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4850 or 9800gtx+

B

bonsai

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Jun 27, 2008
Messages
1,282
So my 7800gt is showing it's age and I've got the itch to upgrade. I'm looking for something to get by until I can afford a full upgrade to a C2D machine.

I have an AMD X2 4400+ and game at 1680x1050. Mostly would like to run stuff like COD4, TF2, and Bioshock.

The 9800gtx+ is more interesting to me because it should be a nice OC'er at 55nm and I like Nvidia's driver support and software much better than Ati. I also run a dual boot into Ubuntu where Nvidia support is much better.

Opinions?
 
i actually just went from a 7800gt to a 4850 and i would highly recommend it. I can crank everything to the max in bioshock and everythng high in crysis. I havent even tried to overclock ityet but its not too hard to do. either or would be about the same but i would go for a 4850 for sound in hdmi and directx 10.1 support. not to mention that the 4850 is usually alot cheaper than the 9800gt+ (150 AR vs 200)
 
I think the 4850 is a slightly better card, but the cooler on the 9800 is a lot better.
 
About 80% of this forum is going to come in here and tell you to buy a 4850, and their going to give you reasons like price, or its faster (not if you don't overclock), or it uses less power, so on and so forth.

But let me ask, has your 7800GT given you any remarkable problems over the span of its life that would turn you off to future nvidia products, I mean if not, then why go to the other side when their isn't a serious benefit from you doing so?

Two turnoffs to the 4850 (for me) are that it runs much hotter with its stock cooling solution than does the 9800GTX+ (obvious reasons why, but the fact remains), and you are sort of limited with your overclock with that 1 slot cooler they give you, so out of the box the 9800GTX also overclocks better.

The difference between these two cards is much smaller than in years past with some of the 200 dollar offerings from both sides.
 
whats the wattage of the 9800+ because it should produce less heat (55nm) but the 4850 is really good at 110w even though the temps seem high its hot producing that much heat. also if you do get the 9800+ make sure your case can handle the longer cards. to the poster above me, i didnt have any problems with my 7800gt but that doesnt mean im going to be close minded as to which is a better product so thats why i jumped on the 4850 and it and ati hasnt given me any problems yet. maybe theres a reason why 80% of the people here will tell you to go with the 4850.
 
Simpson5774 said:
About 80% of this forum is going to come in here and tell you to buy a 4850, and their going to give you reasons like price, or its faster (not if you don't overclock), or it uses less power, so on and so forth.

But let me ask, has your 7800GT given you any remarkable problems over the span of its life that would turn you off to future nvidia products, I mean if not, then why go to the other side when their isn't a serious benefit from you doing so?

Two turnoffs to the 4850 (for me) are that it runs much hotter with its stock cooling solution than does the 9800GTX+ (obvious reasons why, but the fact remains), and you are sort of limited with your overclock with that 1 slot cooler they give you, so out of the box the 9800GTX also overclocks better.

The difference between these two cards is much smaller than in years past with some of the 200 dollar offerings from both sides.
Click to expand...

what?


and as for $200 vs $200 you can find a 4850 for as low as $150 from newegg. the 9800gtx+ is going for $230
 
risqu3 said:
the 9800gtx+ is going for $230
Click to expand...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130376

Lowest price on Newegg for a 4850 is $175. I don't like mail in rebates and prefer trusted names.

I definitely prefer Nvidia over Ati. I find Ati's supporting software to be well... poor. And Nvidia cards work great in Linux with little hassle.

My next question is can I expect reasonable frame rates (like 40+ fps) with 4xAA and 16xAF in these games with the X2 4400+ or should I just wait until I can do a full upgrade?
 
it depends on what and if your overclocking your 4400+ at. but at that resolution theres less cpu bottlenecking than gpu bottlenecking. there are many trusted names for ati cards as well such as asus, visiontek, etc and if this article is an indication of anything, then 2 of nvidia's 3 largest manufacters are jumping ship.
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1327866
 
onedestinazn2 said:
it depends on what and if your overclocking your 4400+ at. but at that resolution theres less cpu bottlenecking than gpu bottlenecking. there are many trusted names for ati cards as well such as asus, visiontek, etc and if this article is an indication of anything, then 2 of nvidia's 3 largest manufacters are jumping ship.
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1327866
Click to expand...

Yeah, thanks for spreading that fud around some more. no one outside of charlies circle believes that its true, none of the editors here at [H] believe that they have "defected" to anyone. And the wording on the article is about as vague as it gets.
 
