Help picking a 100-200 USD GPU

[adamwashere06]

APPROXIMATE PURCHASE DATE: 1-3 weeks
BUDGET RANGE:USD $150-200. Maybe 250 if its going to make a large difference. I would rather not do rebates. I want them to at least be 30 or so dollars before I'd consider them.

USAGE FROM MOST TO LEAST IMPORTANT: I'll be using it for playing current games like MW2 or BF2 but also for the source games. I occasionally like to watch HD movies.

CURRENT GPU AND POWER SUPPLY: GeForce 8800gt with this PSU
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817152035&Tpk=raidmax%20psu%20rx-630ss

OTHER RELEVANT SYSTEM SPECS: http://7805.110mb.com/ADAM-PC.html

PREFERRED WEBSITE(S) FOR PARTS: I like newegg but also have an amazon prime account. Really any place that you guys ave experience with and think is good is ok with me.

PARTS PREFERENCES: Whatever you suggest.

OVERCLOCKING: I would like to overclock if doing so would be reasonable. Not required however. I don't plan on SLIing at the moment but its a possibility for the future I guess.

MONITOR RESOLUTION: 1920 x 1080 and 2 1680x1050. Should I give up one of the 1680s for performance?

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: It may be relevant that I'm currently using 3 hard drives. Not sure how much they draw on the power.



Thanks a ton for any help.

 

[adamwashere06]

Hey thanks for the feedback. Is there any truth to this?

"(6:00:01 PM) Harshboy: people will tell you that the 4870 and 5770 are mostly the same with most games doing better on the 4870"

 

[Raidur]

ATI's cards are all priced well to performance.

If you don't plan on wanting DX11 or eyefinity then the 4890 would be the best right under $200.

For DX11 cards the 5770 is at $150 and 5830 is closer to $250.

 

[Raidur]

And yes, the 4870 slightly out-performs a 5770 in some cases.

 

[adamwashere06]

Thanks again guys. This community is amazing. Such quick responses.

So I'm looking at this card

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150481&cm_re=ati_5830-_-14-150-481-_-Product

Now would I want to stop using one of the 3 screens to boost performance? How much would it help?

 

[flyinfinni]

The 5770 is really the best option for under $200. the 4870 is slightly faster in general, but the DX11 and eyefinity support of the 5770 are worth it. (4890 isn't under $200 anymore as fast as I can find). If you are gonna go over $200, the 5830 is the highest you'll get without going all the way to $300 for the 5850, but generally I feel like the 5830 is not enough faster than the 5770 to warrant the ~$80+ price increase, since you can get a 5770 for $145 right now, although the free AvP game helps that particular 5830 a bit if thats a game you want anyway. I don't think you'd notice the difference of having 1 or 2 monitors just showing the desktop while gaming on the other display.

 

[flyinfinni]

If the extra displays are only displaying the desktop, its not really taking much graphics power to display them. Wouldn't be bad to drop one for gaming, but probably not necessary.

 

[adamwashere06]

flyinfinni you told me exactly what I wanted to know about the difference. If you think its not enough of a difference to warrant the 80 dollar increase in cost then I'll go with the 5770.

Does anyone have a 5770 they suggest? it would nice if it was possible for me to use all 3 screens with it.


Also, if I turn off the other monitors while gaming would that increase the speeds or would I just have to not use the screens all together?

 

[flyinfinni]

Really, IMO the 5830 should be called the 5790 as its closer to the 5770 than the 5850 in performance, but the price is closer to the 5850 than the 5870. At closer to $200 it would be a good buy. For the 5770- the particular brand doesn't matter too much. I think you can get a Gigabyte for $145, though that might have a 10MIR, so probably better to just go for the cheapest from one of the better companies (XFX, Sapphire, Asus, HIS, etc.) Just avoid Diamond or Powercolor in general.

 

[flyinfinni]

The problem with eyefinity is that two of his displays are 1680x1050 and the other 1920x1080. Eyefinity has to be the same resolution across the displays, so it would probably be really distorted trying to play across all three, plus the need for a displayport adapter.
If the OP wants Eyefinity, its probably worth jumping to the 5830, but then it'll throw an extra $100 onto the price for the active DP adapter.

 

[builderbobftw]

I disagree with the 5830.

It's crap.

People think just becuase it's slow, It has a good OC headroom, but the truth is that it's clocked faster than the 5850.

(Jsut has fail shaders)

 

[adamwashere06]

I don't plan on doing any eyefinity. The 24 or so inches on my main display is plenty for me

regarding this card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127490&cm_re=5770-_-14-127-490-_-Product&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-RSSDailyDeals-_-na-_-na&AID=10521304&PID=3463938&SID=

Do I have PCI 2.1 ? Or 2.0? How could I tell?

 

[builderbobftw]

the 5830 is not crap, its just overpriced

Overpriced.

Slow.

Power hungery.

Hot.

=Crap.

5770 owns it all day

It's 50$ more, and all ^, and like 6% faster,

Yipee.

 

[adamwashere06]

PCI-E x16 is all backwards compatible so if you can run your 8800GT, you can run the 5770

I think I'll get that card then.


Does anyone have any objections?

If not I'll take this chance to thank all of you. You all provided a lot of great advice and you did it in an amazingly timely manner. I don't know which one of you to pick for the best answer.

 

[adamwashere06]

Best answer selected by adamwashere06.

 

[Raidur]

+1 on the 5830 being overpriced. I thought that card was supposed to fill a market gap not abuse it. :/

 

[flyinfinni]

+1 on giving the best answer to Raidur;-)

Raidur- exactly! lol. It would be about right, and a nice filler, if they called it the 5790 and priced it at $200.

 

[builderbobftw]

^ Would need to be 175$ to be a decent idea.

50$ more is to much considering the high heat, low OC headroom, and massive power sue compared to the 5770.