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480 vs. 5870

n1ckkk

n1ckkk

n1ckkk

Associate
Joined
21 Nov 2009
Posts
42
Location
Across the Pond, USA
Please note I'm not a fanboy for either brand, but I am building a new system and am willing to spend about 400-500 for my graphics solution.

Up until the release of Fermi I was dead set on getting a 5870. But now it seems that ever since Fermi has come out, we have a LOT of people bashing the Card. First off, Nerds need to relax and realise it's JUST A VIDEO card. Second off, this post is to form some opinions on a 480 vs 5870.

Reasons for buying a 5870

- Reasonable Price compared to 480
- High-tech card
- Real HDMI Port
- All of the AMD Features
- You get what you would expect.

Reasons for buying a GTX 480

- Only about $80 more than the 5870 for the fastest single-card graphics solution (Don't compare it to a 5970 since theres 2 gpus on one PCB, In some cases I think its better than the 5970, but don't quote me on that)
- I've heard Numbers that it's about %30 percent faster than the ATI cards and blows them away. (we'll see the benches)
- PhysX - Which means games like BFBC2 will perform much, much better than the ATI cards since they don't have built in PhysX. - People complaining about GTX 480 power consumption, shouldn't be. Take a 5870 and add in a 9800GT and you'll be consuming about the same TDP.

- CUDA - Say what you want about it, but it DOES add a cool feature to the card.
- Raytracing technologies - Support for NexGen games..
- Overall I think people are COMPLETELY over-reacting about this card. Even if it doesn't out perform the 5870 by a large margin, its still has a lot of other technologies that the 5870 Doesn't have. Games are built for PhysX, and BFBC2 has half-assed raytracing built into it. The GTX 480 will run much more smoother on a game like BC2. Even if, you have a 5870 with a PhysX Card.. theres no Ray tracing built into any of the other Cards.

Question Marks

- Heat - My answer to this is, people need to stop crying about NOISE. Turn your fans up and stop acting like babys, and I doubt this thing will reach the insane temps it does. Pop it in a case like the HAF 932 with 10 fans.. (which is what I plan to do) The only area where I think that there could be insane heat is 3 cards in SLI. But to be honest, two is enough. On a good spaced board, if you have 3 slots you put the first card in the first slot, second card in the third slot and it should allow for room for the cards to breathe. Although like I Said, I can't see 3 cards stacked up next to each other, that would be a NIGHTMARE!

- Power consumption, See above.


Overall I honestly think the GTX 480 is the way to go. I like the ATI Card because of the price, and it seems to have loads more features, but the Performance from the 480 should be awesome with all the technologies games TODAY are starting to use. It's not like you're getting something with technology that none of the games today use. (BFBC2, Metro 2033, and even future games)

So to everyone whos pondering what to do, I say if you have a good cooling solution, are willing to crank your fans up, and want to blow some **** up, then spend the Extra $80 bucks and get a GTX 480.
 
BC2 doesn't use PhysX

Overall the GTX480 is somewhere between 11% and 30% faster at realworld useful settings than the 5870 but I've not bothered to work out exactly where - unfortunatly its deffinatly not consistantly 30% faster.

I do think that its likely to be a more mature, more stable performance part than the 5870 tho aslong as nVidia don't go on a downward slope with their drivers, I'm quite confident too we will see performance gains of around 15-20% in most major games with driver updates over the next few months.
 
i would get a fermi, if it isnt so hot (literally!). personally if the 470 can cost 20-40 pounds less it would be a great buy for me.
 
n1ckkk said:
Please note I'm not a fanboy for either brand, but I am building a new system and am willing to spend about 400-500 for my graphics solution.

Up until the release of Fermi I was dead set on getting a 5870. But now it seems that ever since Fermi has come out, we have a LOT of people bashing the Card. First off, Nerds need to relax and realise it's JUST A VIDEO card. Second off, this post is to form some opinions on a 480 vs 5870.

Reasons for buying a 5870

- Reasonable Price compared to 480
- High-tech card
- Real HDMI Port
- All of the AMD Features
- You get what you would expect.

Reasons for buying a GTX 480

- Only about $80 more than the 5870 for the fastest single-card graphics solution (Don't compare it to a 5970 since theres 2 gpus on one PCB, In some cases I think its better than the 5970, but don't quote me on that)
- I've heard Numbers that it's about %30 percent faster than the ATI cards and blows them away. (we'll see the benches)
- PhysX - Which means games like BFBC2 will perform much, much better than the ATI cards since they don't have built in PhysX. - People complaining about GTX 480 power consumption, shouldn't be. Take a 5870 and add in a 9800GT and you'll be consuming about the same TDP.

