The Which Graphics Card for £X? Thread

[daza]

4850 in crossfire is usally the king atm

[Webby]

Yeah 4850 crossfire (and 4830 crossfire £180-200) is pretty much the best you can get if your planning on spending £200-250 but with the prerequisites to make it a suitable solution (a motherboard with 2x 16x PCIe slots which actually run at 16x) it is hard to include in this sort of list as the actual cost could be 2 cards and a new motherboard at which point it is no longer a deal.

[SiM]

Maybe have a few links for some bargains too in the OP...

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/s....html?NOV-4850
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/s....html?NOV-4870

[daza]

even with a mobo at 8x 8x its still pretty quick only a few fps lost unless your on a huge res with the eye candy turned up

[Webby]

Originally Posted by daza

even with a mobo at 8x 8x its still pretty quick only a few fps lost unless your on a huge res with the eye candy turned up

Which surely is what you want or else why are you spending £200+ on a graphics card solution?

I personally would not recommend a crossfire system to anybody who did not have a motherboard (or was intending on purchasing one in the upgrade anyway) that couldn't support duel 16x. Why take on the risks of crossfire and then not reap the maximum rewards?

And Sim, was trying to keep away from having links as they would need more regular maintanence especially if prices change or a card goes out of stock

[SiM]

Originally Posted by Webby

And Sim, was trying to keep away from having links as they would need more regular maintanence especially if prices change or a card goes out of stock

Lazy. Its just a case of browsing bargains forum and updating!

[daza]

For the sake of 3~4 fps im quite happy to buy crossfire and a mad board that overclocks to the hills.

That and the p45 sometimes beats the x48 in the 8x 8x 16x 16x war.

[Pob255]

*Bump*

ok who do we have to bug to get this thread sticky?

[Webby]

Updated the first post with prices for today and added links to the cheapest bargain price card if its a lot cheaper than the general price.

If I have missed any offers let me know and I will add them in.

[Pob255]

Oooo nice one on that Novatech ATI Radeon HD 4870, cooler "looks" very nice

Links for 9800gtx+ 512mb
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/s...tml?nov-98gtxp (£135)

9800gtx+ 1gb
http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductId=901978 (£139)

[Aden]

I am between the 9800GTX+ 512MB for £135ish and the HD4850 512MB for about £115.

I have a crossfire motherboard, but when the PCIs are used in it for crossfire, they drop from 16x to 4x.

If i crossfired two HD4850's would I see much of a beneficial increase, as the lane speeds both drop to 4x which surely isnt good?

[strike-down]

afaik its only one of the PCIE slots that operates at 4x, the other still remains at 16x may be wrong, as I've said before, im not an ATI expert, but thats what I've seen from looking at reviews and the different motherboards.

[Pob255]

Depends on which motherboard you have and it's chipset
x38 and x48 are full x16 on both
some p35 & p45 are x16 single card or x8 on both (x16 via a splitter) if you use 2
some use the old system from the 965 motherboards were the 2nd card runs off the southbridge and is limited to x4, so you get one running at x16 and the other at x4

[Aden]

Oh right, so its the second card that runs at 4x (i'm going to be using the Foxconn P43A), if thats so, I'm leaning more towards crossfire as a consideration.

[Pob255]

Yep the Foxconn P43A uses the southbridge to run the 2nd card at x4
http://www.foxconnchannel.com/produc...D=en-us0000396

When using two PCIE x16 slots, the PCIE x16 lanes will auto arrange from x16/ x0 to x16 x4

the big question for you will be "Do you need it?" if you're running a 22" or lower monitor then probably no.

[Aden]

Originally Posted by Pob255

Yep the Foxconn P43A uses the southbridge to run the 2nd card at x4
http://www.foxconnchannel.com/produc...D=en-us0000396


the big question for you will be "Do you need it?" if you're running a 22" or lower monitor then probably no.

I run 24" at 1920 x 1200, so am assuming in the future it will be beneficial, but on its own, lets say a 4870, how well would it perform on my screen for games such as assassins creed, COD:WAW and mirrors edge.