Search
Sign in with
Sign up | Sign in
Solved

ATI 4770 CF vs 5850

Tags:
Last response: in Graphics & Displays
Share

:hello: 
I am planning to upgrade my system to increase gaming performance:

CPU: AMD Athlon II x3 435 (triple core 2,Ghz) although I am not intersted in changing it CPU right now
Motherboard: Asrock N-68S
GPU: XFX Radeon HD 4770
Power supply: 550W with 2x 6-pin PCI-e Connectors (I do not know the name)
RAM: 2x Kingston 1GB DDR2 RAM

To be brief I am currently trying to decide between 4770 CF and 5850 But there is a problem:

my motherboard is not crossfireX compactibe, so I am going for the 477 CF I`ll have to change motherboard. I could get an MSI 790XT-G45 for about 100$. If I go for the 5850 I won`t need a new motherboard at all and I would get DX11, but I really need those 2 extra RAM slots plus some other features and extension slots that my current motherboard does not have.

Price of 4770 + new motherboard should be about 210 $
Price of a single 5850 would be 300 $
The performance of 2x4770 should be almost equal to a 5850. If I go for with the CF 4770 I will save some money and increase RAM and I get a CrossFireX compactible motherboard

By the way, my monitor does not support resolutions higher than 1280x1024

More about : ati 4770 5850

Register or log in to remove
Motherboard Expert

Absolutely no point in either CF4770's or a single HD5850 as both are completely overkill for your system.

A HD5750 or HD5770 is more than enough + Your CPU will bottleneck even a HD5750 so it would be completely pointless to get anything better

Best solution

Motherboard Expert

His CPU is fine, don't know why you would say that. OCing it is a decent idea though.
The reason he doesn't need 2 HD4770s or an HD5850 is that his resolution is very low so they are entirely unnecessary. Really the HD4770 should be quite good for that resolution. The most you should be considering is Ebaying your current HD4770 and grabbing an HD5770.
As for the motherboard if your goal is 4 gigs of ram then once again I would say your best plan is Ebaying what you have and just buy 2x2gb sticks.
In the end you'll probably be spending about $150 I would think.
Motherboard Expert

Oh yeah, if that PSU isn't a particularly good brand then crossfiring even a rather low power card like the HD4770 might be asking a bit much from it.
Related ressources
Ask the community
Motherboard Expert

my bad, in his orginal post it says "AMD Athlon II x3 435 (triple core 2,Ghz)" So I assumed his CPU was just 2Ghz (because I really didn't have a clue what clock speed a x3 435 has)

Turns out its 2.9Ghz and so its fine and dandy :p 

That was helpful but I am still considering upgrading my motherboard as it gives me more upgrade options especially crossfire X capability which would be very useful whatever card I decide to buy

My 4770 is good enough for now, so there`s no need for me to replace it immediately. I`ll wait until I save more money to buy a better card and a new monitor (and a power supply if I really need it)
Motherboard Expert

Well ideally for a new motherboard you will want the latest chipset which is the 890GX;
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=E...
It is DDR3 however so you will have to ditch your current ram. I'd recommend one that says USB3.0 so you have the latest standard for everything. Also with some of these boards you can attempt to unlock the fourth core of your processor so you may want to look into which ones are capable of such.

My power supply is:
http://www.hkc-europe.com/showPro.asp?ArticleID=391

I didn`t want to switch to DDR3 because I`ve read on multiple websites that is not much faster than DDR2 while being much more expensive.
Regarding the unlock of the fourth core It would be great, however I don`t know how "safe" will it be for my computer to run with CPU which has a defective core enabled
I would really appreciate having USB-3 slots but those boards tend to be more expensive
Motherboard Expert

The point of unlocking the core is to see if it is defective. If not there's no reason not to use it. If it is you'll want to turn it off again. Some of those chips are even a Deneb(Phenom II) core and the extra cache can be enabled as well. This feature isn't exclusive to the 890GX so you can get a board that can let you do so even with the older chipsets.
The price difference is between DDR2 and DDR3 is fairly small at this point. As for the performance difference if you get some DDR3 1600 with good timings the performance difference should be 5%+ I believe.
The new chipset also uses SATA III(6 gb/s) while the others use SATA II(3 gb/s)
Motherboard Expert

Forgot about the PSU. It only has 24 amps on the +12v rail which is very low for a 550w. You'll definitely want something better for crossfire. It can probably handle an HD5770 though if you want to go that way.

I decided to get a motherboard with DDR3, USB 3.0 and DDR3 RAM as described above although I have not decided on any specific model yet

I am rather confused about the power supply. In all power Power Supply Calculators I`ve tried the total power I need resulted being within 550W even at full load and my power supply is almost new

I`ve just got some good news right now. A frind of mine just bought an Nvidia GTX 480 and he is giving away his Sapphire 4770 for only 85$. Anyway I`m creating another thread about the power supply. This thread is almost over now
Motherboard Expert

What do they cost new there? $85 seems like a bit much for a used HD4770.
The problem with your power supply is that it is a very poor brand. Like I said earlier that amperage on the +12v rail is very low for a 550w(+12v is what video cards use for power.) For an example here is a 380w PSU from a quality manufacturer;
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...
It has 32 amps on the +12v rails, much higher than yours despite the supposed 550w rating and I wouldn't recommend crossfiring with that PSU either.

I bought my 4770 for 95 euros (almost 130 $) not much time ago. 85$ would be cheaper even than ordering it online (without shipping) and his 4770 is in good conditions

Well I`ve done some some research and now I got this:
Radeon 4770 draws 80 watts at max. Regarding to the formula a single card should need 80 watts / 12 volts = 6.7 Amps
Crossfire 4770 needs 6,7 Amps x 2 = 13.4 Amps on the +12V rail
CPU consumes 95W so it should need about 7,9 Amps
It remains the RAM and HDD, but I don`t really know how much power do they really consume but I don`t think they will draw much

My system does not have a lot of devices connected ( CPU, 1xHDD, 1xDVD-R and 2x RAM sticks) No additional PCI cards, no power-hungry large coolers or LED`s and I`m not intersted in overcloacking either

Anyway you probably know more than me about this

Ok, F. it I`m going to get a job next month as soon as I finish exams. And with the money I`ll earn + the ones I`ve saved I`m going to buy some high-end components
Power supply + motherboard + RAM
And a monitor of course I have any money left
Register or log in to remove
 
Ask the community
Read discussions in other Graphics & Displays categories
!