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Upgrading from an 8600GTS

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onlytrueromeo

n00b
Joined
Feb 25, 2010
Messages
43
Hey everyone, I've been a 6mo+ regular visitor to the site but never decided to register...never had questions until now!

I'm going to be upgrading my rig over the next few months...already started in some areas!

Just picked up a 26" 1920x1200 Asus monitor...and my 8600GTS is not enough to run this + my 19" CRT that I have next to it!

I do like to game occasionally, currently only playing Darkfall and Dragon Age Origins. My FPS is 32 w/ low settings at 1920x1200 in Darkfall, and dips to 20s freqently. Clearly this is not going to cut it in a FPS style MMO.

With that said,

I currently have a 965BE in an older am2+ board. I will be upgrading the board come the 890fx series, but I chose to upgrade the CPU now since I don't believe the 6 cores will be all that necessary til bulldozer comes out.

Corsair 520hx PSU, and 4gb ddr2 800 for now.

I'd love to get my hands on a 5870, or even a 5850, but I can't really justify spending $400 on a GPU when my CPU cost me 179.

How long do you think it will take for the 5850's to drop to around $250?

Should I wait for the price to drop to $250 or just buy a 4850 when I see one @$100?

I don't plan to buy 2 more monitor's anytime soon but there is a SLIGHT possibility I could get 2 22" monitors (TN again) for ~100 each within 8mo to a year. So eyefinity isn't on the chopping block for awhile.

Suggestions? I could use all the advice I can get, thanks!
 
Thanks for the response! I know the 5830's just came out I was going to wait a little more time to see how they perform. How overclockable is the 5830? I have 2 6 pins on my PSU so power shouldn't be a problem.

EDIT: It's hard to find a 5850 from a retailer I trust for even $300.

Also, "what I can afford" is subjective...my girlfriend tells me I can't afford anything, but clearly I have other thoughts :-P. Tax returns soon!!
 
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5830 will be the most feature filled card you can get with $250. I'd personally recommend the 5770 just because it's significantly cheaper and performance isn't that much worse.
 
Get a 5850. You will not look back. 5830 is completely lacking in my opinion. If you wants its performance you're better off getting a used 4890.
 
You are almost in the identical place that I was, right down to the PSU. Get the 5850, it was totally worth it for me.
 
or you could always crossfire 2 4890s for 400 dollars... it might be a lil faster than a single 5870...
 
I'd get the 5770. Best performance per dollar at the moment IMO. (new)
 
I dont want to spend 400 on a crossfire dx10 setup, sure it may be faster than a single GPU setup but will eat way more power and not support tesselation!

I should have mentioned that I was thinking of keeping my 8600GTS to use as a dedicated physics card in the future. Currently my board only has 1xpcie since I got a budget board awhile back after my am2 one crapped out on me due to a USB being forcibly removed (someone tripping over it).

So I will already have 2 GPU's and don't need 3 :-P

I would love and I mean LOVE to get a 5850 but can you help me find links to ones that are actually $300 or as close to it w/ free shipping? I'm partial to big name manufacturers and places that will let me return it (I don't think you can have a warranty after purchasing on ebay can you?) Have had great experience w/ MSI/Asus Gigabyte not so much all the time. XFX is clearly a winner, don't know much about sapphire and everything else seems like it'd be cheap and not worth it...is this correct?

$300 is already pushing it way past what I want to spend (My g/f and I discussed that I can spend $1200 / 3 years for a computer. I already spent $180 on a processor, $269 on a monitor / $190 on 2 OCZ vertex's. I want to buy a new mobo+at least 4gb ddr3 and at least 1 new storage HD. Clearly the 300 on a video card is pushing the envelope (but I can justify that my monitor will last me 6 years, like my previous CRT, long as it doesnt break 1920x1200 should be a good res. for awhile!)

If I can sell my X2 5600+ and mobo/4gb ram for like 200 then that would prob. help me a bit!

If I buy a $300 card, it will have to last me 2.5years minimum. Will the 5850 run 3x 1920x1080 monitors at decent frame rates? (if i decide to go eyefinity at some point) (I don't need ALL maxed settings in Darkfall or other games, 3d sounds are nice and the bigger the landscape the better is all that matters!)


EDIT: I should mention that my current LCD (and therefore the 2 others I'd be getting POSSIBLY in a long time from now) would be 60hz...yeah I know its not 120hz but I can't tell the difference. So I don't need 150fps performance...just 60+!
 
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Darkfall is a FPS MMO, and yeah I mostly play PVP MMO's, and the occasional single player game. Only games I've ever gotten into are Counterstrike (mostly before steam) UO, Diablo 2 LOL, Shadowbane and now Darkfall online. Have oblivion/dragon age kicking around as well. Would love to try a driving game if I went eyefinity just for the hell of it. No COD2/etc for me.
 
I'd recommend to the OP to try waiting a week or two for another paycheque to get the 5850 if you can. I've always taken video card purchases as buy the best you can afford at the moment your buying it, as your goign to live with your choice for the next x months or years and you'd probably end up happy in the long run having your games run extra smooth over the next x months or years than a bit choppy or borderline smooth.
 
I'd go with the 5850. The 5830 would be a decent card if it was cheaper, but as it stands, it's too expensive for what it delivers, which is performance that is still under 4890 levels, while consuming more power and running hotter than a 5850.
 
LOL damn this forum for making me want a faster card.

It's not about waiting another week so I have money. My girlfriend and I recently started splitting everything (we've been living together 3 years, now have joint bank accounts, etc) so I can't just blow all my money on my computer (besides which I have other hobbies such as building cars...engine management is my next big purchase but thats OT)

I don't know for sure if/when I will ever be upgrading to eyefinity...I'd love to, but I don't know. My girlfriend has a POSSIBLE scenario where she will be given 2 new monitors for her workstation at home if she gets hired "full time" in december when her 1 year contract runs out, in which case I would get her 2 22" 1080p monitors. If that doesn't happen, I prob. will not be doing eyefinity. There is a 50/50 chance of that happening, and I dont know if it will happen until right before it happens. Boo.

Clearly, a faster GPU will perform better @higher resolutions. And an i7 920 is faster than a 965BE but I just bought a BE because it's fast enough for my needs and I can't justify the $100 price increase.

I read here that a 5850 OC'd to 900/1000 or something was able to run BF2 @ 50fps on low settings. w/ 3x1080p monitors. I cannot imagine that most of the games I would play on my setup would be as intensive as that.

For reference, I am currently getting 32-44fps on my 8600GTS and it's still playable, but I can clearly notice the performance drop...and this is in darkfall. I have not tried benchmarking or loading up a different game. Dragon age played fine on low settings on my 19" CRT @ 1280x1024.

Would having a dedicated physics card+eyefinity help framerates at all? I didn't know if offloading those properties onto the separate GPU would do anything (I know its all w7 based)
 
The game has to specifically use hardware Physx for that to matter and I don't think any of the games you've mentioned do.
 
Hmm. I did not know that! I thought it would help in most games. Good to know! May be able to sell the card then for a few extra bucks! Might be able to get 35-40 out of it! That helps the budget :)

Stupid fermi not being released has kept the prices high. I'm temped to wait it out another month and see if prices fall...I was hoping monday's announcement would get things moving. Stupid Nvidia ruining AMD's pricing :p
 
What is the new EAH 5830/5850 that got posted in the news today, they've been selling with that tag for awhile now, havn't they? All the Asus 58xx cards I've seen have EAH at the front.

Am I mistaken here?
 
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