- Apr 29, 2006
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I've decided to make this post after a discussion I had with some people on Tom's forum. We were talking about whether the GTX 260/280 is a "good" card. Since its been released, not everyone has jumped on the bandwagon proclaiming the GTX “god among cards”. I put the numbers from Toms review into a spreadsheet, did some math, and present the finding to you today. I have put the spreadsheet on RapidShare, so if you feel like checking my math, feel free to do so.
http://rapidshare.com/files/123444679/280_and_260GTX_review.xls.html
Let me start this off by saying if I have any “fanboy” tendencies, I lean towards AMD/ATI. This may explain some of my thinking, but I think/hope I've managed to keep it in check for the most part. The first thing we should do is decide what makes a good card. A good card will show several traits. First, it will introduce new features, that it can actually use, at a certain price point. The 9700pro was a good card. It was the first from ATI that could use DX9 code. The FX5200 was not a good card. Although it was the first low end card that could do DX9, it couldn't really run the games at a fast enough pace. That honor went to the 6200, so you could call that a good card. I hope you see what I mean by this. Second, it will at least equal (but preferable pass) the previous generations scores. For example, many people were happy with the 7600GT, because it not only passed the 6600GT, it passed the 6800GT. And used less power. Many people were also not happy with the 8600GT, because it wasn't much faster then the 7600GT, and couldn't pass the 7900GS. Third, if you combine these two “rules”, you will see that the good cards will offer much better price/performance ratios compared to the old cards. Last, a good card might offer some other benefit. These might include lower power usage, more Vram, new display ports or interfaces, etc.
Lets start by looking at the 1900x1200 picture, and see what comes up.
This might look a little weird, I'll get to the colors in a bit. Most of the columns should be ok, but let me explain the “high end” columns, J and K. Frankly, I couldn't decide what the old “high end” cards should be. 9800GTX? 8800U? GX2? I eventually decided that the GX2 is a separate case, and should be dealt with as such. I still couldn't decide which was better, so I simply averaged the 9800GTX and 8800U together. (column L) Most of the time, this have little effect on the outcome, but it does change a bit when at 2560x1600 with AA/AF on. If you start with J, you can see how the 260 compares to the 9800GTX/8800U. It certainly meets the second condition, as it is (mostly) faster then the old high end. Sometimes by as much as 15-20%. Notice the weird low score in FSX, this is probably a driver issue. Still, at this res, the 260 looks good. If you move down to where they apply AA/AF, it looks even better. The GTX cards don't take as large a hit in performance when applying AA/AF as compared to the older cards. You can see this it true because now the 260 is ahead by ~25-45%.
If you move on to the 280, it should be the same story, just bigger percentages. Indeed, the section with AA/AF shows the 280 to be 50-60% faster then the old high end cards. These new cards are more powerful then the old high end cards, at least at 1900x1200.
The story changes a bit when you compare them to the 9800GX2. (or older 8800 cards in SLI.) The 280 is basically as fast as the GX2, the 260 10-15% slower. The situation does improve a bit with AA/AF turned on, as the 280 is now 5-10% faster, and the 260 is not ~10% slower. Ok, now look at columns B-G. If the scores where <30FPS, I colored it red. White cells are 30-60FPS, and blue ones are anything over 60FPS. This isn't important at this res, but its important later. What you should be looking for is any time the new cards are a higher color then the older cards. This means that buying these new cards will allow you to run a game at a higher res, or add AA/AF while the other cards can't. Compared to the old cards, this never really happens. It does happen on Grid, but thats about it. If you turn on AA/AF, it happens most of the time. If you compare it to the GX2 however, even if AA/AF is on, it nearly never happens. The only time it does happen is in one game, Grid.
Moving on to 2560x1600, what changes? If you look at the old high end cards, the 260 is still ~20%, the 280 is still around 50%. If you look at the GX2 scores, the 260/280 is gaining. The 280 is now 10% faster, while the 260 nearly caught up to being its equal. If you look at the colors however, its pretty easy to see that the GX2 probably provides the better game play, as it spends more time in the blue then the 260, or even the 280.
