Advice on New Graphics Card, want to play Crysis 2 w/ DX11 and HR

Hello! I'm currently in the process of upgrading my computer as it is starting to, in my opinion, fall behind quite a bit. I currently have an ATI Radeon HD 4850 512Mb and I'm looking to upgrade it to something powerful enough to play Crysis 2 at Max Settings with DirectX 11 and the High Resolution Texture pack without dropping to much below 35-40 FPS. Correct me if I am wrong, but I figure this will be a good base for future titles and will keep me settled for the upcoming few years while I am in college.

APPROXIMATE PURCHASE DATE: Sometime after Christmas as I will have the money then (and I am hoping for some Deals) BUDGET RANGE: I am assuming by then I will have at the minimum of $560, but I will be spending at the most $170 on the new CPU (so around $390) Before / After Rebates

USAGE FROM MOST TO LEAST IMPORTANT: Gaming [Crysis 2 (DX11, Max Settings, High Res Textures, Skyrim (With a lot of graphical overhaul mods and what-not), etc], Adobe products (Flash, Photoshop, Premier), Watching Movies in HD

CURRENT GPU AND POWER SUPPLY:

ATI Radeon HD 4850 512Mb
Blue Star 680W 20+4-pin Dual-Fan ATX Power Supply w/SATA & PCIe

OTHER RELEVANT SYSTEM SPECS:

BIOSTAR A870U3 AM3 AMD 870 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX AMD Motherboard
G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL
AMD Phenom II X3 710 2.6Ghz Processor (upgrading to an AMD Phenom II X6 1090T 3.2Ghz Black Edition Processor around the same time I upgrade my Graphics Card)

PREFERRED WEBSITE(S) FOR PARTS: newegg.com, amazon.com COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: United States

PARTS PREFERENCES: No real preference. I am quite fine with both Nvidia and ATI.

OVERCLOCKING: Maybe SLI OR CROSSFIRE: Maybe, but not right now. Motherboard isn't very well suited for it.

MONITOR RESOLUTION: 1680x1050

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: As I have said above, I am looking for something powerful to get me through College. I'm heading off to college next year, and I'd like to not have to touch the inside of my computer during that time. I was looking at the GTX570 and 580, as they seem to be quite powerful cards, but, I'm curious what any of you guys think would be good: either of those, a different Nvidia card, or something from ATI.

Thank you in advance!

Reply to Naezo

at $390 you could very well go for a gtx 570 or a 6970 but at 1680x1050 it seems like a waste of a good card so a gtx 560ti or a 6950 will be more then enough at that resolution.

to give you an example, I have BF3 on high settings at 1920x1080 resolution on my gtx 560 (non ti) and it's staying well above the 30+ mark (this includes the 3.2ghz PIIx4 & 8gb (2x4gb) ram in my machine)

Message quoted 1 times
Message edited by James296 on 12-18-2011 at 09:51:46 AM

Reply to James296

AMD and Nvidia are coming out with new GPU's, nvidia is going to come out with their entry level GF cards first then go up to enthusiast by the end of 2013. If you cant wait, there are 2 options. 1, If you are going for pure power, and dont plan on upgrading your system, and need performance, I would DEFFENETLY go with a 6950(Iv seen them online for $200). DONT get 6970, because the 6950 can be unlocked to same as 6970 (proven, and high unlock rate over 85%). The thing is though if you dont CF, I think you might be disappointed. Or if you are going to spend $390 you could get 2 6950 and have them unlocked to 6970, and that would be more powerful then 6990(Cost around $700). If you look at the site, if 6850 cf is num 1 in Battlefield 2, then a 6950 unlocked to a 6970CF would be.....

2. Go with 570, it doesn't use as much power as 2x6950, and you can add another whenever (its going to be hard to add another 6950, because ur mobo prob doesnt support more than 2). But yeah, you WONT be dissapinted with 570.

this is good comparison-> http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] 818-9.html

6950CF(watch this too)-> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSMhfpS6XTQ

Message quoted 1 times
Message edited by fitimio on 12-18-2011 at 10:31:23 AM

Reply to fitimio

a gtx570 is needed to run crysis 2 with dx11 patch at 1080p smoothly. your cheap and nasty "blue star" PSU will have to go and replace it with something of good quality 650w. the 560ti should be fine for your 1680x1050 resolution though. you wont get much of a boost from upgrading to a 6 core cpu, id just see if i could unlock the 4th core on your current cpu and/or overclock it. 3-4 cores at high clock rate is all you need for gaming

Message quoted 1 times

------------------------------ INTEL CORE 2 Q6600 @ 3.49GHz, CM Hyper TX3, ASUS P5N-D, 8GB DDR800 RAM, Powercolour HD6850, 650w Antec Trupower New PSU
Reply to iam2thecrowe

Forget the 1090T it will not help for gaming. 960T VE or a 965/970/975/980 will be a better buy and free up 20 dollars. Maxing crysis 2 as you say will take a 570/ 6970.
You may be able to do it with a 6950 1GB if you take it easy on the AA.

