5850 Upgrade dilemma

[dxwarlock]

Usually picking a good upgrade path for parts is a easy path to walk..this Time I seem to be double guessing all my choices. so figured ID ask around.

I just upgraded my q9550 to an i5 2500k. and can tell my 5850 is the bottleneck in some games now.
Looking to upgrade, but it seems any choices to get a appreciable fps boost is a $350+ card.
There are some that is an 'upgrade' for sure. but cant see spending 200-250 on a card, that only really gives 3-5 FPS boost over what I have now. And i cant do SLI, as it seems everyone stopped making 5850 cards. and the ones I CAN find for sale are different brands and ref boards. (always skeptical of mixing 2 different brand and board cards of the same series..only have one experience of trying it..and didn't work at all)

Anyone have a good suggestion for upgrade path to match well with the i5 2500k?

 

[Warmacblu]

Your best bet is to just wait a few more months and see what the HD 7000 series brings us.

 

[hameem 1]

OR get the GTX 570 or the HD 6970 !! FTW !!

 

[Warmacblu]

The only cards that would be a worthy upgrade would be a GTX 580, GTX 590 or HD 6990. Anything lower than that would not be worth the money. I am assuming you want to stay with AMD, in which case waiting is your only real option unless you really want to spend money now.

 

[dxwarlock]

Brand isn't that big a concern..NV or AMD works for me.
and what I was thinking. only 580 or 6970-6990 is a upgrade worth a noticeable difference. just dumping that much into a new card is a leap of faith hoping the "value of performance" difference between what i have is worth the cost.

 

[Warmacblu]

Take me for example, I have a GTX 275 which is okay but I want a little bit better performance so I am going to purchase a GTX 570 or GTX 560 Ti 448. For me it's a worthwhile upgrade, but you have a perfectly good graphics card right there. If I were in your shoes, I would definitely wait for the HD 7000 series.

 

[swifty_morgan]

there's more to performance than FPS. I still use a q9550 for my main gaming machine. I had a 5850 on it. I went to a 6950 2gig card and it was the best move I could have made.... price/performance. you have an upgraded machine. It should really sing in that. stay away from the 1gig cards. you'll do to yourself what the 5850 is doing now.

 

[dxwarlock]

Best answer selected by dxwarlock.