ATI 5850 vs Nvidia GTX 460

Secret_Window · 21 Nov 2010 at 20:47

Seen a lot of good offers on both these cards and desperately need to replace the Nvidia 8800 GTX I am using now (on its way out) so I can game comfortably till I upgrade the rest of my components and have been wondering which one is the best to go for that will:

a. use very little power ( I only have modular 450w Corsair PSU.)
b. perform well for the money in 1680x1050 (the max res of my monitor.)
c. doesn't get hot (my Nvidia 8800 were terrible for this and don't want issues like that again.)

From my understanding so far, the ATI 5850 is a brilliant card all round, but after seeing so many people selling their 5850's to be replaced with a GTX 460 I couldn't help but wonder.

From what I have read in benchmarks, the ATI 5850 is still a damn great card and it puzzles me why people are opting for the GTX 460 over it, when it's still a perfectly good card. Maybe I am reading too much into it and worried there is some issue I have yet to discover? I just want the best card to suit all my requirements for under £180.

Would I also be correct in assuming an overclocked GTX 460 is faster than an ATI 5850 and might this be the reason why people are ditching their 5850s?

Sorry if I sound overly paranoid, I just want to be sure I go for the right card. I have considered the ATI 6870 but I don't want to stretch to £180 and the ATI 6850 seems quite expensive compared to the GTX 460 when it performs similarly.

With all things considered, what do you think will suit me best for the money?

Games wise, these are what I mainly play and/or hope to in the future:

Left 4 Dead 2
Team Fortress 2
GTA IV
COD: Black Ops (Hopefully soon)
Battlefield 2 Bad Company (Hopefully soon)
Metro 2033 (Hopefully soon)
Crysis (Maybe..not too bothered)
Deus Ex 3 (when it comes out)

Thanks

kylew · 21 Nov 2010 at 22:27

A 5850 should edge a 6870 in performance, ever so slightly I think, and a 5850 can easily be overclocked to over 5870 performance too so I'd suggest the 5850 if the price is good enough. Don't forget a 5850 is pretty much on par with a GTX470, give or take.

reiyushin · 21 Nov 2010 at 22:32

kylew said:
A 5850 should edge a 6870 in performance, ever so slightly I think, and a 5850 can easily be overclocked to over 5870 performance too so I'd suggest the 5850 if the price is good enough. Don't forget a 5850 is pretty much on par with a GTX470, give or take.

This!

5850 is a cracking card!

Blue160 · 21 Nov 2010 at 22:34

I've got an overclocked 1gb 460. I play most of the games you've listed and it copes with maximum settings at 1080p with most of them. Also no problems with temperatures, power requirements or noise.

If you are serious about wanting to play Metro 2033 or Crysis at high settings though you probably need something more powerful.

Peter450 · 21 Nov 2010 at 22:42

I think your going to run into performance issues with your dual core on some games, a graphics upgrade will see improvement, but your going to be limited by the CPU in some of those games i expect

Porcelina · 21 Nov 2010 at 22:50

kylew said:
A 5850 should edge a 6870 in performance, ever so slightly I think, and a 5850 can easily be overclocked to over 5870 performance too so I'd suggest the 5850 if the price is good enough. Don't forget a 5850 is pretty much on par with a GTX470, give or take.

The two ATI cards edge one another out every other game almost. If you play a specific set of games, go and look up the benchmarks to get the best value for your pound.

It is not impossible that the 6870 will edge out with further driver optimisation, but this is mere conjecture at this point. Still, if it hangs in the balance, this is something to keep in mind.

Either way, both seem to be cracking cards and I am very pleased with the performance of my 5850.

tommybhoy · 21 Nov 2010 at 23:53

Either would be great cards. If you prefer Nvidia cards then
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-106-MS&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=1830

Or if you prefer Ati cards then
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-103-MS&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=411

Take into account that with the 460 you get cuda/physx/free hawx 2 game for the same price as the 5850 which has in turn Eyefinity and Ati stream.

Imo (as stated MY opinion, please don't start the mines better than yours rubbish please!) the ati is a stronger card than the 460 as most 5850 oc to 5870 territory with a good oc.

PhoenixUK · 22 Nov 2010 at 00:21

5850 spanks the 460, it's around 470 performance.

All depends if you need the extra power or not.

6850 will be the better card as well and 6870 should be available at around 180 if you fish around.

Or if you're not that much in a hurry, wait till 69xx comes out, maybe nvidia will respond with 56x / 57x at around same time and this should drop the prices a bit and give you more options.

But then again, if you can source cheap 460 on sale for around 110-115 then it's a great card as well, wouldn't pay for it more than 120 right now tho...

muon · 22 Nov 2010 at 00:26

I'd like to see who swapped a 5850 out for a 460. Bizarre move to make.

As mentioned above the 6870 is around the same level of performance, (and from what I've seen my conclusion would be that the 6870 is better. But they are pretty close.

