4890 or 275? Can't decide.

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shredman

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Mar 19, 2006
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Sad to say I've just found out that my 2nd GTX 260 Black Edition is crashing on me. So it's going back. I had an 8800gts 320 that served me well, but I had the opportunity to sell it for a good price so I chose to upgrade to a 260.

Current System:
AMD Opteron 185 dual core/2gb memory
windows xp
1680x1050

I will upgrade my system with windows 7 next year, but I plan to hold on to my current monitor and video card (the one I buy now).

My big concerns are driver stability/support and heat/noise. My case is good, but seems to be hot (antec p190b with 4 120mm fans)...probably because my old Opteron is a hot cpu.

I've read all the reviews and it seems the performance is about the same, but 275 uses less power at idle and 4890 is cooler under load.

Both the 4890 and 275 are $229 AR....I can't decide which to choose.......
 
with that cpu you will likely have zero improvement using a gtx275/4890 over a gtx260/4870 so dont waste your money. heck you are already holding that gtx260 back as it is. also next year when you upgrade your system newer and faster cards with better tech will be out so there is no reason to do what you are suggesting. you just need to figure out whatever issues you are having with your current gtx260.
 
Generally, I've seen the 4890 for a little cheaper than the GTX 275 - http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?sduid=0&t=1322575

Basically, you have it down. At stock, the GTX 275 has better power management, but will use more power and put out more heat at load. Also, it's fan (by most accounts) is quieter than that of the 4890's, but that doesn't mean the 4890's has to necessarily be louder than the GTX 275 in everyday use. However, the 4890 can be tweaked to match the power management of the GTX 275 with a program like ATITrayTools. Considering performance, they're both extremely close at stock and overclocked, so it really doesn't matter.

Personally, I'd go for the 4890 because it's $35 cheaper, but you should consider all the factors presented and decide which means the most to you.
 
I understand that my current system is holding me back, I really do. However, I have already sold my 8800gts and need another card now. I chose to upgrade the GPU now because I was able to get $100 for my 8800 and in a year it would've been worthless. My current rig is fine for everything I do until windows 7. As far as gaming, everything is very playable at 1680 and with a 260/4870 or better card I have no complaints.

The card I get now I want to last me for a couple of years so even though I don't really need a 275/4890 in my current rig, I'd like the room to grow. Besides, the 4870 seems like it is too hot and loud....the 260 is fine, but they are still about $170 AR. So for just $50 more, I get a newer card in a 4890/275 that may have longer legs when I upgrade in a year.

Here is what I want...........stable, cool, quiet, compatible. It's all tradeoffs, but that is why I'm asking for advice. Mr. K6, the deal at ewiz (sweet20 code) seems to be dead. The best prices for good brands I'm finding are at newegg....evga 275/xfx 4890 oc either one for $229AR?

"you just need to figure out whatever issues you are having with your current gtx260." - I've done the troubleshooting and it appears to be I got unlucky with 2 cards that can't handle the stock overclock. It's not a heat issue or driver issue...if I use rivatuner to downclock the card to closer to 260 ref clocks, it works no problems. Since it's only going to get worse and I paid for an overclocked card, I will return it while I can........
 
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if you have to buy, at 229, get the 275. because the market value* of a 4890 is less than that. notice i say value, because the 4890 seems to be overall a little cheaper and frequency of the deals are higher than that of the 275. might as well get something that doesnt change in price so often that you end up with greater buyers remorse later.
 
shredman said:
I understand that my current system is holding me back, I really do. However, I have already sold my 8800gts and need another card now. I chose to upgrade the GPU now because I was able to get $100 for my 8800 and in a year it would've been worthless. My current rig is fine for everything I do until windows 7. As far as gaming, everything is very playable at 1680 and with a 260/4870 or better card I have no complaints.

The card I get now I want to last me for a couple of years so even though I don't really need a 275/4890 in my current rig, I'd like the room to grow. Besides, the 4870 seems like it is too hot and loud....the 260 is fine, but they are still about $170 AR. So for just $50 more, I get a newer card in a 4890/275 that may have longer legs when I upgrade in a year.

