ATI 4850 or Nvidia 9800 GTX

Hello I was going to buy one of the graphics card stated above, ATI HD 4850 or Nvidia 9800 GTX.

Which one do you think i should get?

I'll be playing:

Crysis for sure
RTS games such as World in Conflict and Starcraft 2 when it comes out
Call of duty games mainly World at war and the upcoming Modern warfare 2

Q6600 @ 3.0 GHZ
4 GB RAM clocked at 1066
600 Watt power supply, plenty of power for either card
X-fi Titanium sound card
Currently a 9500 GT

did i leave anything out?

1680x1050 is the resolution i would run at.

I was leaning on the 4850 looks like it has slightly faster clock rates while its a bit cheaper, also it seems it can run really cool and have good OC potential with custom fan controls setting them at around 50% am i correct? My speakers are always VERY loud so fan sound doesnt bother me one bit, its always masked by the video game sounds so i dont care if it makes alot of sound at higher fan speeds.

With either one of those cards running at that res..... Crysis, not gonna happen at a reasonable setting to see what the game has to offer. You'll be playing at 1024x768 with some settings on medium. You have some decent hardware. Why dumb it up with a soso card ? Get a 1gig 4870 ( minimum ), a 4890 1gig or a GTX260/275. A 1gig 4870 is only $150 right now.
And I think you forgot to mention opsys......... but that doesn't change my opinion.

You obviously have your heart set on the 4850. If that's whAt you want, buy it. I had a 4870/512 card and I used it @16x10 to play Crysis......... take it from somebody who's been down that road........... get a 1gig card like I posted above. I have had 8 higher end cards and many mid range and low end junk go through my hands so far this year. Take my advice........ screw the 4850.

i always sort of cringe when i see 2x4850... or 4850x2.

its like, the budget card that decided not to be budget. its messy.

except when its not. that card pops up with more problems than any other. (4850x2) seriously. the forums are full of people with issues.

This should make your decision a little easier.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814161244

+1 swifty. 1680x1050 is worthy of a 1 gb card.

Normally I would let this drop but........... I game at his resolution and That card isn't enough for many games. And newer games are going to be more demanding........ Try and say they're not.
And if he wants to take your word for it... ( somebody who buys one card every few years and thinks it's the best in the world because you don't know any better )..... well then he's going to screw himself. COD4 isn't that demanding. All you have to do is read benchmarks covering a slew of mid range video cards. What happens 6 month's from now when the next great game comes out and the 4850 card tanks because his hardware can't handle it ? Play at 800x600 with all the goodies turned down ?? Get real here.
I wish the 4850 would be a diamond in the rough. I'd have 2 in cross fire right now. But I know what my needs are and those cards can't give it to me. Why should I encourage him to piss his money away on sub par hardware ?

Ummmmmm Hi Mr Swifty, I think the 4850 just a little..... or just a tad i should say is better than just a mid range card dude. I mean common that card has some really good ratings.

Ok swifty you made your point. But all those cards on those charts are great cards no matter which ones are faster.But for people who like to build nice solid computers with a bad economy at least here in the U.S. the 4850 is the way to go.

The expense isn't totally true. I have an MSI Lightning running at 675/2200+. At 1680x1050 on enthusiast settings in Crysis I can use 8aa and not get a hiccup. ( card has 1792 video memory ) At 16Q it spits and sputters like an 896 card without aa enabled. The card cost me $300 when it first came out.

a GTS 250 is good. find one.

Apparently you are, since theres only 2 choices and you picked neither. LOL.

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/ [...] 0#t1967816

swifty, your above post tell me you are more concerned with settings than gameplay...so go ahead and waste your money. Just don't expect the rest of us to give bad advise to someone else to follow your lead. I don't think you have any hands on experience with a 4850. I build systems, I have tons. I would not recommend it for high resolutions, but 16 x 10 and lower it is a great card. (and if you run two of them you will be bottlenecked by other things at that resolution) I will not lie and say it will run crysis on the absolute highest settings, but as I have pointed out several times in this thread, neither will any graphics solution under $1000....and that is in a system costing much more than the OPs with a faster cpu, ect. And its just not worth it to spend that much more for just the handful of games that won't run at the highest settings at that resolution. If you do happen to get one of those games that won't run on the highest settings its very simple to tweak down the AA and AF or other settings to achieve smooth gameplay, which is what most people are after. Some people want bragging rights and 100fps when 60fps looks exactly the same, but I'll assume the original poster is not one of them.
For some reason you seem to be under the impression that 16 x 10 requires tons of graphics memory....it does not. It is still a fairly low res, and 512mb of gpu memory will be fine in a decent system. You don't really see memory scaling until 19 x12 and above in most games. I would look around for all the reviews and comparisons, but I think no matter what evidence we give you will keep arguing your point, so its useless.

Where is Mr Swifty at? I just wanted to tell him i bought my second HD 4850 today for my upcoming build . And for joshbad if you haven't decided yet, i still think you should go for that 4850 my friend.