best gfx card on the market atm

sparkicks1

what are the best gfx cards on the market atm? i have a bit of cash to splash out i have a nvidia geforce 6800 gt atm.

awhir

hmm well would reccommend for ya waiting a few weeks and see how the g80s turn out.

if you wana buy now get the 7950

L31mr0d

Keep an eye on this list, it gets updated fairly regularly and is usually very accurate. But like was said if you have a DX10 capable system wait for the 8 series cards to get reviewed. If not, you need to give us specs on your system, socket? PSU?...etc there is no point getting a 7950 GX2 if you are sitting on 256mbs of RAM and a sub 2Ghz CPU.

sparkicks1

well everything is upgradable if i dont have what it needs i can always buy it in... im not sure atm but i gotta rush out

dam the first one on that list is big it takes up 2 slots...

KamiKazi

what would be better, a 7950 Gx2, or 2 x1950's in crossfire?

IgsTer

sparkicks1 wrote:

well everything is upgradable if i dont have what it needs i can always buy it in... im not sure atm but i gotta rush out

dam the first one on that list is big it takes up 2 slots...

thats because that card has two gpus on the same board..one on either side..and the first one on that list is quad sli meaning its two of these cards..so 4 gpus in total

8T8

KamiKazi wrote:

what would be better, a 7950 Gx2, or 2 x1950's in crossfire?

2 X1950XT cards for sure.

A 7950GX2 is just a 7900GT SLI setup on a card.

If anyone is contemplating a 7950GX2 I wouldn't go spending money on the 7950GX2 with the 8800GTX so close to launch as we already know that it is fast as if not faster than the GX2 in DX9 & that's with pretty early drivers.

L31mr0d

well it might be advantageous to go for a 7950GX2 once the dust has settled after the DX10 cards are released as the prices of the 7950's will probably drop considerably.

KamiKazi

how much would two top of the range 1950's cost?

8T8

ATI Crossfire for the X1950XT line requires a master card and a regular X1950 unit. The Crossfire edition can be gotten for the same price as the regular one €450 so both would be roughly €900.


Motherboard wise you need an ATI one for AMD CPU's.

For Intel CPU's the Intel 956,975 chipset's alongside the few remaining ATI Intel chipset's out their are required.

Such processing power is a waste unless you have a high resolution monitor 1600x1200/1680x1050 & greater at lower resolutions all you can do is crank up the image quality with 8xAA or higher personally I barely notice anything past 4xAA anyway.

KamiKazi

well i plan on gettin a 22-24 inch screen

Psycopat

would you really fork out 900 euro on 2 1950's when you can get better frames in most games with a 7950 which costs about 550 euro? its also alot quieter and less power hungry. Prey, FEAR, Quake 4 are heavily Sli and i believe battlefield 2142 will be quad sli ready. Oblivion and source will run better on the 1950 but not by a large margin, your still talkin well over 200 fps for both.....

8T8

Quad SLI isn't as good as you think it is, it has three fundamental problems;

1) Direct-X 9 does not work properly with quad GPU solutions & the rendering methods used, some creative hacks can make certain games benefit e.g. as was the case with FEAR. But for the most part the limitation will hold back any quad SLI setup in the majority of DX9 games.

2) OpenGL does benefit but the API is only used in a small handful of games.

3) Direct-X 10 will remove the limitation in the Direct3D API that holds back quad solutions but seeing as the 7950GX2 is DX9 only that's no good.

You also need 2 7950GX2 cards not just one for Quad SLI usage.

2 X1950 cards eat a single 7950GX2 for breakfast, yes in some games the Quad SLI setup would be faster but it's not worth the investment.

FYI the cooler is quieter on the X1950 than the GX2 & the GX2 consumes more power at idle and under load than a single X1950.

The main reason going for a X1950 is that you get better IQ options and very good DX9 performance, they will do better in the long run vs the 7950GX2 parts as games begin to use more visual effects.

But I do agree unless you got serious cash to burn I would just buy the master Crossfire card so you have one then if you really want to go down that route pick up another X1950 later.

Of course there is the GeForce 8 coming very soon but if you have an aversion to NVIDIA then it will be quite a while before ATI's next gen will show.

