GTX 470 or GTX 480?

whats your screen resolution and PSU info?

1920 x 1080

PSU: 750W or 850W Corsair

Mobo? SLI support?
If yes, dual GTX 470 would be great...  

ASUS P7P55D-E Pro LGA 1156 Intel P55 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard

I would go with the EVGA 470 or wait for the 460's and buy 2 of them if the mobo is SLI.

if you have SLI ,it is said that two GTX465 in SLI give up to 90% effeciancy in the second card rather than 50% in most SLI , if it is true then two GTX465 are better than a single GTX480 with the same budget to spend (almost) .but you should research this .

How much of a hassle is it to correctly setup SLI?

I might go for 2 GTX470 over the GTX 480. (Good Idea?)

Also, is my motherboard good with the SLI?

I realize the 2 cards might perform better, but a dual-card setup isn't always wise. You fill your PCI-E slots right away rather than leaving room for later upgrades. Also, it requires more power. All GTX400 Series cards scale with about 90% performance in many games..

What games tie?
I like OvrClkr's suggestions unless you're going to be playing really heavy games at really heavy settings. A 470 is an amazing card, and the 460 is looking very appealing so far. I hope a SLI 460 setup will be a huge bang for the buck.

You could also consider the HD5870 if you're not opposed to AMD/ATI, they run cooler, require less power, and falls (performance wise) right between the GTX 480 & GTX 470 and its typically only $40.00 more than the GTX 470... Just suggesting, If not, i would have to agree with OvrClkr and say that the 470 is a great option.

470 is the best bang for buck solution in nvidias camp right now, but I'd wait til next week to see what the 460s are like

If you're willing/able to spend the money I'd go with the 850W Corsair PSU, and the SLI GTX 470's. That'd be the best performance. Keep in mind, the GTX 470/480's put off a lot of heat. So you'll want good air intake into the PC case to supply them with cool air. So don't skimp on the case/cooling fans.

That being said, unless you're 1920x1080 (MINIMUM) or higher there's not much point in doing SLI with the GTX 470s. So get a good monitor with at least 1080p resolution.

I totally agree with the GTX 470. However, I can't see buying two 460's later on for SLI. If you already have a GTX 470 you might as well just buy a second GTX470 and SLI those.

EDIT: Okay, misread that. Nevermind. Thought you meant to buy a GTX 470 and later buy 460's. Mised the "or" part.  

SLI is a piece of cake. Install two cards. Hook up power connectors (2x 6-pin PCI-E connectors on each card) to both. Connect the two cards with an SLI bridge (may come with motherboard or graphics cards). Install latest nVidia drivers from website. Right click on desktop, go into nVidia Control Panel. Enable SLI. Done.

The P55 motherboards 'technically' will lose some performance with SLI due to using an 8x/8x PCI-E platform. But it's a relatively small performance hit.

Ok, one last question.

If I order my EVGA GTX 470 Superclocked from Newegg.com or Tigerdirect.com, will I still get the free high flow bracket?

The P55 motherboards 'technically' will lose some performance with SLI due to using an 8x/8x PCI-E platform. But it's a relatively small performance hit.[/quotemsg]

Yeah about 99.8% of a 16x,16x board.

Will overclocking my own cause problems with the warranty?

Will 2 GTX 470 SLI fit in antec 902 or should I get Antec 1200?

The GTX 470 is actually smaller than a GTX 260.   So you should be okay.

Personally, I like large cases as they give me more room to work in. Not to mention you can put more 120mm fans in to create a lot of air flow. But that's a personal thing. I went with the Thermaltake Armor (full tower) cause I like having all the room inside. Plus I liked how it looked.  

quite a bit smaller..

Here's the upgrade I just made  

If you're going to be buying the GTX 470 I think it's totally worth it to buy the evga GTX 470 Superclocked +

It goes with a backplate and the highflow bracket. Def worth the extra 20 bucks.

I would spend the extra 25.00$ for the Lifetime Warranty alone. I purchased the above GB GTX 470 back when it came out from the Egg and it was faulty. Not sure if psycho is talking about the same model though.

Good track record :

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

Not so good track record :

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

Correct but my point is why risk it when it all you have to do is pay 25.00$ more for lifetime?

They're giving the high-flow bracket away, not the backplate. Might as well order one that has both, and is a proven overclocker, for the extra 20 bucks.

What is the bracket and backplate u speak of?

And a comparison shot.

yeah saw the review, imo waste of momey, get custom water

Or take a Dremel to the original.

What is the difference between the highflow bracket and the backplate?

Which is which picture?

I haven't got a picture of the backplate but the hi flow bracket is the bottom one.

Thank you everyone for clarifying and educating an ignorant noob.

Backplate on an EVGA GTX 480:



EDIT: Oh yeah, and with no backplate:

Both do ACTUALLY reduce temps by 5-7 degrees when combined (they each do a little)

Hardware canucks has a review

Will cutting the high flow bracket in parts cause problems with warrantee?

