Looking at upgrading from my 7600gt..to something bit more powerful and that would last couple years..

Looking at either 4870 or 4870x2 or perhaps a single 9800gtx+..
I'm using an asus P5e m'board..hence why i could go a crossfire setup..

Play the occasional game..could play more once i start spore up and when diablo3 comes out..Computer is also linked upto tv with dvi to hdmi..mainly used for photo work as well..will be connecting 2nd monitor in couple months, most prob 24"

What are peoples recommendations for brand and setup?

Figure out how much you want to spend and go from there, your current suggestion of cards are in 3 different price ranges.

4870X2 is probably the biggest bang for buck available atm, it's getting a lot of praise online too.. that's my recommendation.

^ It's (4870X2) also the hottest temp card on the market as well so you need to give due consideration to the case your going to place it in and it's surrounding components.

also on the topic would it be worth upgrading from a 8800gts 320mb to a 4850.

yes, 4850's are f***ing awsome.

the 48** series is not hot, it runs hot at stock cause they f**ked up the bios. you can use riva to up the default fan speed to 45-50% and it drops the temps in half.

get a 4850, see if it meets your needs, (its is equivalent to the 9800gtx+) if it doesnt play to your standards cf another one and you have a nice little setup that didnt cost you your left nut, and plays everything to a very acceptable level.

all ati cards run hot...

I just got a GTX280 and ran Crysis on it. Its f***ing up and overheating. Gonna take it back tomorrow and swap it for another. But its a massive step up from the 9800gtx IMO

if you up the fan speed a bit the 48** series aren't too bad heat-wise.

plus they kick ass in terms of $/performance

sapphire, powercolor or gigabyte..??

Seems every review i've seen it as the sapphire in it..what are the other two like in comparison(this is for the 4870x2)

the only difference between any of the brands now a days is the cooler, and the stuff in the box. just grab the cheapest, or get one with a game u like or one with a non reference cooler.

looking at sapphire 4870 1gb or maybe 512 if other isn't availale, but trying to figure out what it means by "dongle" when connecting with hdmi.

lol dong

it runs hot at stock cause they f**ked up the bios. you can use riva to up the default fan speed to 45-50% and it drops the temps in half.

And therein lays the design flaw. It's beyond the average user to know how to do that. This and the fact a lot of the people I've seen buying these don't want to change the default fan speed cause it's "noisier than a farting mouse" in their media centres.

You sell people a 4870X2 for a Media PC?



What?

looking at sapphire 4870 1gb or maybe 512 if other isn't availale, but trying to figure out what it means by "dongle" when connecting with hdmi.

Probably this:

http://www.jkcomputersystems.com/Assets/Pictures/items/AD-ATI-HDMI-DVI.jpg

You sell people a 4870X2 for a Media PC?

LOL

I was thinking the same thing. Why would you need an $800 video card to watch movies and play music?

You sell people a 4870X2 for a Media PC?

Sadly no, they won't fit. Though they would sell like hotcakes if it could.

Why would you need an $800 video card to watch movies and play music?

They also expect to play games. Which would be all fine and dandy if they ditched the s***ty HTPC cases, but then it doesn't fit in their cabinets.

waiting for reply about 4870 1gb..if nothing will get the 512mb..

just did a 3Dmark vantage test..

3dmark - 8745
GPU - 8457
CPU - 9739

this about average or what...

I just got a 4870X2 and it kicks total ass if you take note of the following things:

Hack CCC to make the fan spin faster as mentioned, drops the card temp by 20-30 degress. Piss easy to do.

You need a high end power supply or you will run into problems and you should read this clicky

how you go about hacking ccc?

create a profile called fanspeed and enable Overdrive then navigate to C:\Users\UserName\AppData\Local\ATI\ACE\ and hack the following string in the fanspeed.xml

(Feature name="FanSpeedAlgorithm_0")
(Property name="FanSpeedAlgorithm" value="Manual" /)
(/Feature)
(Feature name="FanSpeedRPMTarget_0")
(Property name="Want" value="0" /)
(/Feature)
(Feature name="FanSpeedPercentTarget_0")
(Property name="Want" value="65" /)


this part here
(Feature name="FanSpeedPercentTarget_0")
(Property name="Want" value="65" /)
65 = 65% speed increase - adjust accordingly

last edited by d[o_0]b at 11:24:57 20/Sep/08



further instructions here

last edited by d[o_0]b at 11:27:04 20/Sep/08

sweet cheers, just also found out you can use riva tuner to do same thing.. :)