KamiKazi

so two x1950xtx's are the way to go?

Psycopat

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/graphics/charts.html?modelx=33&model1=585&model2=517&chart=231

I dont trust most of the readings on this site, but this looks about right, its the SM3 test of 3dMark 06 and shows 2 1950's just about beat the 7950 im sure modern games will rely on SM3 and an extra few points costs alot of money.

i realise if you look at the performance in games the 1950's will come out on top, but i dont trust them when its says a 7900 gt is better than my 7950 GX2 in Prey

If it was me i'd buy the 965 asus p5b deluxe and a 7950 GX2, if your only goin for 1, the 7950 is a better choice, however i know ya got money to throw away so maybe you'd prefer to get a 975 board which is only slightly less overclockable than the 965 ones and 2 of the 1950's.

although in that case you gotta ask yourself, will i buy a 7950 for 550 euro and when DX10 comes out only have lost 550 or spend 900 on 2 1950's and when DX10 comes out be down 900, i dunno, either way you'll have a serious rig

KamiKazi

pat if ull look a bit closer i think youll find thats it two 7900gtx's in Sli;)
which makes sense seeing as a 7950 is basically two 7900gt's

two 1950's in crossfire are the best by far when it comes to hl2 episode one, which is the source engine, and im building this rig to play source.

also those are the leaders in most of the other tests

Psycopat

KamiKazi wrote:

pat if ull look a bit closer i think youll find thats it two 7900gtx's in Sli;)

ummm no it isnt, look at the blue bars :rolleyes:

KamiKazi wrote:

which makes sense seeing as a 7950 is basically two 7900gt's

lies again, its 2 underclocked (500mhz) 7900GTX's which has more pipelines than a GT.

KamiKazi wrote:

also those are the leaders in most of the other tests

As i said above the tests arent accurate, ie a 7900GT aint better than a 7950 GX2 i think they use the nvidia drivers for non sli

KamiKazi wrote:

two 1950's in crossfire are the best by far when it comes to hl2 episode one, which is the source engine, and im building this rig to play source.

Get an AMD 4000+ a radeon 1800xT and a gig of ram if thats all you'll be doin

8T8

If you intend to play all games at the native resolution of a 24" of 30" display with all the eye candy enabled with AA/AF than that is not enough. For only HL-2, & Source Counterstrike it is though but a single X1950 is better than a GX2 in this field anyway.

lies again, its 2 underclocked (500mhz) 7900GTX's which has more pipelines than a GT

Sorry you're wrong the GT & GTX are the same except for clocks the GPU's present in the 7950GX2 are mobile 7900GT Go parts with slightly different clocks, but they are equivalent to an SLI 7900GT setup.

KamiKazi

no its definitely 2 7900gt's, coz if you look at the benchmarks the 7950 is getting minced by two 7900gtx's in sli mode.

7900gtx's are the best set up, but so damn expensive

Psycopat

KamiKazi wrote:

no its definitely 2 7900gt's, coz if you look at the benchmarks the 7950 is getting minced by two 7900gtx's in sli mode.

I dont think your understanding what im trying to say, go to the link i gave to toms hardware and choose the 7950 GX2 and the 7900 GT Top, and have a look at the prey results for example, they are wrong :eek:

Psycopat

8T8 wrote:

Sorry you're wrong the GT & GTX are the same except for clocks the GPU's present in the 7950GX2 are mobile 7900GT Go parts with slightly different clocks, but they are equivalent to an SLI 7900GT setup.

beg pardon you are right the GT and GTX line have the same pipelines the only difference is the speeds and the fact that a 7900 gt has 256 mb ram and a 7900 GTX has 512mb.

to avoid confusion it appears that the easiest way of classing a 7950GX2 is 2 X 7950 GT's i think.....

PogMoThoin

Psycopat wrote:

beg pardon you are right the GT and GTX line have the same pipelines the only difference is the speeds and the fact that a 7900 gt has 256 mb ram and a 7900 GTX has 512mb.

to avoid confusion it appears that the easiest way of classing a 7950GX2 is 2 X 7950 GT's i think.....

:rolleyes: The 7900gt is available in 521mb as well as 256

Psycopat

not very common though is it?

edit* lol you said 521