Simpson5774 said:
Yeah, thanks for spreading that fud around some more. no one outside of charlies circle believes that its true, none of the editors here at [H] believe that they have "defected" to anyone. And the wording on the article is about as vague as it gets.
Click to expand...

hey i know the inq isnt the most reliable of sources but can you really believe that these manufacturers arent a little shakey considering how the gtx200 cards and 9-series have dropped so much in price within one month
 
The 9800GTX+ and 4850 are pretty much neck and neck in terms of performance (although the 4850 edges out the 9800GTX+ in CoD4 and Source games). On the OC front, I would give the nod to the 4850, as it can get within 4870 speeds.

I myself just went from a 7950GT to a 4850, and it was definitely worth it. Don't let the ATI drivers turn you off - they work perfectly (both in Windows Vista x64 *AND* Linux). ATI now has BETTER LINUX SUPPORT than nVidia, which will only grow now that ATI has made their specs open, and the open source RadeonHD driver supports the 4850/4870 cards.

Now, that said, I think it should come down to the following two questions:
1) Do you prefer single or dual slot cards? (I myself like single slots - more room for the other cards I have)
2) Is your motherboard SLI or crossfire capable? (and if so, do you have any desire at all to run CF/SLI?)

If the choice still isn't clear, then go for the cheaper of the two (which at the moment is the 4850, especially with the newegg deals. I got mine for $170 shipped - $25 MIR)

hey i know the inq isnt the most reliable of sources but can you really believe that these manufacturers arent a little shakey considering how the gtx200 cards and 9-series have dropped so much in price within one month
Click to expand...

No, because nvidia is the one that took the loss, the manufacturers still have the same margins on the gtx200 cards, which is why some have offered refunds for the price difference, because it isn't costing them.
 
onedestinazn2 said:
hey i know the inq isnt the most reliable of sources but can you really believe that these manufacturers arent a little shakey considering how the gtx200 cards and 9-series have dropped so much in price within one month
Click to expand...

So what, the last 3 years don't mean anything to these AIBs, if one quarter they are raking in mass amounts of money, and the next they are doing slightly less, that means its time to jump ship? The prices dropped because nvidia dropped the price they sell them to AIBs as well as the UMAP price, AIBs may be making smaller percentages, but they are still making good money (atleast as far as I can tell), there are alot of people here with GTX 260/280 cards.

Where are they going to go? They going to ATi? who as a company was devalued 3 times last year? or are they going to intel which doesn't have a working product out, and wont be selling one until next year, and even then isn't proven? The article is absolutely baseless, and one sided, you know that and you posted it anyways.
 
They are both excellent cards for the price. The single-slot cooler of the 4850 was a plus for me since I only have a m-ATX mobo. It's also got DX10.1 and a newer architecture.

I prefer ATI's drivers over Nvidia.. Used to have the 8800GT and Nvidia released a total of one (1) driver update during the months I owned it. ATI releases a new driver every month (Catalyst 8.7 = the july release).

Both have excellent driver support for Linux as well. When I got my 4850, I just used EnvyNG to grab the 8.6 driver for Linux.. didn't have to enter a single command into any terminal window. Granted, it failed to auto detect my 4850, which meant about two extra mouse clicks to select the correct driver :p The whole driver was downloaded and installed in a few minutes.. Now I've got full suport for Compiz and OpenGL games.

My suggestion - Buy whatever card is the cheapeast of the two. Maybe you can find one with a mail in rebate or find a special, time limited deal somewhere.
 
JimmiG your rig is pretty close to mine in specs, how's your frame rates?
 
ATI drivers are probably better than Nvidia's now - they get WHQL drivers every month around the 21st. Also, they have better Linux drivers now than Nvidia. And when you turn on AA and higher resolutions, the 4850 suffers far less than the G92 cards do
 
JimmiG said:
They are both excellent cards for the price. The single-slot cooler of the 4850 was a plus for me since I only have a m-ATX mobo. It's also got DX10.1 and a newer architecture.

I prefer ATI's drivers over Nvidia.. Used to have the 8800GT and Nvidia released a total of one (1) driver update during the months I owned it. ATI releases a new driver every month (Catalyst 8.7 = the july release).