Its only until you turn on AA/AF that the GX2 falls apart. It might have two fast GPUs on those cards, but they are still limited to 512MB frame buffers. You simply can't turn on 4AA at 2560x1600, you don't have the room. This is true on Crysis, and Unreal3, as all cars that have 512MB or less per CPU score a zero. At these settings, the 260 spends most of its time in the red, and the 280 half the time in the red. Even these cards are barely able to handle this. The zero's throw the math off horribly, I'm not sure I'd even bother looking down there.
Its hard to look at price/performance ratios because price is always changing. These are new cards, and they haven't hit their “sweet spot” yet. The 260 does appear to be a good card. At 1900x1200, it beats the old high end cards, and allows more time in the white/blue. Its 10-15% slower then the GX2, but at the current time that card costs ~$50 more. If you are looking to upgrade, either the 260 or the GX2 would be a good card. The 280 can beat the GX2 with AA/AF turned on, but the GX2 is MUCH cheaper then the 280, so the 280 is a hard sell for me. Frankly, from what I'm seeing here, I'm not impressed with the 280.
The same is true for 2560x1600. The 260 has nearly closed the gap with the GX2. The colors show that the GX2 probably allows for smoother game play seeing as it can hit 60FPS in half the game while the 260 can't in any of them, but the 260 does a little better with AA/AF on. Again, its a little close, but as long as $50 is what separates these cards, then its going to come down to which you can get a better deal on. With AA/AF on or off, the 280 does a great job compared to the GX2, but I'm not sure its $200+ better.
Features wise, I'm not sure of many new ones in the 260/280. I believe they share the same video decode engine, and both support the same level of DX. The biggest new thing that people might notice is the ability to MASSIVELY download and save power. If there is a simply $50 price difference between the GX2 and the 260, depending on how much your power costs, you might recover the costs fairly quickly.
Well, there you have it. Sorry for making such a long post, but I really felt like doing this. I do feel that your probably better off with the GX2, but the 260 is a “good” card. Much faster then the 9800GTX/8800U, while nearly keeping pace with the GX2. If the price comes down a bit more, or the GX2 meets its EOL, the 260 isn't a bad replacement. The 280 OTOH is simply to much money for what it provides.
http://rapidshare.com/files/123444679/280_and_260GTX_review.xls.html
Let me start this off by saying if I have any “fanboy” tendencies, I lean towards AMD/ATI. This may explain some of my thinking, but I think/hope I've managed to keep it in check for the most part. The first thing we should do is decide what makes a good card. A good card will show several traits. First, it will introduce new features, that it can actually use, at a certain price point. The 9700pro was a good card. It was the first from ATI that could use DX9 code. The FX5200 was not a good card. Although it was the first low end card that could do DX9, it couldn't really run the games at a fast enough pace. That honor went to the 6200, so you could call that a good card. I hope you see what I mean by this. Second, it will at least equal (but preferable pass) the previous generations scores. For example, many people were happy with the 7600GT, because it not only passed the 6600GT, it passed the 6800GT. And used less power. Many people were also not happy with the 8600GT, because it wasn't much faster then the 7600GT, and couldn't pass the 7900GS. Third, if you combine these two “rules”, you will see that the good cards will offer much better price/performance ratios compared to the old cards. Last, a good card might offer some other benefit. These might include lower power usage, more Vram, new display ports or interfaces, etc.
Lets start by looking at the 1900x1200 picture, and see what comes up.
This might look a little weird, I'll get to the colors in a bit. Most of the columns should be ok, but let me explain the “high end” columns, J and K. Frankly, I couldn't decide what the old “high end” cards should be. 9800GTX? 8800U? GX2? I eventually decided that the GX2 is a separate case, and should be dealt with as such. I still couldn't decide which was better, so I simply averaged the 9800GTX and 8800U together. (column L) Most of the time, this have little effect on the outcome, but it does change a bit when at 2560x1600 with AA/AF on. If you start with J, you can see how the 260 compares to the 9800GTX/8800U. It certainly meets the second condition, as it is (mostly) faster then the old high end. Sometimes by as much as 15-20%. Notice the weird low score in FSX, this is probably a driver issue. Still, at this res, the 260 looks good. If you move down to where they apply AA/AF, it looks even better. The GTX cards don't take as large a hit in performance when applying AA/AF as compared to the older cards. You can see this it true because now the 260 is ahead by ~25-45%.
