Upgrade from GTX260

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CoolGuy90

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Oct 1, 2007
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I've had the GTX 260 Core 216 55nm since 2009 and looking to upgrade to a faster, quieter and cooler video card. With the specs in my sig I am running on a 20" 1680x1050 monitor with no plans to upgrade my display for quite some time. I wanted to keep my budget under $200. The only games I play are TF2 and Arma 2, the latter in which a GPU upgrade would benefit from.
 
There are NVIDIA GTX 570's on amazon that are going for around $200, also the 570 can be found in the for sale section of this forum. That would give you more then double performance. the 570 would use a little less wattage and much less heat will be produced.
 
I'll look into the 570. I was also looking into the HD6950 and 6970 as both are available with 2 GB of memory.
 
hmm HD6970>GTX570>HD6950 in general.. the HD6970 is certainly not worth it... the price on them has not changed even after the release of the HD7000 series for some reason... GTX570 roughly equals the GTX480 which roughly equals the GTX295 in raw power which is roughly double what the GTX260 has to offer
 
You can also get a 7850 for like $210 after rebate. Its slightly better than a 6950 in most cases.
 
loxety said:
There are NVIDIA GTX 570's on amazon that are going for around $200, also the 570 can be found in the for sale section of this forum. That would give you more then double performance. the 570 would use a little less wattage and much less heat will be produced.
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um a 570 uses more power thus puts out ore heat than a gtx260.

OP, get a 7850 if you want a card that does not use much power but is still very fast.
 
GTx 560 ti probably, I would also stress to upgrade your monitor as soon as you can as a side note :)
 
CoolGuy90 said:
I've had the GTX 260 Core 216 55nm since 2009 and looking to upgrade to a faster, quieter and cooler video card. With the specs in my sig I am running on a 20" 1680x1050 monitor with no plans to upgrade my display for quite some time. I wanted to keep my budget under $200. The only games I play are TF2 and Arma 2, the latter in which a GPU upgrade would benefit from.
Click to expand...

Get the MSI HD 7850 . nice card available for USD 210 after rebate. overclocks easily to 1.15 - 1.2 Ghz with voltage tweaking and GTX 580 perf. draws much less power and runs cooler.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127663

HD 7850 will let you run Arma II at 60+ fps at 1680 x 1050.

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2012/06/22/amd-radeon-7970-3gb-ghz-edition-review/3
 
if your PSU can handle a 480GTX, newegg has the EVGA model for $210.

I've debated it...but I'm not sure I want something that hot in my case...but I've heard alot of praise for the card.
 
I went from a 260 to a 460 and at 16x10 the upgrade wasn't really worth it. I'd wait a little bit more and see what the 660 brings, especially regarding price slashes to the 560/570.
 
I went from 3 way SLI gtx 260 core 216's to a single 570. .ANd i noticed a BIG difference.. than the 2nd 570 just made it even better.. 260 is great cards and still got some pull.. But newer games will just eat them now days :(
 
didn't see a PSU in your sig.. make sure your PSU can handle the new card.... or else :eek:
 
You want faster, quieter and cooler? Go get the HD 7850. It's quite powerful and uses very little juice. It will give you double the performance of your GTX 260.

If you insist on Nvidia and can wait a month, then wait for the GTX 660 (rumored release in August). This should compete nicely with the 7850 on power and performance.

If you insist on Nvidia and you have to upgrade today, get a GTX 560 Ti. It will use ~ the same power as your 260, while performing almost twice as fast.
 
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If you get the 560 TI,, try to find the 448 core ED.. they run great! But.. I do agree that AMD seems to get more bang for ya buck :)
 
Ended up getting a refurb Sapphire 6950 2GB for $160 on ebay. How can I check if I can flash it to a 6970 BIOS?
 
I didn't know you could just flash the bios on the ATI card and then all of a sudden the hardware thinks it's a new card. Isn't there some physical changes between the models?

I upgraded from the nVidia 260 >>>> nVidia 285 >>>> MSI 6850 and so far it has handled things pretty well. I'll be getting an IB i7-3770 soon enough so the VirtuMVP will help me get past the 60Hz refresh rate limited by vSync.

My 6850 is around the same price after rebates as the card you purchased.
 
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