GTX260 216core v HD 4870

[djglenn]

GTX260 896MB 216core v HD 4870 1GB

Is their any difference in these two cards? Either better?

The below card is £149 in Novatech, and is seriously tempting me to upgrading my 8800GT....

Gainward GeForce GTX260 "Golden Sample" *216 Stream Processor* 55nm SLI 896MB DDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI PCI-Express

I like the look of the cooling on the above card, as my curent 8800 GT runs hot as hell under load!

Any tips?

[jim]

Hexus did a review comparing these two cards (in Vista and Windows 7 as well) a few days back, should cover what you're asking regarding 260 vs 4870

Obviously it depends what resolution you intend to run them at, but they're pretty much neck and neck in Vista.

Hope that helps

[!TIMMY!]

Ive just upgraded from a 8800GT, and went for the 4870 1gb because I have a crossfire mobo and I can get another at a later date 2nd hand cheapish. They are both very close in performance.

[Hyperviper34]

Looks like the GTX260 all the way after reading the linked article, also better at folding I would imaging.

[_Starbuck]

Both are the best bang for buck cards at the moment. I think on the whole the GTX260 is a little ahead but to be perfectly honest I would just get which ever is cheapest.

Although you will struggle to find a 4870 1Gb for that price so maybe the 260

[djglenn]

Ive just upgraded from a 8800GT, and went for the 4870 1gb because I have a crossfire mobo and I can get another at a later date 2nd hand cheapish. They are both very close in performance.

Just out of interest, did you notice much of a performance increase? If so, on what game?

Reading those charts for COD4, I am pretty sure my 8800GT can get a similar FPS with the same res....

[TooNice]

Both are the best bang for buck cards at the moment. I think on the whole the GTX260 is a little ahead but to be perfectly honest I would just get which ever is cheapest.

Although you will struggle to find a 4870 1Gb for that price so maybe the 260

I reckon that the lower end model (4830/4850) still edges on a strictly £/fps basis on average. But at £150, you are not paying an unreasonable premium for the extra power with the 4870 and GTX260. I also give the edge to the GTX260 by a small amount overall, but I think that the two cards do trades wins often enough that you should look at the performance of the games you play on each card.

[Golden Dragoon]

Looks like the GTX260 all the way after reading the linked article, also better at folding I would imaging.

Beyyer for ppd, but acording to most of the talk on the folding forums, not quite so good for the science, I don't know the in's and out's but the amd workunits are apparently more usefull, but the nvidia ones complete faster so get more points.

[Netjock]

Beyyer for ppd, but acording to most of the talk on the folding forums, not quite so good for the science, I don't know the in's and out's but the amd workunits are apparently more usefull, but the nvidia ones complete faster so get more points.

I think it is good for the science... I had 2x 8800GS running for the project before (relocating from Oz to the UK). Nvidia gets more points for a few reasons:

1. Work units are benchmarked on some old ATI 3450 card (so nvidia appears faster until the 4xxx came out).
2. Nvidia has less but more efficient SPs (say 216 vs 800) which are all put to use for smaller proteins, ATI has a lot of work to do in order to enable the 800sp to be used efficiently.

Nvidia points have dropped by 20 - 30% since they got new more complex proteins which the SPs take a lot longer to process.

Depending on what you're buying the cards for (folding farm?) base decisions on your needs.

Cheers.

[djglenn]

OK.....explain this one.

I wanted to see what I am getting in COD4 so as to compare the benefits I would get going with a better card?

my 8800GT runing at 2048x1152 produced the following results:

2009-03-30 08:50:36 - iw3mp
Frames: 9789 - Time: 130416ms - Avg: 75.060 - Min: 28 - Max: 94

Is it me, or is that not better results than the hexus team got with testing out the GTX 260 and the HD 4870 1GB???

Confused as hell now...

Link to test: http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=17784&page=3

[scaryjim]

I assume you had the 4xAA, 16xAF? Everything turned on to full? And you used exactly the same repeatable section of gameplay that Hexus use for their benchmarking?

Benchmarks are only comparable if run on the same base system, with identical settings, for *the same section of demo / gameplay*. You may simply have been benchmarking a section of the game that is easier to render, you may have had one particular setting tuned slightly differently: there are all sorts of reasons that your benchmarks could be inconsistent with the Hexus ones. Given that an 8800GT is basically a slower-clocked 9800GTX+ / GTS250, I'd recommend looking up reviews for those cards to get an impression of their relative performance in the Hexus benchmarks as compared to the GTX260 / HD4870 - that'll give you a proper comparable benchmark.

[Blitzen]

Hexus did a review comparing these two cards (in Vista and Windows 7 as well) a few days back, should cover what you're asking regarding 260 vs 4870

Obviously it depends what resolution you intend to run them at, but they're pretty much neck and neck in Vista.

Hope that helps

I think, (although not 100% sure) that the Hexus test results look suspect.

The results show in most of their tests that the 4870 is the better card. This seems to fly in the face of almost all other tests comparing these cards have shown.

[jim]

I have to admit, I was surprised. I put it down to some kind of driver update that I'd missed somewhere along the line which had swung it around, but nonetheless the GTX 260 is still the cheaper card at the moment so I'm not fussed all that much personally.

[!TIMMY!]

Just out of interest, did you notice much of a performance increase? If so, on what game?

Reading those charts for COD4, I am pretty sure my 8800GT can get a similar FPS with the same res....

When I installed the 4870 I moved from XP 32 to Vista 64. I game @ 1920 x 1200.

On 3DMARK06 there was a small increase, ie 200 points (I think its cpu limited @ the default res). In COD 4 it allowed me to use 4x AA instead of 2x and more AF and get the same FPS. In Red Alert 2, I could max it out on the 8800GT anyway. Far Cry 2 I can now run DX10 instead of 9, and @ very high I get 40-50 fps at the start. Far Cry 2 nailed my 8800GT @ ultra high and I didn't try it on very high. CS:S I can put 8x AA and 16x AF and still rarely go below my cap of 120fps on public, the 8800GT I had 2x AA and 2x AF.

Overall it wasn't a massive jump, but I now have the option to go xfire at a later date.

[lim_ak]

I'm fairly certain that the 4870s the better card, but they really are neck and neck so you really can't go wrong with either of them. Pick based on which mobo you have/going to get.

[Hyperviper34]

Have a look at this - Discussion Topic, 4890, 4890 Xf, 4870 and G260, it's an interesting ready with tests and results.