Yes

u play dx 11?, if not find cheap 2nd hand 285/295 & use it later as pshyx  

last i knew there was no such thing as a "cheap" GTX 285 or GTX 295 as they are still selling quite well on Ebay and are no longer in production.

Funny thing is that the 460 is putting a hurt on the 465 and 470 so does this mean that we are going to see some NV and AMD price drops soon?

Agreed, and to answer OvrClkr's question, yes, prices will drop across the board on both sides...

The 5870 only matches performance with the 470 IF you aren't running with tesselation enabled, in the case that tesselation is enabled the 400 series GPU's edge out even the 5970 cypress xt's. My old saying when deciding whether to pick nVidia or ATI boils down to this, they both perform similarly under normal circumstances. However the ATI does this task at half the cost....the reason you pay more for an nVidia is because you want all the bells and whistles like surround vision, stereoscopic 3d, cuda, physx, tesselation, etc. it's like deciding whether to buy a toyota or a lexus....if you've got the money to buy a lexus....why would you buy a toyota?


Also pertaining to the 460:465 comparison....I wouldnt drop the 465....I'd drop the 460 and drop the 465 price down to match the 460 as they prepare to release the 475 and 485....makes more sense to get rid of the first version and replace it with the slightly beefed up version....doesnt the 460 have like 768mb of ram? the 465 has 1gb and the price difference to date is almost a moot point as it stands. It would just look better on a shelf as well, 485>475>460? I hear an error buzzer going off somewhere. That's not to mention that the 460 is 192 bit while the 465 is 256 bit....and the hits just keep coming....

Wonder if I can get a backplate for my MSI GTX 470. LOL Any extra bit of cooling surface would be good!!

BTW...just FYI, my setup is housed in a Cooler Master CM690 which has the power supply on the bottom instead of the top....this created a problem with the fitting of the triple SLi bridges....I called EVGA's top level tech support and they told me that the classified edition motherboards do not require an SLi bridge to enable SLi....that may help out when considering case configuration if you own an x58 classified

The reason everyone loves the 460 so much is not only it's price and performance, but it's a GF104 chip resulting in lower power consumption, cooler temps, and lower noise... GF100 generally are none of these. Also, 460's come with 768MB or 1GB, both models are available and the price difference from a 460 to 465 gives you a negligible performance increase.

I did confirm that the 460 is available in a 1gb version, however it is not available with a 256bit memory interface, a 33% increase in memory interface performance is to say the least...more than negligible. Like I said, drop the price to match the 460 so that power to price makes more sense....it's the inevitable marketing idea anyways, nVidia always does this...they release the good and then the budget minded version in a few different series of the same gpu, they eventually market the higher performing gpu at the price of the lower budget one prior to moving onto the next gpu. Example: the 8600GT vanished as the price of the 8800GT came down. I'm sure nVidia isn't in the business of removing the top dogs from their line-up and keep the garbage. as for temperature....that's only a problem if A: you dont know what you're doing, OR B: you're too poor (and in this case you shouldnt be buying 400 series GPU's to begin with).

BTW...just on a side note...the 460 with 1gb of gddr5 @ 192bit costs 224.99 on tigerdirect, the 465 with 1gb of gddr5 @ 256bit on tigerdirect costs 229.99 and the 460 isnt even an EVGA...it's an off brand Galaxy....I'd gladly pay the extra 5 bucks for the 33% increase in memory interface performance and the lifetime warranty that comes with all EVGA products.

Your facts are incorrect. Read a review of a gtx 460 1gb, it has 256 bit interface.

The GTX 480/470/465 use a totally different gpu design than the gtx 460. At 40nm the production process of these more complex chips, creates many imperfect final products. For economic reasons they have to create a business model for these 'imperfect' chips. That accounts for some of these models. The future is unclear how Nvidia will go with future models. The original Fermi, the 480,470,465 is similar to the GPU used in Nvidia Pro Graphics cards. For workstations.

Ha....well slap my *** and call me sally....nicely done....at the end of june when I chose the 465 the 460 was only available with a 192bit memory interface. I do concur with your statement pertaining to the 40nm design and I'm sure revisions will be made....however...that's one more reason I go with EVGA. I have the option to trade in my hardware for revised models. Thanks for the diagram. I still persist that nVidia will address any issues with the 4X5 models to bring them up to date and get rid of the 4X0 models. It's merely a trend they've followed since the GeForce 4000's maybe even further back than that (I didn't buy my first nvidia until the 4000 series lol, I was rocking a VooDoo 3d with the "golden fingers" setup)

Another hardware note that separates the models, you can only do two card sli with the gtx 460. All models have only one sli connector. So tri-sli has to go with the GF100 gpu's.

Well I guess that nullifies any notions of changing to the 460 for me lol....as you can see at the bottom in my signature I apparently have a need for the GF100 chip. I noticed a discrepancy with the polymorph engine abilities from the 100 to the 104....why would the 104 perform slightly better at everything but polymorphing? was the 100 designed for rendering and the 104 for gaming?


also on another side note, I have my clocks set at 750/1500/3600 on the stock cooling system with the 465 and it never really goes over 70 degrees.