Peter450 · 22 Nov 2010 at 00:27

You'd be better off skipping the £180 card and getting a 460 and quad core CPU, and then OC the CPU to around 3.2 Ghz, that will give you far better performance, than running a mid/high spec card on a 2.4 Ghz dual core, as the CPU will hold you back in some of those games you list

muon · 22 Nov 2010 at 00:31

Peter450 said:
You'd be better off skipping the £180 card and getting a 460 and quad core CPU, and then OC the CPU to around 3.2 Ghz, that will give you far better performance, than running a mid/high spec card on a 2.4 Ghz dual core, as the CPU will hold you back in some of those games you list

What makes you so sure his set-up will allow him to clock a q6600 to 3.2ghz. His e6400 for some reason is stuck at 2.4ghz.

But yeh, if there is a cpu bottleneck, then buying a better card than the 460 may just be a waste of money. A 460 should allow all games to run well at 1680*1050.

Peter450 · 22 Nov 2010 at 00:43

Well even at stock a Q6600 would be better as it's still a quad vs dual, which games are starting to use more now

Even if he cant OC to 3.2 and stays at stock, or only gets a lower OC of 2.8, i would say that a 2.8 quad and 460, or ATI equivalent would be faster in most games, than a 2.4 dual core and 470/5850

I mean most games list a dual core of 2Ghz or faster as a min requirement, these days, and from my experiance close to min requirements never translate into good gameplay

el Kuarlos · 22 Nov 2010 at 01:56

Honestly, I think it is up to you.

460 would be a good idea if you want to save, and buy a quad core setup with a blinging new card.

Forget the 5850 it is eol and its tesselation perfomance may well start to show soon enough given ati have put some effort into modifying their cards to suit it, for 15 quid more you can get a 470 and that would leave your processor as a bottleneck (maybe, this isnt for sure- gpu based games probably not).

Then you can upgrade around that. I would just bag a 460 and save.

Secret_Window · 22 Nov 2010 at 10:16

Thanks for the info guys.

What I wanted to do was go for something that would both serve me now while I save and then be thrown in along side my upgrade in January (Sandy Bridge or i5), so I am not too bothered about my dual core not being able to cope, as it's going to be replaced eventually anyway.

The only reason I am slightly put off by the ATI 5850 is because it costs a bit more than the GTX 460, and for about £10 more I could just get the ATI 6870 but again, I don't really want to stretch my money that much, as I am saving to replace my CPU, MOBO and RAM later on.

If there is an overclocked GTX 460 that offers comparable performance for less, then that would probably be a reasonable solution, but my worry then would be the overclocked GTX 460s being quite demanding on my PSU.

I also have a gut feeling that I buy a GTX 460 now, and then by Christmas the ATI 5850's will start coming down in price to ridiculously low levels.

I just want to play L4D2 and TF2 properly, as the 8800 GTX I am using keeps crashing out because it's getting too hot and FPS in both games fluctuates ridiculously, making it totally unplayable.

Oh joys of computer technology!

Blue160 · 22 Nov 2010 at 10:55

Secret_Window said:
If there is an overclocked GTX 460 that offers comparable performance for less, then that would probably be a reasonable solution,

Even the cheapest stock 460's overclock extremely well. I bumped my Palit one from 650 to 800 on the core clock with no stability problems at all on standard voltages. There are plenty on here who have gone much further.

arknor · 22 Nov 2010 at 11:10

whatetever u buy will be bottleknecked on that cpu anyway u may aswell get the cheaper of the 2

Secret_Window · 22 Nov 2010 at 13:11

Don't forget, I am only going to be using this dual core until I upgrade my CPU during Christmas or January. I don't mind going for the beefier card knowing that it won't be running its full potential until I upgrade - because while slower with my dual core, it will still be considerably faster than my 8800 GTX.

The main issue is finding the best card value performance for under £170. The ATI 5850 on the OcUK site looks great, but I hear it's very noisy and the cooler just generally isn't all that great. The ATI 6870 are more than I want to spend. The GTX 460s look fabulous but to get one similar to ATI 5850 speed I will need to buy an overclocked model which is nearly as much as an ATI 5850. The ATI 5850 also, like many have said, can overclock to ATI 5870 speeds quite easily. Then there is the ATI 6850 which is quite expensive compared to the GTX 460s, and I hear the more costly 6850 overclocked models aren't much improvement.

Damn, decsions..

Hairybudda · 22 Nov 2010 at 13:20

I'll be going from a 460 to a 5850 soon since I managed to get one for a cracking price on the MM over the weekend, if I was buying new I'd probably go for a 5850 this time round because they do clock really well (as do the 460s I guess) and I only game at 1680x1050. I guess my main reason is automatic fan ramp up on my 460, it basically refuses to do it for me without MSI Afterburner (it's a nice program but damn is it ugly, give me rivatuner back).

Stanners · 22 Nov 2010 at 13:23

I would go for the 5850 and get it clocked to near 5870 speeds if you can.

Secret_Window · 22 Nov 2010 at 16:18

Hmm, I will keep checking the prices for the ATI 5850 over the next few days. If I don't find a fantastic price for one, I might just add the extra £10-20 and get an ATI 6870 and be done with it.