New card around £135

[chris_argyle]

Well I have finally got round to selling my 8800gtx, a colleague of mine is taking it off my hands on Thursday, so that means I have to get a replacement card before then, or resort to using my old laptop!
I mostly use my computer for web browsing and gaming (FPS's and driving games) at 1920x1200. I havn't really found the 8800GTX limiting, which is why I have set my current budget, I would just like a bit more sparkle!

I noticed Scan have two 6870's on Today Only, the XFX black at £127, or the MSI Hawk at £133. They also have an XFX 5870 for £143, all of which I am considering.

My current frontrunner is the MSI Hawk, rightly or wrongly I have an idea that the non reference design will be worth the small premium, and with newer games using more tesselation its likely to offer near identical performance to the older 5870.

Would you agree with this? Which would you choose? Is there another option within this price range I really should consider?

[dfour]

I would probably go for the MSi. Even though the 5870 is more powerful it will possbily struggle when tesselation really kicks in (if you keep the card that long).

[Tarinder]

MSI Hawk is a decent all-round card. I'd pay the extra and go for that one instead.

[jjgreenwood]

2nd hand gtx480 may fit into that money and that'll eat em all and warm up your room nicely

[Joee]

Try to get a better card like a 6950 or a eVGA 560. Lower end cards usually end up going crossfire.

[chris_argyle]

Thanks for the replies. I am especially pleased with the first two replies because I now have a 6870 Hawk in my case! My girlfriend had a day off yesterday, so rather than having to take the arduous journey of collecting a card from the courier I took the plunge on Saturday, buying the 6870 from scan with deliver yesterday. First impressions are very good. I've been played a bit of dirt3 and was admiring the dx11 shinies!

[Machinegun]

Thanks for the replies. I am especially pleased with the first two replies because I now have a 6870 Hawk in my case! My girlfriend had a day off yesterday, so rather than having to take the arduous journey of collecting a card from the courier I took the plunge on Saturday, buying the 6870 from scan with deliver yesterday. First impressions are very good. I've been played a bit of dirt3 and was admiring the dx11 shinies!

How noise it is ?

[Taiko]

How noise it is ?

It prolly goes rata-tata-tat.

[shaithis]

The Hawk is one of the quietest coolers around, along with the Gigabyte Windforce and Asus DirectCU II coolers. Choosing card with those coolers will get you minimal noise.

[masterplan1]

I picked up a Sapphire 5850 for £114 new, pretty decent card, does everything I need it to with easy, can't hear it over my A70.

[Brewster0101]

Got my 6870 Hawk the other day, is silent in idle and barely audible when running under stress. One down side to the cooler though is that is does not exhaust the hot air out the back, instead it seems to push out into the case.

[Wakinglimb]

Asus gtx 560 in today only?