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ATI 260 or Nvidia 5770

Dancer

Dancer

Dancer

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I'm about to upgrade my PC to either i5 or an AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 and I want to upgrade my old NVidia 8800 GT card at the same time.

I was going to get the Palit GeForce GTX 260 Sonic 896MB GDDR3 as I've been thinking about the possibility of getting a 120Hz monitor and the Nvidia 3D vision glasses later in the year. Will my 500 Watt PSU be enough for this card?

However, as I've been doing my research most builds seem to be using ATI and I've considered getting something like Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 5770 1024MB GDDR5, as from my reading the ATI cards seem to require less power and be just as good (and have more outputs which is nice if I get a 2nd monitor).

The card will be used primarily for gaming and office/2D photo manipulation, but I also want to connect the HDMI output to my 42" TV to watch BBC iPlayer and high-def streams.

What would you recommend (anyone who's tried NVidia 3D?)?
 
@stiv121: low power consumption (and presumably quiet running?) is primarily what is making me consider the 5770, there is only a £10 difference though. Are you saying the 5770 supports dx11 and 260 does not? Or in other words that in future games the 5770 will have better graphics (i.e. more detail)? Looking at the specs this seems to be the case which is strange.

@arctine: why, doesn't support dx11, slower memory and more expensive?
 
We'll if you want 3d vision then as far as im aware it'll have to been an nvidia card, if it was me tho i'd go with the 5770, supports dx11, as stated already it's just as fast(if not faster than a 260) and use less power. 4890 is quicker than both cards, but doesn't support dx11, only Dx10.1.
 
Erm, slower memory? Last time i looked the 4890 had twice the memory bandwidth of a 5770...

There is no point at all in getting a 5770 with dx11 in mind. It simply doesn't perform well so you'd end up either having to use low settings or running the game in dx10. The 4890 is A LOT faster than the 5770 and out performs it in dx10.

I'm not even going to mention the 260.

Buying a 5770 isn't a clever idea at all. Games will still support dx10 for years to come, just like they still support dx9 now. If you want a card that supports dx11, either spend more or wait until the 5800 series drops in price because the 5770 simply isn't very good.

As for it being more expensive, it's £10 more for a 4890?
 
arctine said:
Erm, slower memory? Last time i looked the 4890 had twice the memory bandwidth of a 5770...

There is no point at all in getting a 5770 with dx11 in mind. It simply doesn't perform well so you'd end up either having to use low settings or running the game in dx10. The 4890 is A LOT faster than the 5770 and out performs it in dx10.

I'm not even going to mention the 260.

Buying a 5770 isn't a clever idea at all. Games will still support dx10 for years to come, just like they still support dx9 now. If you want a card that supports dx11, either spend more or wait until the 5800 series drops in price because the 5770 simply isn't very good.

As for it being more expensive, it's £10 more for a 4890?
Click to expand...


I assume you will not crossfire 5770, so I do agree 4890 as he said is a better choice
But for the 3D vision, I have no idea about the difference, so I hope someone else can help you
 
I agree with arctine. tbh i'd go with a 4890, they are very quick cards and i've had no problem playing any games so far,Quicker than 260 and 5770.
Here's a quick pic of 1 of my 4890 specs. Bandwidth etc, maybe it will help.

power-1.png
 
Thanks, arctine, I just saw OcUK 5770 : 4800MHz and 4890 - 3900MHz and assumed that meant 5570 is faster... missing something I guess Thanks for the screen uksoldierboy, might help. Guess I'll also have to do some quick research about dx11, but I guess you might be right that it is too early to go that route.

The downside I can see with the 4890 is that there is no HDMI out like the 5770. Getting a DVI to HDMI converter would add another ~£25 to the price for TV output. Anyone know if it is possible to get audio through the DVI->HDMI for the 4890 like it is for the 260GTX?

There is no chance I'll go for crossfire. If I want the option of the 3D vision I'll have to go the NVidia route. However, if the ati card is better (quieter?, less power and faster) I might leave that for now. Although I'm excited by the prospect of 3D gaming (virtual reality?) it is still early days and waiting for it to mature can only be a good thing... still it is a strong reason to consider nvidia.
 
Dancer said:
Thanks, arctine, I just saw OcUK 5770 : 4800MHz and 4890 - 3900MHz and assumed that meant 5570 is faster... missing something I guess Thanks for the screen uksoldierboy, might help. Guess I'll also have to do some quick research about dx11, but I guess you might be right that it is too early to go that route.

