Couple of 4870 Questions

Get an x38 board. They're a lot cheaper than X48 and there's not much difference between the two.

Nevermind, turns out I was wrong. X48 > X38 > P45 > P35. Though the X38's lead on P45 isn't much and the differences in the chipsets seem to really show when you crank up the resolution and settings. Understandable I guess.

Linkies!
MadShrimps - http://www.madshrimps.be/vbulletin [...] p35-45871/
Legion - http://www.legionhardware.com/docu [...] id=761&p=0
Tweaktown - http://www.tweaktown.com/articles/ [...] index.html

Indeed, very good links, thanks a lot.

I'm wondering a little on the strong difference between the Legion and Tweaktown tests. The Legion test would seem to indicate very little difference between the two setups, while the Tweaktown review at times shows almost double the performance from the x48 chipset. I wonder if the legion review is limiting all these games by using only a 3 Ghz Q6600, while the Tweaktown uses a 4Ghz Q9650 and gets vastly different results. The Swedish page would seem to agree with the Legion review (assuming im reading it right), but again i feel like it might be CPU capped with a non-OC'd E8500. I'd be curious to see the results with the CPU OC'd to around 4Ghz, since that's what im hoping to do with an E8400.

Also, I'm wondering if the results may change using CF 4870's instead of 4850's. The higher performance cards might want to make more use of the bandwidth and might thus lose more performance, but thats just my uneducated speculation.

Yeah, it definately sounds like a good idea to wait for prices to stabilize before buying. Still curious about the differences among the chipsets, but i suppose more analysis may come out.

I am not too sure if Nvidia has something to compete with the R700. I have heard no rumors of any new card from them. It will be very hard for Nvidia to do a dual gtx280 because of the thermals. The only thing I could see Nvidia doing is lowering prices to compete, but when ATi's 4870 is on the heels of the gtx280, I don’t think the lower prices would help.

The only rumor I have heard was that Nvidia was deliberately slowing down the gtx280 until the HD4870x2 came out. After the R700 is release, Nvidia would release the full drivers that would stop crippling the GTX280 and showing the full potential. I personally do not buy that and think Nvidia has their own HD2900xt on their hands. Over hyped, over promised, no show. Its like a worked Honda Civic; makes a lot of noise, but doesn’t get anywhere.



On another not, is there a reasonable gain for moving to the Q9450? I have a Q6600 B3 and I was thinking of upgrading. All I do is play games, watch movies and stuff like that. I love my quad, but I was considering moving back down to a dual (E8400) if the gains are there. I am also thinking of waiting for Nehalem to release to pick up a Penguin (Penryn) for cheap!