Both have excellent driver support for Linux as well. When I got my 4850, I just used EnvyNG to grab the 8.6 driver for Linux.. didn't have to enter a single command into any terminal window. Granted, it failed to auto detect my 4850, which meant about two extra mouse clicks to select the correct driver :p The whole driver was downloaded and installed in a few minutes.. Now I've got full suport for Compiz and OpenGL games.

My suggestion - Buy whatever card is the cheapeast of the two. Maybe you can find one with a mail in rebate or find a special, time limited deal somewhere.
Click to expand...

A lot of people don't like the cooler on the 4850 and frankly I sympathize. 80C idle at stock speeds is simply too damn hot and without a dual slot design, all that hot air is blown straight out into your case. Nevermind the fact that the CCC can go suck on a big fat penis compared to the NV control panel.

And if you're wondering, I'm currently using a 4850 and I upgraded from an 8800GT.
 
krameriffic said:
A lot of people don't like the cooler on the 4850 and frankly I sympathize. 80C idle at stock speeds is simply too damn hot and without a dual slot design, all that hot air is blown straight out into your case. Nevermind the fact that the CCC can go suck on a big fat penis compared to the NV control panel.

And if you're wondering, I'm currently using a 4850 and I upgraded from an 8800GT.
Click to expand...

The 8800GT doesn't exhaust the hot air out of the case, either - the 4850 only dumps slightly more heat into your case than the 8800GT - both have a TDP of 110W. Whether the GPU runs at 50C or 80C is irrelevant, it's the amount of heat in generates that matters. The maximum "safe" temp (for sustained operation) of the 4850 is 104C - thermal failure doesn't occour until it reaches 125C.

The 9800GTX has a TDP of 160W, so it will put out alot more heat.. but of course its cooler exhausts the hot air from the case so that's definitely an advantage for the 9800GTX (if you've got the expansion slots to spare). It does use more power and requires two PCI-E plugs rather than just a single 6-pin one for the 4850.

Again, I'm not saying that the 4850 is a better card - if I was offered a choice between a 9800GTX+ and a 4850, it wouldn't be an easy one.. Since they are both excellent cards, the "best" one is whatever card you can find cheapest.

JimmiG your rig is pretty close to mine in specs, how's your frame rates?
Click to expand...

I'm very satisfied with the gaming performance of my rig.. I sometimes wish that the CPU would do 3 or even 3.2 GHz but apart from Crysis, I haven't ran into a single game that my system couldn't handle with ease.
 
9800gtx+ is going to launch at $229 from what I hear, and the 4850 can be bought for $169.99 brand new. $139.99 is the lowest reported price on the 4850 and that was an open box buy at newegg...which I just sniped last night. That Guru 3d article really doesn't show a clear winner. Seems like the 9800gtx+ and 4850 trades blows. 4850 excels in the game I care about, which is cod4 at the moment and maybe Grid, edging out the 9800gtx+ barely. I will say that the 9800gtx+ has a better stock cooler than the 4850. This cannot be denied, but I don't think that justifies a $60 jump especially when you can slap an accelero S1 Rev. 2 cooler on the 4850 for a mere $25 at directron.

But all in all both are good cards and are priced nicely, you can't lose with either one.
 
BigCactus said:
9800gtx+ is going to launch at $229 from what I hear, and the 4850 can be bought for $169.99 brand new. $139.99 is the lowest reported price on the 4850 and that was an open box buy at newegg...which I just sniped last night. That Guru 3d article really doesn't show a clear winner. Seems like the 9800gtx+ and 4850 trades blows. 4850 excels in the game I care about, which is cod4 at the moment and maybe Grid, edging out the 9800gtx+ barely. I will say that the 9800gtx+ has a better stock cooler than the 4850. This cannot be denied, but I don't think that justifies a $60 jump especially when you can slap an accelero S1 Rev. 2 cooler on the 4850 for a mere $25 at directron.

But all in all both are good cards and are priced nicely, you can't lose with either one.
Click to expand...

Thier is 1 9800GTX+ on newegg right now (EVGA) for 199.99. That came out yesterday. so its like 200 v 175 now.
 
If you're using a 7800GT, just remember the 4850 requires only one pci-e plug and is 9" long whereas 9800GTX+ is longer and requires 2 plugs
 
bonsai said:
I definitely prefer Nvidia over Ati. I find Ati's supporting software to be well... poor.
Click to expand...

Strange, I can't recall ever having a problem with ATI drivers in the last 4-5 years. Perhaps your system was at fault or not optimised as you are in a large minority these days. A few years back maybe, but I find that hard to believe nowadays.