The downside I can see with the 4890 is that there is no HDMI out like the 5770. Getting a DVI to HDMI converter would add another ~£25 to the price for TV output. Anyone know if it is possible to get audio through the DVI->HDMI for the 4890 like it is for the 260GTX?

There is no chance I'll go for crossfire. If I want the option of the 3D vision I'll have to go the NVidia route. However, if the ati card is better (quieter?, less power and faster) I might leave that for now. Although I'm excited by the prospect of 3D gaming (virtual reality?) it is still early days and waiting for it to mature can only be a good thing... still it is a strong reason to consider nvidia.
Click to expand...


you can get the a DVI to HDMI converter with certain grahpics cards for free 1 was with mine when i brought it .

im gunna go with the 4890 . yes its not as cool but it is quite a bit faster than the 5770 and faster than the 260gtx .

if you look in 99 percent of the benchmarks it loses to the above cards everytime.so how people say its faster than a 260gtx i dont know.



quite a good review here with benchies

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/HIS/HD_5770

4890 does very well for the money.
 
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Bare in mind when considering Nvidia based on 3d, the card may be around the same price as the ATI alternative but ! the glasses are currently around 110 quid and a 120Hz monitor carries nearly a 100 quid premium also. So, you end up spending around 200 quid more for what is essentially a bit of a gimmick (imo).
I think the extra cash would be far better spent on the GFX card to be honest.
 
Whether 3D is worth it or not aside, and doing a bit of reading there were some very nice number comparisons over at Tom's. Not what I expected...

Cheapest: 5770 > 260GTX > 4890 (260 and 4890 about same)
Most Quiet: 260GTX > 5770 > 4890 (note: in idle all about the same)
Lowest Power Usage: 5770 > 260GTX > 4890
Best Framerate: 4890 > 260GTX > 5770 (260 is often very close to 4890)
Best HDMI/DVI Outputs: 5770 > 260GTX > 4890

My conclusion: The race for me is between 5770 and 260. 260 for performance and 3D, 5770 for price, power usage and outputs...
 
My 5770 has no issues with DX11 at 1920x1080. Again I feel people with no experience are bashing it.
Its a great little card and very quiet which was my main reason for purchasing it. There are plenty of good reasons to go for it - some of which you have mentioned.
 
I have 2 4890s in CF and they own all games, even Crysis (now that I have managed to get CF working in it). I would rate 5770>260 simply for DX11. No point going 260 you may as well as a 4890
 
BIGBC said:
My 5770 has no issues with DX11 at 1920x1080. Again I feel people with no experience are bashing it.
Its a great little card and very quiet which was my main reason for purchasing it. There are plenty of good reasons to go for it - some of which you have mentioned.
Click to expand...

Benchies I have seen do tend to show exactly that, the 5770 is a cracking little card. Obviously some (one specifically) game engine will tax it at 1080p with a few goodies turned on but generally it stuffs out good average frame rates.
I think the only criticism I have seen of it is that in graphic intensive scenes the memory bandwidth cripples the frame rate and results in stuttering.
 
Dancer said:
Whether 3D is worth it or not aside, and doing a bit of reading there were some very nice number comparisons over at Tom's. Not what I expected...

Cheapest: 5770 > 260GTX > 4890 (260 and 4890 about same)
Most Quiet: 260GTX > 5770 > 4890 (note: in idle all about the same)
Lowest Power Usage: 5770 > 260GTX > 4890
Best Framerate: 4890 > 260GTX > 5770 (260 is often very close to 4890)
Best HDMI/DVI Outputs: 5770 > 260GTX > 4890

My conclusion: The race for me is between 5770 and 260. 260 for performance and 3D, 5770 for price, power usage and outputs...
Click to expand...

Whoa, how wrong could you be?

The 4890 is faster than both the 5770 and GTX260.

The 4890 also handles HDMI output as well as the 5770, nVidia cards aren't that good for HDMI output with sound.

Any 4890 you will buy should come with a DVI>HDMI adapter as standard.

Tom's Hardware is absolute junk, they never have consistent numbers in all honesty, I personally don't consider them particularly credible.

Outright performance numbers, the 4890 will win over both, power usage, I'm pretty sure a 4890 uses less than a 260, with a 5770 leading with the lowest power usage.

GTX260s are obsolete, there is no real benefit to getting one over anything ATi offers currently.

You'd be mad to buy a GTX260 over a 4890 when you're talking the same monies.
 
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