- CUDA - Say what you want about it, but it DOES add a cool feature to the card.
- Raytracing technologies - Support for NexGen games..
- Overall I think people are COMPLETELY over-reacting about this card. Even if it doesn't out perform the 5870 by a large margin, its still has a lot of other technologies that the 5870 Doesn't have. Games are built for PhysX, and BFBC2 has half-assed raytracing built into it. The GTX 480 will run much more smoother on a game like BC2. Even if, you have a 5870 with a PhysX Card.. theres no Ray tracing built into any of the other Cards.

Question Marks

- Heat - My answer to this is, people need to stop crying about NOISE. Turn your fans up and stop acting like babys, and I doubt this thing will reach the insane temps it does. Pop it in a case like the HAF 932 with 10 fans.. (which is what I plan to do) The only area where I think that there could be insane heat is 3 cards in SLI. But to be honest, two is enough. On a good spaced board, if you have 3 slots you put the first card in the first slot, second card in the third slot and it should allow for room for the cards to breathe. Although like I Said, I can't see 3 cards stacked up next to each other, that would be a NIGHTMARE!

- Power consumption, See above.


Overall I honestly think the GTX 480 is the way to go. I like the ATI Card because of the price, and it seems to have loads more features, but the Performance from the 480 should be awesome with all the technologies games TODAY are starting to use. It's not like you're getting something with technology that none of the games today use. (BFBC2, Metro 2033, and even future games)

So to everyone whos pondering what to do, I say if you have a good cooling solution, are willing to crank your fans up, and want to blow some **** up, then spend the Extra $80 bucks and get a GTX 480.
Click to expand...

very true but at the moment its around £100 more which I dont believe is worth it for the performance gap
 
Rroff said:
BC2 doesn't use PhysX

Overall the GTX480 is somewhere between 11% and 30% faster at realworld useful settings than the 5870 but I've not bothered to work out exactly where - unfortunatly its deffinatly not consistantly 30% faster.

I do think that its likely to be a more mature, more stable performance part than the 5870 tho aslong as nVidia don't go on a downward slope with their drivers, I'm quite confident too we will see performance gains of around 15-20% in most major games with driver updates over the next few months.
Click to expand...

Sorry buddy, but BFBC2 uses a very complex frostbyte engine which is PHYSX. Ever wonder why the buildings blow up?
 
There is only so much throwing more fans at the problem can do, ultimately the heatsink still has to get the heat away from the chip and thats no easy task when it wants to run at 100C.

These bad boys are running at 95C out of the box, what happens six months down the line when you get some dust in there clogging the heatsink....

To go fermi i would recommend getting something with a custom cooling solution or putting a waterblock on. Otherwise its going to throttle or die.
 
LoL the fact you think BC2 uses physx say a lot about your GFX card making decisions, you start of neutral then it turns in to one big 480 promotion.

By the way, the majority of reviews state the 5870 is the sensible choice for the gamer.
 
You're talking dollars, the uk pricing is a joke. The difference between the two cheapest on ocuk is ~$220, state-side at least the price difference make it worth considering (lucky people :p)

If you can afford the power bill and have a case capable of dealing with the heat (I hear this water-cooling has some potential) then for that price difference, probably.
 
$80 dollars is like 50quid isnt it? Too bad here in the uk its much more than that. I dont think im going to get either of them atm il skip a gen for once, the 4870 is still going strong and Itl make it seem more worth while to wait too for a much larger boost when i finaly do upgrade.
 
n1ckkk said:
Please note I'm not a fanboy for either brand
Click to expand...

Your post suggests otherwise, sorry.

You really do have to be a fanboy to buy a GTX480 - if you care about "bang per buck" you get a 5850 or 5870. If you want the "fastest card" there is you get a 5890.

The whole "single GPU" point is moot as Crossfire and SLi work so well these days.

I guess there's a valid point for GTX480 SLi but you'd have to be clinically insane to spend £900 on grpahics cards when the HD5890 is around half that.
 
n1ckkk said:
Sorry buddy, but BFBC2 uses a very complex frostbyte engine which is PHYSX. Ever wonder why the buildings blow up?
Click to expand...

You're getting confused between physics and PhysX.

PhysX is a brand owned by nVidia, it's a form of physics simulation.

PhysX belongs to nVidia but it doesn't mean only nVidia cards can do physics in games.

I'm with Tute on this, you might claim not to be a fanboy, but realistically, anyone who gets a GTX480 is a fanboy, anyone who gets a GTX470 is an even worse fanboy.

The exception is obviously those who need/want to use it for CUDA and its various uses.
 
You don't have to be a fanboy to buy a GTX480 (tho it certainly helps) nVidia still provides the most mature, stable platform, with the most consistant baseline performance. Personally I'm quite happy to pay over the odds to get what I want i.e. less problematic 120Hz support, proper application/multiGPU profiles, no random bugs with rendering to a hardware surface with 2D clocks (which is a massive problem with ATI and still not entirely ironed out 10 years on) and theres plenty of people like me - not everyones strictly bang for buck orientated.
 
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