Being that this is the GT300 thread, I have a feeling we shouldn't dwell too much on ATI. My parting contribution, in ATI's regard, will be this.

As GoldenTiger, I got a 4870 after the massive amounts of positive reviews only to find my experience with the card left a lot to be desired. I quickly switched to a GTX280 and had no issues (other than the first 185.xx drivers for Win7 being crap until 19x.xx came out).

I've wanted to go back to ATI, since my x1900 was one of my favorite cards I've ever owned. But they keep giving me reasons to go to nVidia....