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5850 or 6970
- Thread starter Skilty
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http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-6970-radeon-hd-6950-cayman,2818-12.html
Bare in mind that a stock 5850 is below a stock 470.
I doubt it is going to blow your mind away (the difference) but it will be a lot smoother and higher FPS.
If I had a 5850 though, seeing as it is a DX11 card, I doubt I would be looking to change it right now.
I'm looking to change my card atm but mostly bcos it's DX10.1 not DX11.
Wu
Bare in mind that a stock 5850 is below a stock 470.
I doubt it is going to blow your mind away (the difference) but it will be a lot smoother and higher FPS.
If I had a 5850 though, seeing as it is a DX11 card, I doubt I would be looking to change it right now.
I'm looking to change my card atm but mostly bcos it's DX10.1 not DX11.
Wu
I would keep that 5850 and OC it, and buy something else, ssd perhaps. For instance do you really need 67fps over 59fps?
Last night at 1.30 am I was itching to press 'buy' on the His 6970, I am so glad I didn't. I have a 5870 and expected great things from the new cards, but I don't think they justify an upgrade from 58 series. 'On average, the Radeon HD 6950 is roughly as fast as the Radeon HD 5870, giving it a value on par with the past single-GPU flagship from AMD.' Link
Personally the refreshed cards from both sides have disappointed me. As I said , do yourself a favour and wait till next years gpu's come out.
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Soldato
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This. Although there's a lot of people on here who upgrade every time something new comes out and it can be very temping to join in, in terms of getting your money's worth it's probably better to skip a new release or two unless it's a massive step up and there's games you've bought that are struggling. You already have a DX11 card that performs well and can be OC'ed well, might as well keep it till the next lot come out late 2011.
Which as the 69's are certainly NOT a massive step up.
The 5870 WAS a massive step up, it beat the previous 4870x2, where as the 6970 doesn't get close to the 5970!
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No dont bother. People seem to be missing this hence my use of caps...
THIS GEN IS A REFRESH!!!
My 5850 dealt just fine with metro and crysis at 1600x1040 at 875/1250.
Upping the res combined with upping the overclock to 1000/1250 I would imagine you will be just fine until crysis 2 and barring that game what the pc hardware world needs is the next console generation.
I use a vf3000 and have just pulled the trigger on a thermalright vrmcooler to make sure the card stays cool doing this. I will be buying a 1900 monitor then kicking back till next gen, where the 6900s and 500 series will plummet in price, then I will upgrade.
PC games are going to be held back until the next gen of consoles; if you were going to make a game would you really spend twice as much developing to reach much less than a quarter of the market??
It makes me wonder how many people who whine about performance actually need the performance they go on about as the only res that really needs bleeding edge performance is 2500 or multiple monitors.
THIS GEN IS A REFRESH!!!
My 5850 dealt just fine with metro and crysis at 1600x1040 at 875/1250.
Upping the res combined with upping the overclock to 1000/1250 I would imagine you will be just fine until crysis 2 and barring that game what the pc hardware world needs is the next console generation.
I use a vf3000 and have just pulled the trigger on a thermalright vrmcooler to make sure the card stays cool doing this. I will be buying a 1900 monitor then kicking back till next gen, where the 6900s and 500 series will plummet in price, then I will upgrade.
PC games are going to be held back until the next gen of consoles; if you were going to make a game would you really spend twice as much developing to reach much less than a quarter of the market??
It makes me wonder how many people who whine about performance actually need the performance they go on about as the only res that really needs bleeding edge performance is 2500 or multiple monitors.
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Good thread, I was in a similar position, contemplated selling on my 5850 for peanuts and hooking up a 6950/6970, then realised it was totally unnecessary. That's the problem with shiny new tech, it lures you in and empties your wallet!
As el Kuarlos points out, this generation is a refresh and is still on the 40nm process, and the dominance of the consoles means the graphics quality of games is generally not advancing as quickly as graphics card technologies.
I haven't overclocked my 5850 yet, and won't until I feel the need to (Crysis 2 maybe? lol). There is still life in these old dogs yet, and by late 2011/early 2012 we should be seeing 28nm Radeon cards, which could potentially offer massive performance increases over the current generation without increasing power consumption or temperatures.
As el Kuarlos points out, this generation is a refresh and is still on the 40nm process, and the dominance of the consoles means the graphics quality of games is generally not advancing as quickly as graphics card technologies.
