[Autopsy] ATI Radeon HD 4870 Update: Review

[MomijiTMO]

It's sad that I went to page 20 because that means I remembered the page with the 4870 GTX280 comparison meaning I have no life.


EDIT : Umm I think the Googlenglish is better as there is more text. Maybe not all of it is translated yet.

[AliG]

hey did the review say what cpu setup he was using? I couldn't find it any where in the review, and knowing my platform, that can make a huge difference between the 4850 and 4870 for me

[AriciU]

He was using a QX9650 @ 4Ghz on a Maximus extreme i think. It's stated in page 3-5 or something. Anyway, this is the best part:

Besides, we have benchmarked two or three HD 4800 in CrossFireX, and the the review is coming soon.

[MomijiTMO]

I just want 4870 CF results. Can I have them yet?

lol

[AliG]

He was using a QX9650 @ 4Ghz on a Maximus extreme i think. It's stated in page 3-5 or something. Anyway, this is the best part:

damn that means my results won't be anything like his (well probably close, I'll lose at best probably 10 fps if I oc my setup a bit more).

CrossfireX sounds like its going to be amazing, just wait for the drivers to improve

[Miwo]

Hmm, according to the INQ scores on the 4850 (no reason not to believe)
http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquir...-points-3dmark

HD4850 @ 700/1188 (CCC Limit OC, CPU Unknown)
Performance: 7944
Extreme: 3189

HD4870 @ 750/900 (QX @ 4.0GHz from Expreview scores)
Performance: 9075
Extreme: 3671

So compared to a 4870 with a 7% increase in CORE(750MHz) and a 34% increase in Memory(3.6GHz), there is a 13% increase in Vantage scores in Performance and Extreme Mode. My prediction is that the price of the 4870 is going to go up because this card is beating the GTX 260 for $100 MSRP Less....and you also have the short supply of DDR5.

Time to buy a 4850 and go vmod crazy . Rivatuner / ATITool are bound to be updated soon to get past the CCC limit

[MomijiTMO]

Yeah I imagine they will increase by a fair bit. Hopefully the masses blew their cash on a 8800GT and can't afford to upgrade now. I remember how RETARDED the 8800GT prices got to. $500 was the highest in Aus. They launched at $330.

[cookerjc]

damn that means my results won't be anything like his (well probably close, I'll lose at best probably 10 fps if I oc my setup a bit more).

CrossfireX sounds like its going to be amazing, just wait for the drivers to improve

HD 48xx crossfire rocks....


and, English review out, Engoy

http://en.expreview.com/2008/06/24/f...0-and-hd-4850/

[STaRGaZeR]

cookerjc is there any utility to flash HD48xx BIOS? You could test the MSI BIOS to see what PowerPlay can really do, seems buggy as hell.

[Miwo]

Please do, 160MHz core is a pretty big drop from 500MHz
Thanks for the early review cookerjc as always!

[twwen2]

Nice review cookerjc, thanks a heap

[Unbornchild]

Thank you very much, cookerjc!

[RPGWiZaRD]

Yep, great review. Especially the percentage graphs at the end are what are really useful to look at. So HD4870 is like 20 ~ 35% (~27% in average) faster than HD4850, nice. Also it beats GTX 260 most of the time and comes slightly behind in other benchmarks. Except for the power consumption and crappy stock coolers these cards really are something price/performance wise. But would be nice to see how far they really overclock too. Looks like HD4870 PCB differs quite a lot from HD4850 and seems to favor overclockers. It doesn't seem like the 512MB vram is any huge issue for these cards really, most of the time 1GB would probably make no remarkable difference.

[Hornet331]

now some AIB manufacturers should release a 1gb card with 3rd party cooler -> I take 2 please. :p

[perkam]

Any 4870 Xfire scores yet ?

I want to see Anand get this and the Plus cards from both sides.

Perkam

[natty]

Results are impressive. Too bad the power consumption is outrageous and the reviewers claim that it is noisy

[The[R]eaper]

OMG.. 4870.. now.. or two..

1 more day right?

