The GTX 260 or 280 - Which will you buy?

[robx46]

Of course I'm talking about the new series of nvidia cards supposedly launching in a week.
I'm sure most of you guys, like myself, have seen the pics and alleged specs for both of these bad boys. I will be upgrading from the eVGA 8800 GTX KO Ed.
And, for really the first time in my life, I do have the choice here of dropping $650 for the GTX 280 if I really want to.

In the past, I've always gone one step down from the best, but a beefed up version. For example as I said I have the 8800 GTX KO. The fastest GTX you can get, basically a vanilla Ultra.

I am a fan of eVGA and will be curious to see what they will offer as far as KO & Superclocked editions, which I'm sure they will do something like that, hopefully right off the bat. Otherwise, I might just go with the vanilla 280.

However, what I was wondering here was if the 280 might be overkill to some extent, bottlenecking my other hardware.
For one thing, I have 2 monitors, don't use dual/clone mode for gaming though. So the highest res I'll be running is single mode 1600x1200 or 1680x1050.

Thus, I definitely don't feel like I will take a performance hit by losing 100mb of vid RAM should I choose the 260, which still has a whopping 900mb! My GTX's 768mb seems plenty right now. So yeah, I think in this case the 260 would be fine.

Then I currently have 4gb of DDR2 800 & an e6600 @ 3.2ghz. Is it possible this cpu could still be somewhat of a bottleneck next to a GTX 280?
I am considering an upgrade to the e8400, hopefully OC to 3.8ghz at least, then get that 2mb more of L2. Just wondering if I really need to do that though.

So this question I ask isn't a question of money, more curiosity and whether others possibly buy the 260 rather than 280 because maybe some of you other guys think the 260 will be more than enough considering that your other hardware might not be super high end. Just curious!

 

[iluvgillgill]

for the money i spend on a premium version of something i simply get the one step higher. because those kind of OC you can achieve it yourself! why give the money to those company? i have never bought anything in a OC form.i just get a stock version and OC it way past any manufactures are offering. im sure there is quite alot of people in this forum that does it.

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

At 16x10, with a 260 you should be able to handle crysis , at least thats whats being said. If your card can handle crysis, what more needs be said? Should be good for 1 year with all eye candy on most yet to be released games. Great chice, and very forward looking as well. One thing. Take a long look at the ATI cards coming out before you plunk your money down as the 4870 should be in the same ballpark as the 260, and cheaper as well. Great time for upgrades are coming soon

 

[invisik]

im going with a gtx 260 it will cost alot less and it isnt much slower then the gtx 280 from looking at the spec. the only way ill pick up the gtx 280 if they price it at 500$

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Look for it to be around 25% slower or so than the 280

 

[invisik]

thats not 2 bad. how much better would a gtx 260 be then a 9800gx2?

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Itll be close. 5 to 10% from what people are saying. But no sli issues, and you can sli these cards anyways, so. Right now, 1 G280 is said to equal Tri sli Ultra. so going on that 10%. Theyre also saying that at lower res, they arent that fast, but who needs faster than 60? The tougher the game tho, you wont see them falling behind either from what the testers have hinted at, or the higher the res as well

 

[iluvgillgill]

apparantly GTX 280 SLI can do 2560x in Crysis.that is something GTX 260 cant do i suppose.

 

[No1sFanboy]

Robx46, I'm running a very similar set up to you and also looking at an upgrade. I've got an e6600 at 3.2 with an Asus 8800gtx that I've been overclocking for gaming and under clocking on start up. I've had the card for over 18 months and don't feel too guilty upgrading. For me though there is no doubt that I'll buy the 280. I will wait a month or so till after the initial gouging settles out.

Back when the 8800 came out I considered settling for the gts but never regretted springing for the gtx; this seems like a similar scenario.

I've been itching to upgrade the processor also but am still waiting for availability/reasonable pricing on the Q9650(want the high multi). In the meantime I built an HTPC with an e8400 to satisfy my curiosity; there is always the option to play musical procs.

 

[invisik]

man y cant they left the nda so we can see benchmarks!!

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Check out chiphell.com

 

[L1qu1d]

I already pre order the 280 GTX lol If benchies don't turn out too be in my taste, I'll just give it back

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Have you upgraded your lcd yet?

 

[invisik]

u can pre-order the gtx 280 already? where?

 

[L1qu1d]

my friend owns a shop lol.

No not yet. I'm shopping for a Sony Bravia LCD TV. I'll just hook up my computer ps3 and wii to it.

EDIT: Still a little scared of the High res lol, but 1920x1200 shouldn't kill my card that much I think.