I haven't overclocked my 5850 yet, and won't until I feel the need to (Crysis 2 maybe? lol). There is still life in these old dogs yet, and by late 2011/early 2012 we should be seeing 28nm Radeon cards, which could potentially offer massive performance increases over the current generation without increasing power consumption or temperatures.
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Completely agree with this. With the exception of blackops there hasn't really been anything out within the last two years that has really punished my machine. I think Crysis was the last time I experienced lag. Does anyone know when the next batch of consoles are coming out? It feels like years since xbox/play station was launched.
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The xbox 360 was launched 5 years ago this December, and someone at Microsoft said it may be around till 2015. Although thats is a LONG time, I'm confident future PC games will use the technologies available to them to make them stand out compared to their console derivatives.
If they don't.....
Have been contemplating ditching my 5850 for a 6950 as well, but I think common sense has won out.
Has been running at 900/1000, which I upped to 940/1100 yesterday. Would have loved to have gotten it to 1000/1100 but doesn't seem to like going over 950
Anyway, I just don't think I will notice much difference outside of benchmarks going to a 6950, so am going to stick with the 5850 until something twice as fast is out for less than £200.
Has been running at 900/1000, which I upped to 940/1100 yesterday. Would have loved to have gotten it to 1000/1100 but doesn't seem to like going over 950
Anyway, I just don't think I will notice much difference outside of benchmarks going to a 6950, so am going to stick with the 5850 until something twice as fast is out for less than £200.
I am still using a 4870x2 as it is more than enough at the minute, yes abit power hungry and hot but I haven't really seen anything amazingly special to get a new card. Some may say DX11 or tesselation but I only have 1 or 2 games that use these features.
Think I will wait for the next gen unless current gfx goes bang. Also as a lot of other people have said, where are the AAA* games to go with these games soley for PC with outstanding gfx and not console ports?
Think I will wait for the next gen unless current gfx goes bang. Also as a lot of other people have said, where are the AAA* games to go with these games soley for PC with outstanding gfx and not console ports?
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I bought a 5850 about a month ago to replace my aging 4890 and for dx11. If I hadn't and still had the 4890 and was buying now, I think I would go for the 6950 (wud swing me over the 5870 as its new 
) Not sure if the 6970 would grab me. But like saying the 5850 even if i had for a while i wouldnt replace right now. Its a beaut of a card. Usually well over 50fps in most games even more in most first person shooters and source games like counter strike source into the 100's.
Only game i think that pushes it i have is metro 2033 where it averages around 35 and rarely drops below 30 even then by only a few fps so is still perfectly playable so I think its got a good good time in it.
Saying that any january bargains to be had on a 6950 chances are I might treat myself!
) Not sure if the 6970 would grab me. But like saying the 5850 even if i had for a while i wouldnt replace right now. Its a beaut of a card. Usually well over 50fps in most games even more in most first person shooters and source games like counter strike source into the 100's.Only game i think that pushes it i have is metro 2033 where it averages around 35 and rarely drops below 30 even then by only a few fps so is still perfectly playable so I think its got a good good time in it.
Saying that any january bargains to be had on a 6950 chances are I might treat myself!
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If that's the case, then you're doing things wrong. You bought a £600 graphics card to play console games.
Download some high-res texture packs, and mods which increase the spawn-rate and number of npc's. There are plenty of games out there that will bring your system to it's knees.... just you need to do a little more than click "very high" in the graphics menu.
Soldato
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In my honest opinion, I think a gpu should ideally to get your money's worth be keep for about 2 years.
After two years, it is starting to show its age, and probably should be upgraded if your looking at keeping up with gaming technology.
After two years, it is starting to show its age, and probably should be upgraded if your looking at keeping up with gaming technology.
Well after reading the posts my 5850 is now running 765/1125 with little effort and is rock solid.
I haven't gone to great efforts to increase the GPU clock further but will do over xmas.
Hell might invest the money in a decent case and better cooling, namely WC
I haven't gone to great efforts to increase the GPU clock further but will do over xmas.
Hell might invest the money in a decent case and better cooling, namely WC
Black Ops punished your machine? I think you are getting confused because of the lag that everyone had on release date, which has since been patched. Black Ops is a console port and has very low system requirements...