If you move on to the 280, it should be the same story, just bigger percentages. Indeed, the section with AA/AF shows the 280 to be 50-60% faster then the old high end cards. These new cards are more powerful then the old high end cards, at least at 1900x1200.
The story changes a bit when you compare them to the 9800GX2. (or older 8800 cards in SLI.) The 280 is basically as fast as the GX2, the 260 10-15% slower. The situation does improve a bit with AA/AF turned on, as the 280 is now 5-10% faster, and the 260 is not ~10% slower. Ok, now look at columns B-G. If the scores where <30FPS, I colored it red. White cells are 30-60FPS, and blue ones are anything over 60FPS. This isn't important at this res, but its important later. What you should be looking for is any time the new cards are a higher color then the older cards. This means that buying these new cards will allow you to run a game at a higher res, or add AA/AF while the other cards can't. Compared to the old cards, this never really happens. It does happen on Grid, but thats about it. If you turn on AA/AF, it happens most of the time. If you compare it to the GX2 however, even if AA/AF is on, it nearly never happens. The only time it does happen is in one game, Grid.
Moving on to 2560x1600, what changes? If you look at the old high end cards, the 260 is still ~20%, the 280 is still around 50%. If you look at the GX2 scores, the 260/280 is gaining. The 280 is now 10% faster, while the 260 nearly caught up to being its equal. If you look at the colors however, its pretty easy to see that the GX2 probably provides the better game play, as it spends more time in the blue then the 260, or even the 280.
Its only until you turn on AA/AF that the GX2 falls apart. It might have two fast GPUs on those cards, but they are still limited to 512MB frame buffers. You simply can't turn on 4AA at 2560x1600, you don't have the room. This is true on Crysis, and Unreal3, as all cars that have 512MB or less per CPU score a zero. At these settings, the 260 spends most of its time in the red, and the 280 half the time in the red. Even these cards are barely able to handle this. The zero's throw the math off horribly, I'm not sure I'd even bother looking down there.
Its hard to look at price/performance ratios because price is always changing. These are new cards, and they haven't hit their “sweet spot” yet. The 260 does appear to be a good card. At 1900x1200, it beats the old high end cards, and allows more time in the white/blue. Its 10-15% slower then the GX2, but at the current time that card costs ~$50 more. If you are looking to upgrade, either the 260 or the GX2 would be a good card. The 280 can beat the GX2 with AA/AF turned on, but the GX2 is MUCH cheaper then the 280, so the 280 is a hard sell for me. Frankly, from what I'm seeing here, I'm not impressed with the 280.
The same is true for 2560x1600. The 260 has nearly closed the gap with the GX2. The colors show that the GX2 probably allows for smoother game play seeing as it can hit 60FPS in half the game while the 260 can't in any of them, but the 260 does a little better with AA/AF on. Again, its a little close, but as long as $50 is what separates these cards, then its going to come down to which you can get a better deal on. With AA/AF on or off, the 280 does a great job compared to the GX2, but I'm not sure its $200+ better.
Features wise, I'm not sure of many new ones in the 260/280. I believe they share the same video decode engine, and both support the same level of DX. The biggest new thing that people might notice is the ability to MASSIVELY download and save power. If there is a simply $50 price difference between the GX2 and the 260, depending on how much your power costs, you might recover the costs fairly quickly.
Well, there you have it. Sorry for making such a long post, but I really felt like doing this. I do feel that your probably better off with the GX2, but the 260 is a “good” card. Much faster then the 9800GTX/8800U, while nearly keeping pace with the GX2. If the price comes down a bit more, or the GX2 meets its EOL, the 260 isn't a bad replacement. The 280 OTOH is simply to much money for what it provides.
I was going sli em, but QUad exchanges blows with them both with sli and tri-sli
, I thought it was my computer that was the problem lol but The 280 underperformed in most games. In non sli profile games (Grid Rainbow Vegas 2 etc) it killed the GX2, but not by much around 20-30 fps.
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