 

[ovaltineplease]

Of course I'm talking about the new series of nvidia cards supposedly launching in a week.
I'm sure most of you guys, like myself, have seen the pics and alleged specs for both of these bad boys. I will be upgrading from the eVGA 8800 GTX KO Ed.
And, for really the first time in my life, I do have the choice here of dropping $650 for the GTX 280 if I really want to.

In the past, I've always gone one step down from the best, but a beefed up version. For example as I said I have the 8800 GTX KO. The fastest GTX you can get, basically a vanilla Ultra.

I am a fan of eVGA and will be curious to see what they will offer as far as KO & Superclocked editions, which I'm sure they will do something like that, hopefully right off the bat. Otherwise, I might just go with the vanilla 280.

However, what I was wondering here was if the 280 might be overkill to some extent, bottlenecking my other hardware.
For one thing, I have 2 monitors, don't use dual/clone mode for gaming though. So the highest res I'll be running is single mode 1600x1200 or 1680x1050.

Thus, I definitely don't feel like I will take a performance hit by losing 100mb of vid RAM should I choose the 260, which still has a whopping 900mb! My GTX's 768mb seems plenty right now. So yeah, I think in this case the 260 would be fine.

Then I currently have 4gb of DDR2 800 & an e6600 @ 3.2ghz. Is it possible this cpu could still be somewhat of a bottleneck next to a GTX 280?
I am considering an upgrade to the e8400, hopefully OC to 3.8ghz at least, then get that 2mb more of L2. Just wondering if I really need to do that though.

So this question I ask isn't a question of money, more curiosity and whether others possibly buy the 260 rather than 280 because maybe some of you other guys think the 260 will be more than enough considering that your other hardware might not be super high end. Just curious!

If a gt260 is 2x the performance of an 8800 GT, then i'll get two and SLI them. If its not 2x the performance, then i'll go with 2x gt280 - I currently use 2x 8800 GT

But, I won't be buying at least until there are new titles on the market that demand this kind of power. I've already played through Crysis enough

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

@ L1qu1d, Im thinking a 19x12 wont phaze these cards, not for a long while. Sounds like you better invest in the shop owners friendship for the long run heheh

 

[L1qu1d]

hahaha yeah, my dad owns a couple of restaurants haha I need to bring the Computer store owner free food once in a while just so I can get first dibs lol

its how I got my GX2 lol (100$ off).

These new cards better be revolutionary if not, I give up PC gaming and move to console, atleast that way i don't need to upgrade lol!

 

[JAYDEEJOHN]

Rumors are running that these are = to Ultras in tri sli....so if you factor that in, and then with the new resolution, youll be sitting fat for awhile

 

[darktravesty]

One 280 is supposedly equal to three 8800 Ultras in SLI?

 

[ovaltineplease]

One 280 is supposedly equal to three 8800 Ultras in SLI?

Well, as someone else pointed out to me not long ago - a 9800 GX2 with the newest drivers is near equal (literally a handful of frames short) of 2 ultras in SLI

I don't think a gtx280 is going to be equal to 3 ultras, but it might be nigh near close

 

[yipsl]

The 4870 looks good to me, but won't be much faster than my 3870x2, so I'll wait till the fall. Then, I can either go 4870x2 or get a Crossfire motherboard and go CrossfireX.

CrossfireX choices:

4850 + 3870x2

or

4850x2 + 3870x2.

Nordic Hardware reported in February the 4850 will be clocked around 850 (same as my factory overclocked card) and both the 4850 and 3870x2 have GDDR3. So, they should scale decently in CrossfireX without the older card slowing down the newer, which would be the case if I paired it with a 4870x2.

Nordic Hardware's the source for an upcoming 4850x2:

http://www.nordichardware.com/news,7845.html

Yes, the Nvidia cards will be nice, but when I get that 24" LCD and an 8750 (or 9650) for the Gigabyte board I have waiting, I'd rather pair it with an ATI card.

At what resolution do you think the 4870 and GTX260's will be CPU limited? Will they need quads or AMD's mutant triple and 1920 x 1200 to really shine?

 

[romulus47plus1]

Great. Crossfire's real good.
Hope the SLI would achieve something similar(mix and match)

 

[Amiga500]

The GTX 260 or 280 - Which will you buy?

Neither.


I will not support a company that stifles the competition and screws the end user through immoral practices.


I will also never purchase any creative hardware again.

 

[John Vuong]

I'll probably wait for the 55nm refresh, see if thats any better. But if not, I'll guess the 280 GTX.

Though I'm starting to hear from sources that the GT200 series isn't as good as we hoped to be. If thats true, damn you NVIDIA again. Lazy asses, what are they waiting for?