Here is what I want...........stable, cool, quiet, compatible. It's all tradeoffs, but that is why I'm asking for advice. Mr. K6, the deal at ewiz (sweet20 code) seems to be dead. The best prices for good brands I'm finding are at newegg....evga 275/xfx 4890 oc either one for $229AR?

"you just need to figure out whatever issues you are having with your current gtx260." - I've done the troubleshooting and it appears to be I got unlucky with 2 cards that can't handle the stock overclock. It's not a heat issue or driver issue...if I use rivatuner to downclock the card to closer to 260 ref clocks, it works no problems. Since it's only going to get worse and I paid for an overclocked card, I will return it while I can........
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your cpu is already going to hold back a gtx260 so why blow 50 bucks more for a card that you cant even utilize. next year if you do build a new pc you could just sell the gtx260 and buy something faster with better tech for the same amount of money. just think about someone that bought a 3870 last year with the idea of keeping it 2 years or more. seems silly now because a $100 card can easily beat it while also using less power and offering better technology.
 
Great points Cannondale...

But my only thought is that even though I might spend $50 more now, I could probably actually sell a 4890/275 in 18 mos for someone who wants to sli....for $50 or more than I could sell the 260. In the meantime I get the benefit of some extra anti-aliasing, etc..
 
shredman said:
Great points Cannondale...

But my only thought is that even though I might spend $50 more now, I could probably actually sell a 4890/275 in 18 mos for someone who wants to sli....for $50 or more than I could sell the 260. In the meantime I get the benefit of some extra anti-aliasing, etc..
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well I dont think you will recoup any of that 50 bucks in 18 months. we will have had many new and improved cards by then and the gtx275 and gtx260 will be equally as outdated and irrelevant in 18 months. nobody in their right mine would be interested in buying another one for sli in 18 months because we will have newer and better cards. heck the first DX11 and more 40nm cards will be out in just a few months.
 
i agree with cannondale. because you spend $50 more now doesn't mean you'll make that $50 back in 18 months. consider this, when the 4850 512 came out it retailed for about $200. most 3870's still retailed for $150 with the 3870x2 at $250. the 4850 was so much better than both previous gen cards that it relegated them to sub $100 values regardless of their retail price. the $230 you're looking to spend now in the 4890/gtx275 maybe worth $100 or less by this summer. consider, the specification leaks about ati's summer refresh are really just about their upper-mid range replacement (for the 4870/4890) and their premium replacement (4870x2). we still don't exactly know what their lower mid range replacement (4850) will be. they might rebrand the 4890 and sell it at a much lower price or build a faster 4770.
 
Yeah, great points guys...I think I'm going to focus on the ~$150 price point.

I'm tempted to keep my defective Black Edition 260 because it seems to be working now if I underclock it. Trouble is the idle temps are really high and maybe in 6 months it won't work at ref clocks. Bummer. It was a decent deal, $180AR.
 
The consensus opinion here is that the 4890 is a little bit better than the 275. But it might be the opposite depending on the games you play. I would wait a bit because I believe the 4890 will drop in price faster than the 275. This is because the 4890 is cheaper to manufacture. So, if you can keep the old 260 working while underclocked for a month or so, prices will look better. Meanwhile, game on another system (console, handheld?) until you have a chance to replace the card.
 
4890 is a bit better than the 275 and should be a lot cheaper too. I know this because I'm planning to buy a 4890 (when it comes in stock on the website I wish to buy from).

The card runs cooler at max load than the 275 too and has a little more RAM.
 
Get the cheaper 4890 and use that extra money to buy a scythe musashi and 2 higher CFM fans for it. The stock fans do something like ~30cfm at ~30dB. Replace them with the ones that do around 59cfm at the same dB rating.
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Performances between both cards are similar but I would go with the 4890 because
1) It is Cheaper
2) It supports DX 10.1
3) Do not care about NVIDIA PhysX, CUDA, ...
 
The 4890 would get my vote, simply because it's better already at default clocks, and has enormous OCing potential (850 to 1 GHz, yes please!). As said before, it approaches GTX280 performance. OCed easily.

