Is now a bad time to buy a GTX 480?

[collettnj]

Hi all,

It's been a while since I've posted for advice here, hope everyone is well!

I've been doing some work over the last couple of months for a company that does video flight training for Flight Simulator X.

Please see my profile for current system specs.

The GTX 480 is seen as something of a 'miracle' card for FSX - it allows for much smoother visuals, better AA/AF, and higher scenery settings than anything else out there at the moment.

ATI cards are, for the most part, less suited to FSX than nvidia products like the GTX 280/285 and the fermi offerings, due to issues with vsync and AA. Dual GPU cards like the 295/5970 are a no-go, as FSX will only utilise one of the cores. Likewise, SLI 460's would be inferior to a single 480.

I've been wanting to get a GTX 480 for quite some time, but haven't had the funds until now. With rumours of a 485 coming along, and the ATI 6 series, is now a bad time to make the jump?

It's a bit of a dilemma really - a 480 would really help with the work I'm doing, but I could probably carry on with my current 280 until the 485 came along if that really would be an improvement. I'm leaning towards this one:

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/1536M...s-DL-DVI-mHDMI

...because of their fantastic 10 year warranty. I'm on my 3rd GTX 280 now, the last 2 developed faults and were RMA'd!

Any insight into future fermi cards (I guess the GTX 485 mainly) would be greatly appreciated. Is a price drop forecasted?

I've been drooling over the 480 for so long now, and it really would be a huge upgrade, but if a superior card were released within a month I'd probably feel a little silly...

Thanks!

[Terbinator]

All things point too a full fat GTX 480 being released but also a fully fat GTX 460.

With the former obviously you get the power consumption and heat issues, with the latter your going to get less performance - even with the extra shaders unlocked.

TBH, i would say just go for the 480 as its not clear, if or when the newer full featured cards will actually come out.

[Marvin-HHGTTG]

The GTX485 is meant to require 2x 8 pin and a 6 pin, making it one stupidly hot card I'd think.

I'd just go for the GTX480 - it's a mother of a card...

[Domestic_Ginger]

the 470s dropped in price recently ca 230 iirc. How much would you lose with one of these? The heat factor would get me thinking...

[razer121]

fully fat GTX 460.

a fully fat gtx 460, what do you mean by this? ive yet to upgrade and have considered waiting abit for nvidia to launch something new...

[Terbinator]

the 470s dropped in price recently ca 230 iirc. How much would you lose with one of these? The heat factor would get me thinking...

some places seem to suggest they are going EOL, so for the price a 470 can be had it would be my port of call personally. Then again i don't know exactly how FSX performs with certain cards. :S

[Terbinator]

a fully fat gtx 460, what do you mean by this? ive yet to upgrade and have considered waiting abit for nvidia to launch something new...

The GTX 460 uses a cut down chip, much like the GTX 480.

IIRC, the chip in the GTX 460 (GF104) is designed for 352 shaders, but because of yield problems the GTX 460 on shelves actually has 336 shaders.

[Platinum]

Whats your reasons for wanting the 480? a 5870 would give you close to that performance at a much lower power draw and much less heat?

[Terbinator]

Whats your reasons for wanting the 480? a 5870 would give you close to that performance at a much lower power draw and much less heat?

It says in the OP for FSX there not as good as Nvidias offerings.

[collettnj]

Thanks for the replies guys - I'd spotted the low prices on the 470's, but I think that if I'm going to do this, I will go to the top and get the 480, there is a fair difference between the two from what I've seen on flight sim forums.

My main concern is the 485 - will the 485 be to the 480 what the 285 was to the 280, or will it just be even hotter and more power hungry? The full fat 480 power consumption figures look ridiculous..

[j.o.s.h.1408]

Go with a 480gtx now. its an awsome card. i got it a month ago and im loving it. plays latest games without breaking a sweat(well technicaly it does by boiling me some water at 91c ) but other then that its a fantastic card man.

im playing mafia 2 highest possible settings with physics on medium and getting 60-80fps average.

[j.o.s.h.1408]

Whats your reasons for wanting the 480? a 5870 would give you close to that performance at a much lower power draw and much less heat?

physiX
tesselation and a few other bits and bobs that come with a 480gtx.

for me it was physix. just watch or play mafia 2 with physicX turned right up. beutiful

[DanceswithUnix]

A 485 is supposed to be 512 shaders rather than 480, an increase of 6.66%, so that sets the theoretical performance improvement. However, when making the GTX480 nvidia turn off the worst performing shader block allowing better clock speeds as well as better power consumption which again helps up the clock speeds. From the reports of how hot the card runs, I guess they found it hard to keep the clock speeds up with that shader block enabled.

Also, those extra shaders do not come with any extra ram bandwidth to feed them.

The 480 is a card pretty much on the edge already, 485 sounds like pushing your luck too far to me for minimal performance improvement.

[scaryjim]

a fully fat gtx 460, what do you mean by this?

The GTX 460 uses a cut down chip, much like the GTX 480.

Checking back on the GTX460 review, the full fat GF104 chip is in fact 384 shaders (8SMs @ 48 shaders each). The GTX460 indeed has 336 shaders, meaning that a whole SM is turned off. Given how high the GTX460 clocks, a full 384 shader version could be very tasty indeed!

That said, there's little doubt that at the minute the top single GPU card is a GTX480. Personally I'd look for one with a custom cooler though, as the stock design is both noisy and hot-running...

This Zotac AMP edition card got a very good review from Hexus, being pre-overclocked and using a custom cooling solution (admittedly a big-ass one!) to great effect, being both cooler and quieter that reference models.