Best Graphics Cards For The Money: December '09

[Lavacon]

[citation][nom]Cleeve[/nom]My mistake. It would help if you could provide a link... Where did you find that $125 4870? please share it with the rest of the class, I'm sure a lot of people would like to pick it up, sounds like an awesome deal.Like I said, prices rise and fall, I never promised to provide an up-to-the-minute realtime pricing article. That's unrealistic. It's a guideline. If you can find a $125 4870, the hierarchy chart combined with common sense should tell you to buy it. I don't have to hold your hand do I Lava? It sounds like you know what graphics cards are worth...[/citation]

I will agree prices are VERY screwy atm. I got an XFX 4870 512 last Thursday from the egg for $124.99 free shipping for my friends pc. I look now and they have nothing there. Perhaps I have the last one ever coming to my door tomorrow... hmm.... Could be a collectors item....

You can hold my hand if you like, but, only if we can skip along as we stroll. I keed I keed....

 

[cleeve]

[citation][nom]saint19[/nom]Why i never see the GTX295 in SLI mode?, or GTX285 in SLI?...i know that are really expensive, but how about the performance?[/citation]

285 isn't as good as the cheaper 5850, so two of them aren't as good as two 5850s. The 285 is a bad deal any way you slice it.

Two 295s aren't so good either. Any dual-GPU card already has some built in latency, so two cards will scale poorly because it has to handle four GPUs. For the price it just isn't worth the performance increase.

 

[Lavacon]

[citation][nom]Cleeve[/nom]Still waiting for that $125 Radeon HD 4870 link, Lavacon.You didn't make that part up, right? Your complaint kind of hinges on it.[/citation]

I lose Cleeve.... It's gone... never to be seen from again...

*Inserts foot into mouth* *why do I taste chocolate? Did I step on a candy bar?*

 

[cleeve]

[citation][nom]Lavacon[/nom]I will agree prices are VERY screwy atm. I got an XFX 4870 512 last Thursday from the egg for $124.99 free shipping for my friends pc. I look now and they have nothing there. [/citation]

Apology accepted!

Look, I know it sucks that the 4850s and 4870s are being end-of-lined. It bugs me just as much as the next guy - I would argue even more so. They have offered amazing price/performance for months now, nothing could touch them and now people are forced to spend more money for the same performance over Xmas. That sucks.

I really hope that the 5770 and 5750 series will drop a bit in price to fill the void and offer that same great performance for the same low price.

But dude, it's not cool to immediately call out bias. Have a long, hard look at the pricing *AND* availability first. If there's 30 models of 4870 for $125 for the past two weeks, yes I've failed at my job. If there's one model on newegg for $125, then maybe consider giving me the benfit of the doubt and accept the possibility that the prices and availability are volatile. I'm doing the best I can, and prices change on a daily basis. No matter what i put in this article someone knee-jerks an accusation of Nvidia or AMD love, and I put a hell of a lot of time and effort into making sure I give everyone a fair shake.

 

[Semi-Lobster]

Prices have been going crazy for the past month, so many video cards are reaching EOL from the Red and Green team (Blue team is dead ). AMD doesn't show any indication that it will lower the prices of their 5000 series until next year to. Mix that in with miserable yields at TSMC and you got yourself a recipe for e-tailers and vendors deciding to charge more for the stock they have left. I think come January things will get more competitive, yields will increase and we'll see a return to lower prices and greater variety of cards on multiple price points.

 

[niacine]

I love my 4670 for the price point it's a pretty awesome solution and it allowed me to keep my AM3 build to using only a 500 watt PSU

 

[njalterio]

Cleeve,

Pretty good article.......but like last month you missed the HD 5750 in crossfire!

At $290 for two HD 5750s they trounce the HD 5850 at $310 (and HD 5750s are in stock!).

Check out:
http://www.guru3d.com/article/radeon-hd-5750-review-crossfirex/

 

[soo-nah-mee]

[citation][nom]Semi-Lobster[/nom]Blue team is dead[/citation]
Is this a Larabee reference? If so, lol. There will never be a third party in the graphics world!

 

[superpowter77]

4890 makes my life happier, when I need to play at 1900x1200 or 2560x1600 I can always add a 2nd 4890 card for a killer crossfire setup.
I wish 4870X2 were still available...4890 crossfire setup will easily beat a gtx 295 in Crysis and farcry2(high resolutions)

 

[superpowter77]

4890 makes my life happier, when I need to play at 1900x1200 or 2560x1600 I can always add a 2nd 4890 card for a killer crossfire setup.
I wish 4870X2 were still available...4890 crossfire setup will easily beat a gtx 295 in Crysis and farcry2(high resolutions)

 

[Ramar]

Only one suggestion: the 4770 on newegg is ~100 dollars, and it's definitely worth the 5 dollars in performance on most games compared to a 95 dollar 9800GT and definitely beats a 4830 in all circumstances.