Still, go buy an NVidia card. Just be wary that once they release a new one, they won't be interested in the product they sold you if you do have problems with it. Just ask the NVidia owners out there who waited months for a half decent Vista driver.

I make no secret of the fact that I don't like a company that with the resources it has, couldn't even be arsed to sort those driver problems out within a reasonable timeframe.


And that despite price gouging us for a good while and releasing 'new' cards that were actually rebadged versons of older ones.
 
Simpson5774 said:
Thier is 1 9800GTX+ on newegg right now (EVGA) for 199.99. That came out yesterday. so its like 200 v 175 now.
Click to expand...

Thanks for pointing that out. BigCactus is always calling me a fanboy whenever I point out something that he says's that not quite right if he sees it as pro nVidia. That said, I'd probably get a 4850 if game performance were my main concern.
 
ZerazaX said:
If you're using a 7800GT, just remember the 4850 requires only one pci-e plug and is 9" long whereas 9800GTX+ is longer and requires 2 plugs
Click to expand...

I wonder if the 9800gtx+ sucks up more watts than a 4850. I'm pretty sure the 9800gtx+ is a lot more oc'able than a 4850 and will have a big edge in that regard. 4850 desperately needs an aftermarket cooler if you want to even consider oc'ing it.
 
9800GTX+ still sucks more energy but it does have a better cooler. If you get the aftermarket on the 4850 though, it will probably OC quite fine
 
Simpson5774 said:
Thier is 1 9800GTX+ on newegg right now (EVGA) for 199.99. That came out yesterday. so its like 200 v 175 now.
Click to expand...

Zipzoomfly.com had the 4850 for 169. So it's more like 200 vs. 169. About $30 difference...and the 9800gtx+ makes up that difference with a better cooler. It's more of a coin toss I guess. I don't think the 9800gtx+ has hdmi and 7.1 sound though. ATI will probably respond and lower the 4850 to $150...or not since they obviously sell well at the current price.
 
After rebates they've hit below $150 already, and considering performance is relatively the same with the nod to the 4850 for AA - the 4850 is probably still the best buy. And if you're wondering about the rest of the feature set, 4850 does have DX10.1 and the new UVD2 which is probably better than Nvidia's decoder but thats up to you on how much you use it.
 
if you can wait out bestbuy does their 25% off all visiontek cards like every month, thats how i got my 4850 for $149
 
heatlesssun said:
Thanks for pointing that out. BigCactus is always calling me a fanboy whenever I point out something that he says's that not quite right if he sees it as pro nVidia. That said, I'd probably get a 4850 if game performance we my main concern.
Click to expand...
Well he joined here the same time the 4850 launched, so you can pretty much smell his agenda. :D

Actually checking his posts pretty much confirms it. :eek:
 
onedestinazn2 said:
if you can wait out bestbuy does their 25% off all visiontek cards like every month, thats how i got my 4850 for $149
Click to expand...

That's a deal I could probably go for. When does that happen? Does that apply to the website or in store?
 
it cycles around every month or two last time it was up was just before the actual launch of the 4850 but they sold it anyway which was like mid of june. im not sure if it applies online but most of the people like i just picked it up in store
 
GET THE 4850! ati deserves your business now. not this dumb nvidia refresh #2 .
 
PRIME1 said:
Well he joined here the same time the 4850 launched, so you can pretty much smell his agenda. :D

Actually checking his posts pretty much confirms it. :eek:
Click to expand...

Good point. ;) I enjoy a good debate and all, but why ANYONE would think that a person like myself who spends thousands each and every year on computer hardware has bias towards companies seems a little loony. I simply want the best I can afford and I come to places like this to learn about what's going on and to exchange ideas. It's great to see AMD with a competitive product!
 
but you always sound like an nvidia troll haha i will say 4850 cause 9800gtx+ is just an oced 9800gtx if you oc 4850 either it will be much faster than that 9800gtx+
 
Here's another thought will an Ati card play nice with my Nforce4 chipset? Obviously I won't have crossfire capability ( no desire anyway ) but will I encounter any issues?
 
eric66 said:
but you always sound like an nvidia troll haha i will say 4850 cause 9800gtx+ is just an oced 9800gtx if you oc 4850 either it will be much faster than that 9800gtx+
Click to expand...

Been posting here a lot for over 2.5 years and have never been banned, not once. And they ban trolls here a lot.

Buy the best you can!:D
 
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