC, and the CUDA feature on the GTX 260 crunches an amazing amount of work. CPU's don't even come close.

[Rise]

gtx260 because i fold when i'm not playing games and nvidia blows ati away when it comes to F@h

[cloned]

WEll seeing as I have a GTX 260 I'd say go with a GTX 260. I've had no issues with any games so far and I've seen less driver issues reported than ATI.

[Fredthered]

See: 'Gamers' UNITE for a link to a review on both.

Cheers
Fredthered

[zsamz_]

well i bought a 4870 a while ago very happy with it
the way i see it if i need more power i'll just get another 4870 n crossfire
no way i'm gonna touch an nvidia chipset
but if i had a nahaleem thats another story

[Ket]

gtx260 because i fold when i'm not playing games and nvidia blows ati away when it comes to F@h

Only until ATi physics come along. Which is rumored to not be long.. but with no real info...

[YukonTrooper]

Will it compete with CUDA, though?

[Pain|Killer]

Nice discussion going on . I have read somewhere that 4870 has better IQ as compared to GTX260 and also it outperforms GTX260 at higher Anti-aliasing settings. Although not sure

[Ket]

Will it compete with CUDA, though?

I expect it will destroy CUDA when \ if it surfaces. The architecture of ATi cards is very different to nVidias, theoretically every single programmable shader on an ATi GPU could be used for folding.

[Penny]

no, you have no way to say nvidia didn't cut IQ so how can you say this?

Um........ actually I can say whatever I like about NV's IQ seeing as I own a GTX 260 and game with it on a daily basis.

If IQ had diminished in anyway with these drivers I think I would have noticed it by now. IQ is the first thing that I check when a new driver comes out that claims to make significant perfomance boost in games and I am well aware of what type of potential short cuts to look for when checking for possible reductions in IQ.


Bottom line IQ with the 180 series drivers is just as good if not slightly better than its ever been before. I think you just have serious issues acknowledging the fact that Nvidia has much much better drivers than ATI at the moment.

Get over it and move along.

[YukonTrooper]

I expect it will destroy CUDA when \ if it surfaces. The architecture of ATi cards is very different to nVidias, theoretically every single programmable shader on an ATi GPU could be used for folding.

Fantastic! That is exciting.

[LennyRhys]

I have both the 192 and 216 versions of the GTX 260 and there really isn't much between them so I would recommend either.

[SNiiPE_DoGG]

Um........ actually I can say whatever I like about NV's IQ seeing as I own a GTX 260 and game with it on a daily basis.

If IQ had diminished in anyway with these drivers I think I would have noticed it by now. IQ is the first thing that I check when a new driver comes out that claims to make significant perfomance boost in games and I am well aware of what type of potential short cuts to look for when checking for possible reductions in IQ.


Bottom line IQ with the 180 series drivers is just as good if not slightly better than its ever been before. I think you just have serious issues acknowledging the fact that Nvidia has much much better drivers than ATI at the moment.

Get over it and move along.

lol so using your feet to measure is a good way to build a house too then?

you cant just say that you "didn't notice" a change, thats ridiculous, that would be like comparing televisions by looking at one, running to another store, and looking at the other. this cant be done at all, you need a side-by-side even if you are the super-duper-all-knowing evaluator of image quality, Penny.

[Penny]

you cant just say that you "didn't notice" a change, thats ridiculous, that would be like comparing televisions by looking at one, running to another store, and looking at the other. this cant be done at all, you need a side-by-side even if you are the super-duper-all-knowing evaluator of image quality, Penny.

You should probably learn to ask things such as (do you own more than one gaming PC) before opening your big goofy mouth and then shoving your foot right into it.

This puts a whole new meaning in the word (Self Owned)

[SNiiPE_DoGG]

You should probably learn to ask things such as (do you own more than one gaming PC) before opening your big goofy mouth and then shoving your foot right into it.

This puts a whole new meaning in the word (Self Owned)

yeah I believe you that you updated drivers on one but not the other then put them side by side and took SS....

[Penny]

yeah I believe you that you updated drivers on one but not the other

Well now that would kind of be the whole point if I was comparing IQ from one driver to the next now wouldnt it? Durrrr

I have come across some really ignorant people on the net SNiiPE but you take the cake.

