4850 or 4870 @ 1680x1050

The HD4870 512 offers better performance at 1680X1050 resolution then the HD4850 512 by a decent amount.

http://www.guru3d.com/category/vga_charts/

right now the price difference is pretty close. (about $25)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

The Corsair HX520 would be fine for either card as long as you're not crossfiring them.
http://forums.atomicmpc.com.au/index.php?showtopic=264

I'd go with the HD4870 512 at the prices available right now.

it never hurts to get better if its reasonable price difference....a 4870 is definitely Stronger... PSU is ok, but think about later on if you decide to add a 2nd video card, go for something like a 650 so you always have the option, Phenom II being pretty strong, strong card to match it, and a possible 2nd card later for a simple upgrade, can always add more ram too... more food for thought....

cool, thanks for the replies. I'll go ahead and check the local price listing for the price difference between 4850 and 4870.

btw, why are the Corsair HX series offered in *20 W instead of the more common *50 W scaling?

i trade my 4850 for 9800gtx+ in coh phsx game no lag phsyx high ati : phsxy low/off all 4AA 1680p, so 250 or second 260  !!!!

4870 is the way to go. And the HX520 is plenty. I run my rig on a VX450.

Right, thanks for the input. Another question, if I am to add another 4870 for Xfire in say 4 months or so, will the HX520 be able to handle that or should I get HX620? (There's about $20 difference between the two.)

Yeah you should have a min of 650Wats just to be on the safe side.

I run two HD4870 1Gb in Crossfire and I got myself a Corsair 750W PSU

4870 definitely. I have 22" 1680 x 1050 monitor from Samsung and 4870 1GB is breezing on it!

I play L4D, TF2, Bioshock, Mirriors edge, GTA 4

Only in GTA4 and Mirrors edge do I have to reduce the settings slightly.

It seems that the Corsair HX series doesn't have 650 (they have 620 instead). Is there a huge difference between the HX and VX series (in terms of quality and reliability)? I'm asking that 'cause on the PSU tier page only Corsair HX was listed as tier 2, and nothing said about the other Corsair models.

i play on 22" 1680x1050 monitor. my 4850 can crank most games fully maxed out. i play fallout maxed with 8x AA instead of 16x - everything else cranked , view distance, antroscopic etc. its a great card but sometimes i wish i had a 4890. i would wait a little bit more till the 4870 becomes the 4850 and the 4890 drops in price and go with that.

with the way the games are being developed these days, its not all resolution that effects gameplay, its the raw power of the card.

All the Corsair power supplies are tier 2. They are good quality supplies across the board. The HX series are modular, the TX (iirc) are standard and usually quite a bit cheaper. If there's a chance that crossfiring 2 HD4870s is in your future you should get a 750w power supply.

Corsair is very reliable. And the main difference between VX and HX is modular cables. And the HX620 will be enough for 4870 CF if you have a minimal amount of hard drives and optical drives. The HX620 delivers 50A on 12v. The 4870 CF consumes 21A at full load. The rest of your parts do not use more than 25A. So there shouldn't be a problem.

Eh, thats a tough one. Although I would say a VX450 would be plenty for a single HD4870... but 2 might be a different story. the HX520 is one of the highest quality power supplies I know of, although I would probably go with the HX620 just to be safe  . Really, a few extra dollars to ensure your fresh $1G+ system's saftey, is good enough for me.

I have the HD4870 at 1680x1050, and I can max out any game (cept crysis, can only do that at high, noAA) and at least get 100 FPS. I would think it'd be worth the cash over the HD4850 though; turn up the AA!!

Get the 750W. It should only cost about 10$ more, and trust me it's worth it.

Well, the calculator on Corsair website said if I want 4870 CF, than HX620 would be enough, but if I want to do any overclock at all (which I still have no clue how to, and people's advise are to read up and don't do anything until I know what I'm doing) I'll have to get a 750TX.

Anyway, I think I'll go with 4870 and hopefully upgrade the system in a few month after I save up enough to get another 4870.

You really don't need a second 4870 @ 1680 x 1050.

How about the 4890? Not that expensive, but faster than 4870

Don't you think 4890 is an overkill for 1680 x 1050? There's only going to be around 4 fps difference between the two cards...

^ lol... 4 fps between 4870 and 4890? what crack pipe are u hitting nvidia fanboy?

ok, 5 fps, so what?

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-4890,2262...

Here's the benchmark from Tom's before you say anything else.

ok, how about WiC, it's a few pages down and same thing.

Don't tell me to look at game that has 100+ fps, with a 20" LCD with regular refresh rate it wouldn't make any difference anyway.

^+1 It does not matter whether a game has 60fps or 600fps as long as its steady.

You're the one that deserves to be called that.

Hey Dragoon190. 4890 wont make much difference to you.
My DH4870 1GB OCed at 820/1100 by itself is performing as stock 4890.

Where HD4890 comes into play is if you are to Overclock the GPU. Due to the changed VRMs hd4890 can OC a lot. If you look at various sites you'll find that the card Overclocks to around 1GHZ on GPU.

If you are not overclocking save yourself $50 and get a HD4870.

I had one HD4870 1GB and now that the prices went down I purchase d a second HD4870 so I run them in crossfire. I am more than satisfied with its performance.

Cheers

Thanks a bunch, that's very helpful  

Just wondering, though, what PSU (650W or 750W) did you use for your CrossFire system?

Like I said, 4870 CF in full load uses about 22A and the 4850 uses 9A full load. A simple calculation will tell you that if the 4850 can run on a 33A PSU, 4870 CF needs 13A more and the HX620 gives 17A more than a VX450 which is capable of running even a single 4870.

I had a Cooler Master 650W but recently purchased a Corsair 750W, just to be on the safe side.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139006

qft and qft.

For instance: 60FPS in CoD4 has a tendancy to be fairly choppy, as it dips many times a second down to very low FPS (15-30), on the opposite end of things, TF2 (At least I think so) plays very nicely at 30FPS, because it stays very steady.

I personally think the HD4890 would be way overkill for the time being, seeing that there would be very little performance gain at 1680x1050. I would recommend an HD4870 512MB for now  . One can be had for under $140 on newegg, while the cheapest HD4890 is nearly $100 more than that. Also, 1GB of video memory would have little to no effect on performance at that resolution.

Way off topic I know, but is your avatar the Metallica logo with a wave distortion applied?  . Sure looks like it.

Ugh, I hate Crysis benchmarks that use the "medium image quality" setting...especially if they're benchmarking high end cards.

Those benchmarks are absolutely worthless for comparing high end cards.

^+1
And CoD4 60 fps does not dip to 15fps.

Sure it does. I'll upload a screenie as soon as I fix my computer   . This primarily happens in smoke.

Your statement was retarded anyway; it's like saying "Counter-strike doesn't run at 35 FPS". Different rigs get different FPS...

I don't have to prove anything to you.

lol when did I say anything about proving anything to anyone? Usually statements like that mean you got your information from nowhere.

It seems to me you play CoD4 @ 15fps. LoL That's why you talk about tendencies. hehe