The sad thing is that I can not buy AMD cards since my work requires PhysX and CUDA support, else I would choose the 4890 for myself, instead of recommending it to people :p
 
Elledan said:
The 4890 would get my vote, simply because it's better already at default clocks, and has enormous OCing potential (850 to 1 GHz, yes please!). As said before, it approaches GTX280 performance. OCed easily.

The sad thing is that I can not buy AMD cards since my work requires PhysX and CUDA support, else I would choose the 4890 for myself, instead of recommending it to people :p
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it doesnt have "enormous OCing potential". the average oc is around 950. percentage wise that is quite poor and much worse than most cards. heck my gtx260 will go from 576 to over 720.
 
cannondale06 said:
it doesnt have "enormous OCing potential". the average oc is around 950. percentage wise that is quite poor and much worse than most cards. heck my gtx260 will go from 576 to over 720.
Click to expand...

Okay, I admit that I'm an OC n00b :p but it sounded impressive to me since RV770 couldn't get more than a few MHz past stock clocks :)
 
cannondale06 said:
it doesnt have "enormous OCing potential". the average oc is around 950. percentage wise that is quite poor and much worse than most cards. heck my gtx260 will go from 576 to over 720.
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So you arbitrarily decided that 720 core is the average oc on gtx 260 just based on your own singular isolated case?

Not how it works and I doubt gtx 260s average ocs are 720.


OP, your cpu will bottleneck either card so its not going to really matter which one you choose since they are so close to each other in performance.
 
DeadSkull said:
So you arbitrarily decided that 720 core is the average oc on gtx 260 just based on your own singular isolated case?

Not how it works and I doubt gtx 260s average ocs are 720.


OP, your cpu will bottleneck either card so its not going to really matter which one you choose since they are so close to each other in performance.
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I didnt say average for gtx260. I said MY gtx260 and actually it will do 740 no prob. either way the average oc for a gtx260 is higher percentage wise than a 4890 and that is a fact. all the gtx260 would have to do is get to 644 to equal the same percentage of oc that the average 4890 does.
 
cannondale06 said:
I didnt say average for gtx260. I said MY gtx260 and actually it will do 740 no prob. either way the average oc for a gtx260 is higher percentage wise than a 4890 and that is a fact. all the gtx260 would have to do is get to 644 to equal the same percentage of oc that the average 4890 does.
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Not going to argue against that, HD 4890s so far dont seem to be the average 1Ghz oc cards that AMD promised them to be.
 
DeadSkull said:
Not going to argue against that, HD 4890s so far dont seem to be the average 1Ghz oc cards that AMD promised them to be.
Click to expand...

As long as you can up the Vcore you'll hit 1.0ghz in most cases. Pricewise it beats the 275, i guess either one is a good pick.
 
I had a tough time making this same decision.

At the resolution I game at (1680*1050) the GTX 275 and the 4890 are in a virtual dead heat - one card might achieve 45 frames in a certain game, while the other might only achieve, say, 38, but you're not going to be able to see any difference at all while gaming.

In most games the difference in frames is often fewer than 5.

And so it becomes incredibly important to base your decision, not on benchmarks, but on other factors - honestly, if you're looking hard at the benchmarks, then in my opinion you're barking up the wrong tree. These two cards, in terms of sheer power, are as identical as two cards produced by Nvidia and ATI have ever been.

I chose the GTX 275 chiefly because my Core i7 is ridiculously quiet, and because I feared that the 4890 would be too noisy. Many people here at this website disputed that, but a couple of people here provided me with links to reviews in which it was clearly stated that 'the noise levels of the 4890 were unacceptably loud'.

Finally I just decided that, for me, it wasn't even worth taking the chance.

I also chose a non-reference based MSI GTX 275, with two fans, that apparently runs even quieter than a standard GTX 275 (this card won't be arriving at my home until tomorrow, and I'm pretty excited about it.)

What finalized my decision for me was that the MSI card was being bundled with a fairly expensive game that was near the top of my list - COD 5.

The bundled game, the low noise level of the card, the non-reference based design - these were what decided it for me. I'm really happy with my decision.

In the end, however, I think that both of these cards are under-priced and that both are superb - I don't believe that you can go wrong either way. I would say to anybody, just pull the trigger and be happy with your decision.
 
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