[benko]

i voted for 4870 because of this

[SNiiPE_DoGG]

Well now that would kind of be the whole point if I was comparing IQ from one driver to the next now wouldnt it? Durrrr

I have come across some really ignorant people on the net SNiiPE but you take the cake.

if you have SS's then do share..... otherwise you are just being a ridiculous liar

[DementeD]

Penny honestly if you're not willing to show proof you should go away..u put in your worthless .02..
anyway i did a quick search and found this picture on toms from the review on Clear Sky..now its about 3 months old so the drivers used are 8.8 ati and 177.92 nvidia compares 4870/260/280 image quality with 4xAA this probably has changed since with newer drivers but its the first i found..

[aztec]

It's silly how those that have bought a certain brand or model will fight to the death that it's the best thing on the planet - to the detriment of all others that might be equal or even better. Has something to do with ego methinks...some people like to think they're so incredibly savvy that no other product is an equally good choice than the one they bought, and those that bought something else are fools.

Silly because about 15,694,372 people think the same goddamned thing, and they can't all be right.

Penny et al, I'd like to see some of you have a "blind" test of the various GPUs and/or driver sets for IQ or whatever criteria you'd like to test for without knowledge of which brands/models/versions you're testing. I wonder if you would pick out the one that is different from the one you're bloviating about? And if you did, would you then accept that it is superior and buy/use that brand/model/version? Somehow, I think you'd find some excuse not to.

The other consideration is: there are some that don't want to (or don't know how to safely) max o/c their GPU, so how much more one can o/c than the other will have little bearing on their choice. A lot of gamers run their cards at stock or reasonably o/c'ed speeds for various reasons.

[Penny]

Penny honestly if you're not willing to show proof you should go away.

Maybe you should actually try reading the thread before you open your mouth guy. It all started with someone claiming that Nvidia decreased IQ with the 180 driver release so if anyone should prove anything its the morons that started this whole thing with their fud while providing zero evidence that nvidia did decrease IQ.

Like I said before, I dont have to prove a friggen thing to anyone of you as im not the one who started the whole IQ argument to begin with.

If someone is going to make such bold claims it is them that should be prepared to back it up.


BTW nice 3 month old chart noob but I was never comparing NV IQ to ATI IQ in this thread to begin with.

[SNiiPE_DoGG]

sometimes when your the only one calling everyone else "morons" it is yourself that you are describing

[Penny]

sometimes when your the only one calling everyone else morons it is yourself that you are describing

Great wonderful well thought out comeback.......I would expect nothing less from a complete and utter

Its also cute how you drug your equally friend into this thread with you to take your side since no one else is.

[M31]

The 260 wins the majority of game benchmarks but both are good cards. Plus with Nvidia you get very solid drivers these days, the same cant be said about ati.

Wrong, you get monthly driver updates with ATI to encompass new games and game patches, 8/12's are solid, this is one area apart from better IQ that I've really appreciated since switching to ATI again. The Nvidea updates were few and far between and far from perfect when they were released on my 8800 ownership.

Both are good cards though, cant go wrong with either of them.

[Penny]

Wrong, you get monthly driver updates with ATI to encompass new games and game patches, 8/12's are solid, this is one area apart from better IQ that I've really appreciated since switching to ATI again.

You get monthly updates with ATI because they can never seem to get it together, always trying to fix one thing and breaking 2 or 3 things in the process.

And im sorry but your wrong about the IQ. Nvidia provides the better IQ these days, not ATI. ATI still uses the same old lame angle dependent AF that they have been using for years now.

Another thing your wrong about, Nvidia releases beta's all the time and before you open your mouth you might wanna know that their beta's are just as stable as the WHQL's and usually provide performance increases across the board and almost everyone uses their betas these days as they are rock solid. (while not breaking things in the process like ATI does)

The Nvidea updates were few and far between and far from perfect when they were released on my 8800 ownership.

The only time this was ever the case was back in nov of 06 when the 8800GTX was first released, we are more than 2 yrs past that point now you know and a lot has changed since that time.

Nvidia has ATI beat hands down in the driver dept these days and plenty of sites out there back this up.