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What GPU, Looking at the 5770, or the 5870

TobyW

TobyW

TobyW

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Joined
11 Mar 2010
Posts
67
Hi again, sorry about previous thread, decided to man up and just wait. ;)

Im also a little reluctant to spend £1000's on a computer, i upgraded mine over a year ago now and i did it fairly cheaply although now its showing its age. A GPU upgrade is definately on the cards, although without trying it before buying it itll be difficult to tell the performance of the card. I guess the two ive mentioned are a totally different kettle of fish and a different price even. The other problem and worry i have is with bottle necking, ive listed my specs below.

First up is the "cheap" option. The 5770 XXX;

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-163-XF&tool=3

Really quite cheap, but seems to have a good spec, although the 5870 has double the processing cores and a better bandwidth. Will it play the likes of metro and last me a year or so without needing to upgrade again?

The 2nd option is the 5870 XXX;

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-152-XF

Far more expensive, and while price isnt an option, i would rarther buy something cheaper that will do the job in an acceptable way, by that i mean play anything out right now cranked up fairly high, Metro2033 in particular.

-

520 watt Psu (yeaa i kno)
8800 GT (Leadtek OC'd edition)
4GB 1066mhz DDR2 (stock speed)
Q6600 @ 3.19 GHz
EVGA 680i motherboard

Am i going to need to upgrade my Power supply with both ofthese cards, 5870 is fairly obvious, so im guessing the 5770 wont be an exception. Will i be able to stretch the 520W ?
 
I cant, ive tried and tried but the thing wont budge above 3.19 much more. Its been a while since i overclocked it and its been running stable at this for months.

Also, the 5850 means ill have to upgrade my case and power supply. Antek 300's too small i think.
 
I THINK that the PSU will be fine for any of the cards, however this will be down to the quality and the make.

As for the case.. ive got a 5870 in an antec 300 so a 5850 will fly in.
 
It will fit in the case, it's about an inch smaller then the 5870. Also, the PSU should be fine, but what make is it?
 
PSU would be pushing your luck with a 5870. 5850 should be ok and 5770 will definately be fine.

The board is probably holding the overclock back
 
Its a Corsair.

Its an EVGA 680i so yes i would think thats as far as it goes for the overclock, i have had it running higher but over time ive gradually slowed it down because of BSOD's and it seems fine at 3.19 for some reason.

My friend is giving me 2 8800GTS' to see if i can get them working in SLI, he says hes not had much luck with them but doesnt use them aymore, so i will be trying them out to see if they make much difference over my GT.
 
It should just be able to cope with the 5850 then, Cosair is a really good brand for PSUs. But maybe getting a 600w PSU will be more safe.
 
Perhaps grab an I5 750, P55 motherboard, single 5770 and sell your current ones one ebay. That should cost around £350.

Your current PSU would be fine for a single 5770, for estimated advice on the PSUs - 580w for a 5870, 650w for two 5770s, 750w for two 5800s would be more than enough.

You could perhaps get an I5 upgrade with 5770 now, and then upgrade the PSU and graphics another time, even by simply adding a better PSU and a second 5770 later on. The corsair HX 750 would be perfect, or if you never want to worry about power again, you could get the 850w one. Corsair are offering 5-7 years warranty on these PSUs too.
 
You will not get above 3.2gig tops with that motherboard and a Q6600... but I guess you've already worked that out :D

As for which GPU - if your playing at 1680x or under resolution then you'd be quite happy with a 5770 - if you play at 1920x or above and like to play with high/ultra settings and atleast 4x AA then you will find the 5850 fits the bill much better.
 
Rroff said:
As for which GPU - if your playing at 1680x or under resolution then you'd be quite happy with a 5770 - if you play at 1920x or above and like to play with high/ultra settings and atleast 4x AA then you will find the 5850 fits the bill much better.
Click to expand...

Going to say the opposite here, i play at 1680 x 1050 and find 5870 is not overkill, i cant believe people still say these things these days. Games still have their demanding times and when it comes to crysis.. well you don't have to say much about that.

I would get a 5850 if you can afford it to be honest, don't skimp if you want the smoothest play possible.

I know people play at higher resolutions than i do and find it acceptable, but for me (and i assume many others) want their games running at top speeds as often as possible and this matters a lot for FPS especially imo.
 
I wouldn't say the 5770 is overkill at 1680x either :P but the 5770 will still put up perfectly good performance generally.

I'm running GTX260 SLI on 1680x atm having dropped down from a 2048x 60Hz panel to a 120Hz panel and performance is silly - 300+fps in a lot of stuff even with max settings - can even run around with 32x SLI AA on in most stuff and still above 60fps.
 
Rroff said:
I wouldn't say the 5770 is overkill at 1680x either :P but the 5770 will still put up perfectly good performance generally.

I'm running GTX260 SLI on 1680x atm having dropped down from a 2048x 60Hz panel to a 120Hz panel and performance is silly - 300+fps in a lot of stuff even with max settings - can even run around with 32x SLI AA on in most stuff and still above 60fps.
Click to expand...

No real point having aa set that high is there? I mean after 8x you're hard pressed to tell any difference.
 
Believe me... you can see the difference with 32x AA heh... for normal gaming I don't notice much difference between 4x, 8x and 16x unless I stop to look, tho anything below 4 looks nasty... but turn on 32 and you do notice it :D
 
At 1680 resolution you dont need a 5850 :p. 5770 is fine.

I have my two breezing through everything with 8x AA at 1920. I often find it funny how people recommend 5800s for low resolutions, 5770 will handle 1080p and less with ease, unless the game is poorly coded or you want lots of AA.
 
bhavv said:
Perhaps grab an I5 750, P55 motherboard, single 5770 and sell your current ones one ebay. That should cost around £350.

Your current PSU would be fine for a single 5770, for estimated advice on the PSUs - 580w for a 5870, 650w for two 5770s, 750w for two 5800s would be more than enough.

You could perhaps get an I5 upgrade with 5770 now, and then upgrade the PSU and graphics another time, even by simply adding a better PSU and a second 5770 later on. The corsair HX 750 would be perfect, or if you never want to worry about power again, you could get the 850w one. Corsair are offering 5-7 years warranty on these PSUs too.
Click to expand...


I was looking at the i5, with DDR3 ram, if i were to upgrade the lot it would be a lot of money spent, which i MIGHT do. Im still undecided though as im not sure if i really want to spend £1000's on a computer, self indulgence and all that, for me it sits in the corner of the room, i play occasional games on it although i would like to benefit from being able to play new ones at a good setting, and revise cisco related crap on it.


Rroff said:
You will not get above 3.2gig tops with that motherboard and a Q6600... but I guess you've already worked that out :D

As for which GPU - if your playing at 1680x or under resolution then you'd be quite happy with a 5770 - if you play at 1920x or above and like to play with high/ultra settings and atleast 4x AA then you will find the 5850 fits the bill much better.
Click to expand...

I have indeed unfortunately, i play at 1280 actually and im happy with that. Although pushing the rez higher means my GT wont cope.


Like i said though ive got two 8800 GTS's to try out and see if they work.


Cheers for the help guys, looks like ill be upgrading my monitor too, i might go for the 5850 or the 5870.
 
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