Message quoted 1 times

Reply to spentshells

I personally have been looking at the info that says you can take a reference 6950 2GB and flash it to a 6970......

Reply to Max1s

James296 wrote :

at $390 you could very well go for a gtx 570 or a 6970 but at 1680x1050 it seems like a waste of a good card so a gtx 560ti or a 6950 will be more then enough at that resolution.

to give you an example, I have BF3 on high settings at 1920x1080 resolution on my gtx 560 (non ti) and it's staying well above the 30+ mark (this includes the 3.2ghz PIIx4 & 8gb (2x4gb) ram in my machine)

Alright, thank you for the info! I may in the future upgrade my monitor (I should have mentioned that earlier), but, again, thank you for letting me know!

fitimio wrote :

AMD and Nvidia are coming out with new GPU's, nvidia is going to come out with their entry level GF cards first then go up to enthusiast by the end of 2013. If you cant wait, there are 2 options. 1, If you are going for pure power, and dont plan on upgrading your system, and need performance, I would DEFFENETLY go with a 6950(Iv seen them online for $200). DONT get 6970, because the 6950 can be unlocked to same as 6970 (proven, and high unlock rate over 85%). The thing is though if you dont CF, I think you might be disappointed. Or if you are going to spend $390 you could get 2 6950 and have them unlocked to 6970, and that would be more powerful then 6990(Cost around $700). If you look at the site, if 6850 cf is num 1 in Battlefield 2, then a 6950 unlocked to a 6970CF would be.....

2. Go with 570, it doesn't use as much power as 2x6950, and you can add another whenever (its going to be hard to add another 6950, because ur mobo prob doesnt support more than 2). But yeah, you WONT be dissapinted with 570.

this is good comparison-> http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] 818-9.html

6950CF(watch this too)-> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSMhfpS6XTQ

I was originally going to go with crossfire, but I ran into a problem when I realized my board has two PCIe x16, but one of them is only at x4 speed. I am worried that would be too much of a hindrance on the crossfire. Though, if it wont be, I'd love to know what the impact would be then. Otherwise, I'll probably go with the 570 based on what you have said.

iam2thecrowe wrote :

a gtx570 is needed to run crysis 2 with dx11 patch at 1080p smoothly. your cheap and nasty "blue star" PSU will have to go and replace it with something of good quality 650w. the 560ti should be fine for your 1680x1050 resolution though. you wont get much of a boost from upgrading to a 6 core cpu, id just see if i could unlock the 4th core on your current cpu and/or overclock it. 3-4 cores at high clock rate is all you need for gaming

Alright thanks! And, yeah, my Bluestar was a quick buy a couple years ago. I didn't realize how much power my current video card drew and it killed the PSU I had. I had forgotten that it was just a cheepy I got.

I have had a lot of bad luck unlocking my CPU (I even just now tried, and it had failed), but, thanks for letting me know! I'm now considering a Quad Core instead.

spentshells wrote :

Forget the 1090T it will not help for gaming. 960T VE or a 965/970/975/980 will be a better buy and free up 20 dollars. Maxing crysis 2 as you say will take a 570/ 6970.
You may be able to do it with a 6950 1GB if you take it easy on the AA.

Thank you, I looked at them and I believe I will be getting a 960T.

---

Basically, I guess my question is this now: would having 1 PCIe x16 at full speed and 1 at x4 hinder a crossfire or SLI config greatly? The motherboard was a birthday gift last month and I had not considered Crossfire or SLI at the time (though now I wish I had), and it is now too late to exchange it. So, would it be better to stick to one card now or would the Crossfire/SLI have only a small performance hit?

Message edited by Naezo on 12-18-2011 at 09:32:09 PM

Reply to Naezo

I wouldn't suggest doing CF at x4.

Message quoted 2 times

Reply to RockNRollz

RockNRollz wrote :

I wouldn't suggest doing CF at x4.

agreed, people always get increased issues with stuttering and low performance when using crossfire and a 4x slot. just stick with a single card.

Message quoted 1 times

------------------------------ INTEL CORE 2 Q6600 @ 3.49GHz, CM Hyper TX3, ASUS P5N-D, 8GB DDR800 RAM, Powercolour HD6850, 650w Antec Trupower New PSU
Reply to iam2thecrowe

RockNRollz wrote :

I wouldn't suggest doing CF at x4.

iam2thecrowe wrote :

agreed, people always get increased issues with stuttering and low performance when using crossfire and a 4x slot. just stick with a single card.

Alright, thank you for letting me know!

So, I've decided I will go with one card, and if, down the line, I come across some money, I will upgrade my motherboard to be better suited for Crossfire or SLI and get a second card. My last question would be what would be the best route to take? 6950 OC'd to a 6970 or the GTX570? I'm leaning towards the 6950 because of price and that it isn't too far from the 570 from what I have seen... but, I could be wrong.

Also, any good brands to go with in terms of benefits/quality/goodies/price/etc.? This will be the second video card I have bought so I don't have much experience with the different companies out there.

Reply to Naezo

what about gtx 560 ti448?

Reply to bharathi521

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