[jVIDIA]

Noisy :S NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOO

The age of noisy vga's shoulnd't have ended ?

[STaRGaZeR]

Results are impressive. Too bad the power consumption is outrageous and the reviewers claim that it is noisy

The card is not in true 2D clocks at idle.

[Macadamia]

overclock

If you haven't tried out a real flagship ATI card since the 2900XT, you are welcome to toture one of the straight-out high-end PWMs and luxurious board designs.

(I had a lot of fun with mine.)

[shiznit93]

Yeah I imagine they will increase by a fair bit. Hopefully the masses blew their cash on a 8800GT and can't afford to upgrade now. I remember how RETARDED the 8800GT prices got to. $500 was the highest in Aus. They launched at $330.

Damn, Aussies must get it up the rear, I constantly see you guys complaining about prices. I got my 8800GT on launch day for $220 USD, why is pc hardware so expensive there?

[gojirasan]

Okay. Very impressive. 4870 meets or beats the GTX260 at pretty much every turn. For either $50 or $100 less MSRP depending on whether or not you can live with only 512MB. Uses a bit more power though both at idle and at load. And it could fry eggs with that feeble stock cooler on it. Should be on water. Actually the price difference isn't all that much. I think Nvidia can just offer some $50 rebates and price performance wiill be about the same. Based on Nvidia's recent pricing actions I would expect Nvidia to just lower their prices to compete. The GTX260 power advantage especially at idle would be important to me. The real question in this close race is which has more overclocking headroom. We have already seen that the 260 can easily clock up to 280 clock speeds without voltmodding, but we will have to wait a bit to see 4870 overclocking results. It should clock even higher since it is 55nm but we will have to wait and see. Is it true that there is no aftermarket OCing utility for AMD? The 4870 does appear to be shorter than the 260 though. That could be a big advantage to some people with small cases. The bottom line is if AMD can figure out a way to get rid of microstuttering and CF driver compatibility issues I will be all over the 4870x2 in late August. It looks like it's going to be a GTX265 GX2 but 6-12 months early and on a single card and maybe with some/all of the multi-GPU issues solved. Although I am certainly not an AMD fanboy, I have to admit that AMD is the one opening the can of whoopass this summer. The underdog is sinking its teeth deep and taking a big bite. This is shaping up to be a very interesting summer for PC hardware.

[shiznit93]

In Call of Duty 4 the 4870 is faster than GTX 280 until 4xAA is applied at high res, damn impressive for a card that cost less than half.

[SNiiPE_DoGG]

i am SOOOO happy right now

i have been firmly in the red since my 7950 gx2 crapped out on me (yeah thats right, i had a 2900xt 1gb gddr4 :P ) and now its incredible to see nvidia floundering as it is. I am pleased with myself for saving my somolians for the xfire 4870's, its gonna be a good summer/winter until nehalem.

[Helmore]

@gjirasan: The GTX260 does not have a power consumption advantage once ATI gets its act together on these cards. The 4850 and 4870 are supposed to run at 160MHz when idling, not the 500MHz that the cards reviewed so far do and this will mean a lot lower power consumption on these cards when idling.
About that so called "GTX265GX2", I don't think we will have anything from NVIDIA like that, not until they move to 45/40 nm. R700 will use 2 RV770 chips clocked at 625MHz. according to rumors so that should mean that power draw is about equal to a 9800GX2, maybe a tad higher.

BUT DAMN these cards rock for price performance man, it's just sick....
Have a look at pricing over here,
HD4000 series:
http://tweakers.net/pricewatch/cat/7...&orderSort=asc
Cheapest 4850 is €145 and cheapest 4870 is €242, although there was a 4870 for €221 earlier today but that has disappeared.
9800GTX:
http://tweakers.net/pricewatch/cat/7...&orderSort=asc
Cheapest 9800GTX is €199
GTX200 series:
http://tweakers.net/pricewatch/cat/7...&orderSort=asc
Cheapest GTX260 is €327 and cheapest €280 is 489.
So that means that ATI is completely dominating the market over here....at least in the €140-€400 price range.