HD4870 1GB vs GTX 260 216

[haofeng]

Hey guys,

I'm planning to spend around £200 on a GPU and I'm torn between the two.

I've heard good things about both of them and the gtx 260 seems to have the edge at the moment with the new driver updates. I've got a 680i mobo so the 260 would give me the option of sli.

Opinions Anyone?

 

[deathwish]

The Ati Card is slightly faster

 

[painejake]

Yeah. However if your mobo supports SLi it may be worth the investment in the long run as in 6 or so months time whenever you upgrade next you can upgrade to 2 260's which will last that big longer. I really WISH i brough a mobo with crossfire support not SLi tbh

 

[Rastalovich]

I'd like to see that 4870 tested against the 260-216 with these rumored awesome drivers.

I have no point of reference to say if they're as much of an improvement as is claimed, but I'm sure a reviewer on OC3D would be better qualified.

 

[haofeng]

With sli, how "identical" do the cards have to be. I mean dot hey have to be the exact same model with the exact same clock speeds made by the same manufacturer?

 

[rrjwilson]

Out of those two I'd ask what games are you playing. If your playing things like UT3 where nVidia's CUDA is used to do some processing then its nVidia all the way as it is FAR more powerful than the ATi. If you play source based games or other single core games then ATi is the way to go as its fast enough in those circumstances.

nVidia cards are barely being used in current games and not being used efficiently in benches (given the comparisons that must be made and compatibility that must be allowed). Realtime ray tracing was mythological only a year ago and for ATi is still years off but nVidia have it and man is it impressive. Hopefully we'll see better optimization for setups during installations and nVidia and AMD will get the deserved rewards for their progress.

I believe it must be identical cards clock speed are usually adjusted to be the same in SLi

 

[haofeng]

So I guess its a pretty close call. Probably go for the gtx 260 then, the idea of sli is tempting. Does anyone have any gripes or know of any probalems with either of the cards though?

 

[MrCaffeLatte]

The 260-216 is the faster card from what reviews I have seen (about 5 on different websites comparing the two) in neutral games (games that don't run better on ATI cards e.g CoD4).

I'm in a similar situation as I'm looking to get a new computer soon.

I've pretty much settled on the XFX 260-216 black edition as this is the fastest 260 out of the box and can be got for 230 quid or so from various e-tailors.

Also the temps and wattages seem lower than a 4870 1gb from what I've seen (without going to the 250 quid mark for a custom-cooled 4870).

 

[haofeng]

yeah, i agree with the black edition gtx260. The review of it on oc3d a while ago rated it pretty highly. Link to the etailer selling it for £230? haven't been able to find it for that price anywhere.

 

[MrCaffeLatte]

Here we go matey:

[Just realised I need 15 posts to post a link or PM it] It's on scan.co.uk for 230.61 inc VAT but P&P might bump it up a little.

 

[ikan dugong]

Get the GT260 if you're planning on using SLI and CUDA-based apps, for anything else, I recommend the 4870, since ATI's scalability thru Crossfire kickass!!! (if you're changing to Crossfire system)

both cards are great and perform similar (no significant performance gap), it depends more on which games you're about to play.

 

[d1abl0]

hi i know this is slightly off the point but does anyone know if the P5Q Pro supports SLI and Crossfire.

 

[!TIMMY!]

Afaik the P5Q Pro only support crossfire and @ 8x 8x, not 16x 16x.

 

[Sihastru]

GTX260 Core 216. You have a SLI enabled motherboard so it's a no brainer. When you'll add a second GTX260 Core 216 you'll have performance almost at the level of the GTX295.

The second card has to have the same memory configuration, same GPU (G200 216). This means the same Device #ID. The clockspeeds, manufacturer and the appearance of the card (different cooler maybe) are not important.

I vote GTX260-216.

 

[Luigi]

Get the Nvidia... As much as I like ati, in the review of the Zotac 260 216 it was faster accross most of the test games

 

[Grimreaper123]

Thats true, and if your not watercooling them a big advantage of all nvidia cards neary is that their coolers look so much better than ati cards.

 

[j.woody]

i have an EVGA SSC gtx260 "Core 216" 65nm 896mb and it thrashes the 4870. i underclocked it to the normal gtx260 speed and it still beat the 4870 plus it runs a lot cooler than it.

http://service.futuremark.com/resultComparison.action?compareResultId=10707785&compareResultType=14 i got 16181

admittedly my cpu was overclocked to 3.19ghz but if you look here: http://www.techimo.com/forum/general-tech-discussion/227429-3dmark06-chart-new.html on 5th position in single cards there is a guy called ultima that has a 1gb 4870 and a Amd Phenom II X3 720BE overclocked to an X4 920BE 3.6Ghz (4th core unlocked)

and he got 16,023.

 

[tinytomlogan]

Simple aswer to that mate, Nvidias are BUILT to bench, real games are how to test true performance and the 216 and 4870 trade blows on many levels, but where 1 beats it in 1 game, the other then comes back and beats it in others.

They are very evenly matched.

 

[j.woody]

Simple aswer to that mate, Nvidias are BUILT to bench, real games are how to test true performance and the 216 and 4870 trade blows on many levels, but where 1 beats it in 1 game, the other then comes back and beats it in others.

They are very evenly matched.

very true but i am a nvida fanboy and always will be

 

[tinytomlogan]

Well at least state facts then dude, Nvids are for benching/folding.

Ati's are for picture quality and value for money performance.