Dual 5770 or 1 5850?

If price is no concern why not just get a 5870 and be done with it?

Honestly I would just get a standard 5850 and overclock it yourself. The only difference between the Black edition and the standard is a factory overclock. With an ATI card you can do this yourself in the ATI CCC Overdrive screen. Also, the 5850 are know to overclock to the 5870 speeds without much issue giving them performance very close to that of a 5870.

Article on some 5850 OC results: http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/radeon-h...

yeah why the hell you wanna buy an old vga card like that anyway? with all these prices ati and nvidia are sparing for advertising to make us buy their new products all you have to do is to search a little.

^What in the world are you talking about?

you know the BIG fight between ati and nvidia.if ati wouldn't sell it's 4000 series so cheap nvidia wouldn't do the same.nvidia is so greedy

^There is not BIG fight. ATI just sold their 4xxx series cards much cheaper than the Nvidia counter parts and it forced Nvidia to cut prices. That was about a year+ ago. ATI now has the 5xxx cards out and Nvidia has yet to deliver their next generation.

The two 5770s would be a little faster, but I say you should go with the 5850 now so that you can add another one latter when you need more power. If you went with the 5770s, you would end up replacing them instead when you found yourself needing more GPU power.

^man 4000 was just the starting ati showed that they can deliver a powerful graphics card with much lower price but in best quality and has continued this untill now with 5000 series
and also you can't deny that nvidia bought physx technology and put an end to the ageia to put it on it's own nvidia cards just for advertising and forcing people to buy nvidia (in earlier 190 ver nvidia drivers when an ati card was detected as primary nvidia physx was simply disabled) you can't deny they are so greedy.

^ +1
Having that 2nd slot open for a future addition is a big plus.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Both cards were just released not too long ago. How are they old?

just read a reveiw @3dguru that puts two 5770s over a single 5850. about equal to a 5870 in most titles. two 5770s are cheaper than 5870 and more available.

Overclock a 5850 = yummy

With a single 5770 unable to do DX11 @ 30 fps on Dirt2, I don't think it's a good investment. I figure what single GPU works now, will work in SLI / Xfire 24 months down the road. A 58xx plays Dirt2 today, two will be needed come XMas 2011.

My vote goes with the 58xx.

Yeah, I'd recommend the HD5850 and OCing it. From what I've read these cards can be overvolted through software and a minor bump in the voltage allows the cards to be clocked up to 1000mhz and higher, beyond the performance of a stock HD5870.
Here's a good article on crossfired HD5750/70s vs HD5850/70;
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/radeon-h...

man i can't believe this.when did i wrote that!??    
sorry folks must have been for another thread  

all i heard was blah blah blah. im an ati fanboy.

go for the 5850 and oc it. with this route you can add another 5850 down the road when you want more power.

I have had both options actually. Since I couldn't get a replacement 5850 I got two 5770's instead.

Currently testing them out, they beat the 5850 quite a lot in 3dmark06 and Vantage. Overclocking is reasonable if nothing to write home about, I reckon 10% over the 850mhz core 1200mhz mem will be good in many cases.

+1 I think you said everything pretty much the way it must be done!

lol +1  

Dual 5770's are superior to the 5850 and 5870 in most games but you have to take into consideration that once it is time to upgrade those GPU's you will hit a wall. If the user is not going to upgrade the 5770's in the near future then I would say go ahead.. If not a 5850 or 5870 would be a wiser choice.

http://www.guru3d.com/article/radeon-hd-5770-review-tes...

Crossfire scaling can be funny sometimes. So a Dual 5770 setup may beat out a 5850 or 5870 in some cases, but a lot of others either not quite get to their performance or not even close. I don't think a set of 5770's blow away a 5870, but there will be times were crossfire doesn't do much for you. This is why I like the single high-end card setups, you know what you get all the time.

congratulations  

like others said 5850 and oc is the best option

Yea but dual 5770's are superior to a 5850 in most games...Thats why they are more expensive. And not really that more expensive. The cheapest 5850 is the diamond at 299.99$ but it is the least prefered as well. A good 5850 is going to cost 320.00$ or above....

There are several models on Newegg at $300 right now. If you buy a Sapphire you get a free $70 PSU with it to.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?Ite...

I just don't like dealing with dual cards and messing around. I'd prefer a 5850 and just OC the thing the best I could.

Yea that is one sweet deal =)

I have seen dual 5770's in action and I have no complaints, maybe to the user that has bad airflow or clearance issues might benefit from a single card setup. I am also looking to purchase dual 5770's unless Nvidia surprises me soon....

^ Just buy a 5870 instead   It's a no fuss card.

Nvidia does not have many surprises these days, besides funny cartoons.

Yea, wish I had 420.00$ to spend on the GPU alone....Right now I am looking at a 320.00$ budget... I want to see the non-reference cards with better cooling.. Anyone know if AMD is going to release these anytime soon?

$400 and a free game, free shipping: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

So get a 5850 and overclock the sucker.

I already have Dirt2 from a previous build. And powercolor is not gettin any of my money... If I get a 5 series it will most likely be an XFX. I only buy cards that have lifetime warranty =) cause I do not get rid of my cards every 2 years.... I was thinking about a 5850 and later on buying a second one for CF.

Bad experience with powercolor?

Yeah if you keep it for over 2 years that isn't such a bad idea. I believe Asus is a 3 yea warranty. But the XFX is $310 so for $10 you get the lifetime warrant, as long as you register the product. I just won't go for any of their OC'ed versions. ATI cards are so dumb easy to OC with the ATI CCC overdrive tool it's not worth it. Just a thought.

Yea, I will buy the regular 5850, not the Oc'ed version. If the GPU is more than 150.00$ i normally go for the Lifetime warranty because since I plan on CF'ing in the future, if one card goes bad after the warranty expires I am left with a bum card... I have had a few cards go bad after 2-3 or more years and I just cannot bear the fact that after all that money spent I would have to throw the card away. If it is a budget card then I dont mind the warranty...I just want my cards to last and not have to deal with any hardships...

I had an issue last year where my niece was playing an emulator on her PC using a 9600GT and the card just gave up... I RMA'ed the card and BFG sent me a sealed 9800GT cause they had no 9600's in stock... So it was a win win situation =) ... When a company treats the customer like that with no questions asked people tend to get attached =)

Is there really any card that you would really care about for over 3 years? To put that in perspective slightly less than 3 years ago the 8800 GTS 320mb launched for $300. If that card dies at this point no one should really shed a tear or be kicking themselves for not spending extra at the time for one with a lifetime warranty.

Well look at it this way, I still have cards that are 5/6/7 years old and they are still under warranty. Meaning if ANYTHING happens to then it is most likely that I will get a much newer card as a replacement since the older cards are not in stock anymore. Second, If i buy a 5850 and later on buy a second I will most likely use both those cards for quite some time and not replace them just cause there is newer tech available. I even have an old AGP card that still works flawless on a 12 year old Dell =) .... So that is basically the reason I do not get rid of my cards every 2-3 years, specially if they were over 150.00$ or more...