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Need advice on nVidia graphics card...

Exactly.

By the time some really good tesselation intensive games come about, the current batch of Dx11 cards won't be able to hand them well at all. So this 'future proofing' business advice is a little misguided if you ask me.

Take for example how almost everyone recommends the 5770 either singularly or in xfire configuration. I'm sure it's a great card but by the time some proper Dx11 games arrive, it's going to be pretty useless rendering those games as it's already (IMHO) struggling with, say, AvP.

I'm obviously refering to the worryingly low minimum frame rates observed which is around the low twenties. This translates to even lower frame rates playing future titles and in reality, you're going to get really annoying with major 'slow downs' and stuttering playing your favourite game with your 'future proof' gfx card. Right.
 
To be honest unless you want to see what Fermi brings to the table, I would honestly just buy a cheap 5850 and overclock it. I haven't had an ATI card in years and depending what happens with GF100 I may well give it a whirl.
 
Wait for the new nvidia cards to be released mate, don't get ati there drivers are terrible. The new nvidia cards should be released in march or there abouts.
 
Leeroy123 said:
Wait for the new nvidia cards to be released mate, don't get ati there drivers are terrible. The new nvidia cards should be released in march or there abouts.
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They will be in short supply and cost a lot,it could be months before there is a good stock of 470 and even longer for 480 which will keep the prices high.

If you need a card now get a 5850 and save yourself £100 over a 5870,if you can wait until they release the 470/480 then wait and see what they cost and what stock shops have at least you will know how good they are and it might even drop the 5850/70 a bit,but i don't think so myself.

edit:- at moment 260/275/285 are EOL and have a price premium on them which pushes the price up a lot and not really worth it
 
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Leeroy123 said:
Wait for the new nvidia cards to be released mate, don't get ati there drivers are terrible. The new nvidia cards should be released in march or there abouts.
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I've always wanted to ask this question in reference to the above. Howcome if 'Ati drivers are terrible' I have no problems whatsoever and I'm running 5770CF. If the drivers were terrible surely I'd be having problems too. Seems a bit of a noob statement to me. I would imagine most driver problems are down to user error or just the occasional incompatability with hardware which I think is inevitable given the make up of Pc's and the range of software. Or do you think Ati and Nvidia test every bit of hardware and software before releasing new drivers. Of course they don't thats why you have problems and they release driver updates to help. I have a fairly standard setup, except for my crossfire, and I use well known apps, software etc and never ever run driver sweeper programs to lessen the likelihood of problems and so far I've been lucky. Ati do not release 'terrible drivers' or every single one of us would be in the same boat.:)
 
^^^
There has been a recent spike in driver problems with the recently released 5000 series but they have since improved fast, but that's normal and Nvidia are no different.
Ati drivers since 4000 series in particular are very good, and AMD seem to be putting in allot of effort to shake of the Ati driver stigma from way back.
 
kylew said:
I would seriously recommend you look at getting a 5850 over a 5870, 5870s just aren't worth the £100+ difference in monies.

You can overclock a 5850 to 5870 performance and beyond (yeah you can overclock the 5870 too but it's still not £100+ more performance).
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would it still be best to get a 5850 if you're going to use eyefinity with multiple displays? or would a 5870 be able to handle it better?
 
doggles said:
would it still be best to get a 5850 if you're going to use eyefinity with multiple displays? or would a 5870 be able to handle it better?
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Some people are having problems with screen flicker from the 5850, but if you don't get that then 5850 is better. 5870 has slightly better performance, it's almost minimal though.
 
5850 clocked to 5870 speeds will be nearly as good as 5870 stock, unless you're running something like Crysis with max AA at silly resolutions, then the 5870 can get like 5-10fps more minimum framerates.

If you can afford a 5870 though, you can get that and overclock it even further. Or you could get a 5970 which is essentially a 5870 CF.
 
Are we expecting the price of current nVidia cards to drop substantially when the new line comes out? And has there been any mention on pricing for nVidia's next-gen GPUs? The reason I ask, is because if I'm only prepared to spend within the region of £300, what is the likelihood of me being able to get anything better than ATI is offering, within the same financial ballpark?
 
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