*** Official OMG I've finally got my 5850 thread **

[eyetrip]

So mine arrived yesterday.

First thing: stock performance compared to my 4870 at 830 - really not impressive. Seriously, barely any improvment in Crysis at same setting (all high).

Anyway, so let's see how things improve with OCing.

Firstly, wish ATI would make OCing higher in CCC easier. Kind of making me wish I had just plumped more for an Asus card.

Very sensitive when it comes to OCing. Am used to a GPU showing signs of an OC not being good for it. With this card, everything just crashes and requires a restart.

Also, had 0 issues setting up my 4870 with MSI AB. This card has proven a nightmare.

Anyway, finally found what I think is a good. stable OC at 950/1100. This memory is not very OC friendly. Had to set votlage to 1.18 for the 950.

So with this am finally running crysis at very high on comparable FPS to what I was getting on the 4870. But still likely going to drop shaders down to high just to make sure the FPS are smoother.

So far, have noticed no difference at all in BF BC2. And this is where I was actually expecting a larger increase.

With my I3 530 at 4.2GHz and my 4870 I was usually hovering around 40 FPS, all high with HBAO and 4xAA. Getting what seems like almost exactly the same performance with the 5850. Not happy with this right now.

So, all in all, considering I got it for £200 including delivery and a copy of Dirt 2, would I say it feels like a worthwhile upgrade?

Not really. But I wanted something which would just handle 1920x1200 a bit better and wanted DX11. Because I want to finish my build, close me computer and just let it run merrily without messing with it for a long time.

I should know by now that it's not normally worth upgrading for much less than a 100% increase in performance, but I don't think that option is going to be affordable for some time.

 

[RavenXXX2]

Something wrong with your setup or you're very very confused, a 5850 destroys a 4870, especially one clocked at 950 core, run vantage, run the crysis benchmark, report back here.

 

[eyetrip]

Not near the pc all day, so won't be able to do testing til tonight.

Like I said though, once OCed Crysis does run same FPS all very high on 5850 against all high on 4870.

Though I am a little stumped by BC not running any better. This card is reminding me why I went to consoles

 

[555BUK]

Not near the pc all day, so won't be able to do testing til tonight.

Like I said though, once OCed Crysis does run same FPS all very high on 5850 against all high on 4870.

Though I am a little stumped by BC not running any better. This card is reminding me why I went to consoles

Try running all settings on Very High for the 4870 and see what happens. My guess is you should notice quite a difference between the two.

 

[eyetrip]

Try running all settings on Very High for the 4870 and see what happens. My guess is you should notice quite a difference between the two.

Have stated couple of times that there is a difference, but let me try make it clearer:
Crysis
4870 @830/1100, All High, hovering around mid to high 30's usually.
5850 @950/1100, All Very High, hovers around low to mid 30's usually.

Thing is, with the 4870, I can set pretty much all to very high, except shaders and not lose much in performance.

Now, with the 5850 getting so little over 30 FPs will likely have to drop to high shaders to keep it smooth, meaning I will still be playing at the same settings as I was on my 4870.

Bad Company 2
Both All high, HBAO ON, 4 x AA
4870 @830/1100, hovers around mid 30's to low 40's
5850 @950/1100, hovers around mid 30's to low 40's

Have not noticed any improvement here. It may be a couple of FPS higher, but nothing very noticeable.

Edit: I run at 1900x1200

 

[Jono8]

Have stated couple of times that there is a difference, but let me try make it clearer:
Crysis
4870 @830/1100, All High, hovering around mid to high 30's usually.
5850 @950/1100, All Very High, hovers around low to mid 30's usually.

Thing is, with the 4870, I can set pretty much all to very high, except shaders and not lose much in performance.

Now, with the 5850 getting so little over 30 FPs will likely have to drop to high shaders to keep it smooth, meaning I will still be playing at the same settings as I was on my 4870.

Bad Company 2
Both All high, HBAO ON, 4 x AA
4870 @830/1100, hovers around mid 30's to low 40's
5850 @950/1100, hovers around mid 30's to low 40's

Have not noticed any improvement here. It may be a couple of FPS higher, but nothing very noticeable.

Edit: I run at 1900x1200

Hm, those Bad company 2 frames seem really bad.

I was looking to upgrade to an overclocked 5850 so i could run Bad company 2 at a solid 60+ (getting 40-60 on my current card).

 

[eyetrip]

I was honestly expecting to be running at about a constant 60 or so with this card. And I am sure others are getting better performance, so not sure what the problem is with mine.

Will do a run at Vantage tonight to see if there is any improvement over the 4870 in that.

 

[Greebo]

Your crysis results are about right, maybe a bit on the low side.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-5850,2433-6.html

A stock 5850 will get 29.4 fps with everything on very high at 1920 x 1200. Overclocked it should be the 5870 result so around 35 fps.

By comparison your 4870 at stock speeds would only get 21.7 fps.

Your BC2 results are definitely way off though:

http://www.techspot.com/article/255-battlefield-bad-company2-performance/page5.html

A 4870 gets 42.4 fps with 2xaa and 4xaf and a stock 5850 gets 55.7. Overclocked it would be more like 68.9 fps. (all on high settings)

Okay, 4xaa is going to reduce you fps slightly but not by half.

 

[RavenXXX2]

BC2 likes a decent quad, easily get 20+FPS more with one, your dual core with hyperthreading could be limiting your FPS.

 

[eyetrip]

BC2 likes a decent quad, easily get 20+FPS more with one, your dual core with hyperthreading could be limiting you FPS.

Oh, please don't say that. Otherwise I will be hunting around for a quad, and wanted to stop spending money on this now.

I do struggle to see how it would be quite so limited with an I3 530 at 4.2GHz.

Sure' it's a dual with HT, but it should still be taking this game quite well at those speeds, surely?

 

[RavenXXX2]

BC2 on 5850 will be using DX11 by default, 4870 DX10, so try forcing DX10 on the 5850 and see what you get.

 

[eyetrip]

Thanks - was just reading the BC2 thread when I saw that it supported DX11. Did not know this til now.

Will keep my discussion on BC2 performance in that thread for now.

 

[hughythomas]

Yer it does seem we are finally getting to the point where quads are being used effectively by games and outperforming even higher-clocked dual alternatives.

Have you got any mates with a quad you could cheekily load BF onto just to see if there is a noticable difference in FPS at your res?

You can always sell off your dual on the MM/ebay to make some money back on it towards a quad if you do find you want to...

 

[eyetrip]

Seem to have sorted my performance.

Only things I did were to update my motherboard BIOS, which I doubt was what helped, and install the February DX update.

Fired up BC2 and could see was running way smoother. Though I had to force DX10 to get an idea on frame rate due to the FPS monitor not working on DX11, and it's pretty much sticking around 60, which it should with vsync enabled - though vsync doesn't actually seem to work?

Crysis has seen an improvement too, and hovers around the high 30's, rather than low 30's, on all very high.

So yeah, am a little more chuffed with it. Though when playing BC2 last night got a couple of CTD's. Not sure if it's the game or my OC, so will have to play on stock for a bit to find out.

 

[PermaChanged]

Just ordered my 5850! I'll own one of the most southerly ones from OCUK in the UK being from Guernsey in the Channel Islands

 

[Nico_Joey]

Was slighty disapointed that i coudnt get one of the 5850s when they where £210. But after finaly having enough cash and the stock being available i finaly got one.

And even better its the PCS+ version with the mahosive cooler on it.

Thanks overclockers