It's gotta be really tough to be an AMD fanboy about now; I'm getting really sick of "Oh this card is going to be AMAZING at ____ price point" and then when the card actually launches they bump up the price and don't produce enough. Just bloody wait!

 

[cleeve]

[citation][nom]Ramar[/nom]...and definitely beats a 4830 in all circumstances.[/citation]

Hmmm. In my testing the 4830 will win a lot of times. not sure why.

Either way, the extra $10 is probably better spent on a GTS 250. When I made the article the cheapest 4770 was $110 tho, so it was an easy choice. now the $100 4770 muddles things up a bit, worth the $5 over the 9800 GT but too close to the GTS 250 for an easy call.

Ah well, it'll probably all be different next month anyway.

 

[Computer_Lots]

I keep seeing Toms articles stating that the Radeon 4670 or the Nvidia 240 are the fastest card without an external power connector. This is not true. There are versions of the 9800GT that do not require it. This isn't some one-off weird configuration by Gigabyte either. I've found at least 10 different cards like this. Here's 1 example...

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=4644389&CatId=3670

I had to go with Tigerdirect since Newegg's site was unresponsive

 

[scryer_360]

Good article, however just a question: how is the GTX 260 tied with the 5770, either in a single or dual card configuration? I agree that performance is almost identical, but the 5770 has a few value adds (like the BD support and Eye-Affinity) that you don't get with the GTX260. Had the 5770 not had these, then yah, a complete toss up. But the fact is those are still valuable.

 

[sledgehammer]

"Despite ATI's new Radeon HD 5890 ?? taking its place as the fastest graphics" ? 5970 I guess ?!

 

[scryer_360]

[citation][nom]Computer_Lots[/nom]I keep seeing Toms articles stating that the Radeon 4670 or the Nvidia 240 are the fastest card without an external power connector. This is not true. There are versions of the 9800GT that do not require it. This isn't some one-off weird configuration by Gigabyte either. I've found at least 10 different cards like this. Here's 1 example...http://www.tigerdirect.com/applica [...] CatId=3670I had to go with Tigerdirect since Newegg's site was unresponsive[/citation]

I sell one of these where I work. Its not some undercut card either: it's performance is near identical to a reference 9800GT in my tests. I don't consider plus or minus .1% significant enough to say that its a "lower performance" 9800GT.

 

[deadlockedworld]

Newegg has the sapphire 4770 for $99 FREE SHIPPING.

 

[eyemaster]

Cards almost impossible to get right now? 4870x2, 5800 series.

 

[dark_lord69]

[citation][nom]falchard[/nom]Lack of research alert. You listed a $200 card for $150. I mean seriously, did you need to create all those new categories so you can squeze in a nVidia. Since nVidia still hasn't dropped prices its only logical in 1 price segment, $100~$130.[/citation]
Yeah, I'd like to know where you managed to find a GTX 260 for $150! If I could get one for that price, I would buy it!

 

[Ramar]

[citation][nom]Cleeve[/nom]Hmmm. In my testing the 4830 will win a lot of times. not sure why.Either way, the extra $10 is probably better spent on a GTS 250. When I made the article the cheapest 4770 was $110 tho, so it was an easy choice. now the $100 4770 muddles things up a bit, worth the $5 over the 9800 GT but too close to the GTS 250 for an easy call.Ah well, it'll probably all be different next month anyway.[/citation]

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/budget-radeon-geforce,2364-18.html?xtmc=4770&xtcr=1 I pulled the 4770 > 4830 concept from this site, check it yourself.

 

[cleeve]

[citation][nom]Computer_Lots[/nom]I keep seeing Toms articles stating that the Radeon 4670 or the Nvidia 240 are the fastest card without an external power connector. This is not true.[/citation]

The fastest *REFERENCE* card without a power connector. This *IS* true.

I believe there is a 5750 from Powercolor coming out in the near future without a power connector. That's probably going to be the fastest card without dedicated power to date, but it will likely cost more than a reference card.

 

[cleeve]

[citation][nom]Ramar[/nom]http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] 770&xtcr=1 I pulled the 4770 > 4830 concept from this site, check it yourself.[/citation]

That's a nice review, but it doesn't really change the fact that in many tests I've done the 4830 will win a lot of times.

 

[cleeve]

[citation][nom]dark_lord69[/nom]Yeah, I'd like to know where you managed to find a GTX 260 for $150! If I could get one for that price, I would buy it![/citation]

Newegg was full of them a week ago when I submitted the review. As I've said many times in the comments and in the review, prices change quickly.

 

[hannibal]

At this moment the prices are really moving fast. Just because they are selling out so many older generation card models. I hope that the next list in the spring is easier to put together.
But in anyway thanks fot the article! The situation is not easy at this moment.

 

[Onyx2291]

Always nice to see an update every month as I might have missed some price drops and I don't always want to compare every single card of a tier against each other as well as prices.

Very useful for the holiday season as well.