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GTX 550 Ti or Radeon 6850?

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Ok, I am somewhat knowledgeable of computer hardware but I am just not sure about this. I know the 6850 is a more powerful card across the board but I just want to be sure before I purchase either card. The games I will mainly be playing are: Skyrim(FTW), Fallout: New Vegas, Fallout 3, Minecraft, and maybe some future games. I am just looking for a GPU that will last me a year or two with playing games on decent settings because I am only 15 and sadly no jobs until this October :(  . I already narrowed my extensive search in GPUs and for price and performance I am really liking these cards. But enough rambling, the questions I would like answered by you kind and gentle people:

Potential problems with the GPUs?
Best card for my specs(refer to below)?
Best compatibility with these games????
etc etc etc etc you get it.

Now for the great high end computer specs(sarcasm)
This is pretty much a stock HP Pavilion p7-1118
Intel i3-2120 Dual Core 3.3 Ghz
8GB of RAM
Use google for the rest lol.
Also, I play on an amazingly high resolution of 1360x768

I am already set on getting a glorious Corsair 600w PSU so no worries there.
Both cards I have mentioned will work with my computer (sadly no chance for crossfire) :cry: 
I plan on upgrading my CPU to an i7-2600 quad core in the future(staying cheap) since it is the best CPU compatible with my mobo and my GPU to a 6950 but that is besides the point.

Someone with experience with either of these cards will be welcomed to describe whether they were satisfied and list pros and cons in excruciating detail for a strange kid on the internet is greatly appreciated.

More about : gtx 550 radeon 6850

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Graphics card Expert

Tukbol, GCN architecture is weaker than VLIW5/4 in DX9 titles, which he will mainly be playing (Skyrim). Jordan, if your budget is about $150 then buy a 6870 because they can be had for $150 and it is faster than the 550ti/7770 and it will overclock past its 900MHz stock clock speed giving you even more performance.

Here's where it gets tricky; 6850/6870 cards are going to start disappearing soon from retail availability meaning if you ever want to crossfire you'll end up having to buy two new cards or one really nice card again. So if you want to crossfire at some point, buy the 7770 but it will be slower than the 6870.

If you do buy a 7770, buy this one (Link: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168... ). It has a more efficient cooler than the one tukbol listed and it will easily get that extra 50MHz. 50 is nothing in terms of video overclocking.

Your CPU isn't that bad by the way.
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Man,if you wanna spend more than $150(not much) for 6870 you can get the amazing 560Ti or the 7850(recommended),also if could find a 6950 and also for the same price as 7850,you can flash it's bios to make it 6970 but at this time they are hard to find.So,Overrall it's the 7850 I recommend and for under $150 or same I would suggest 6870 or 6850.
I hope this helps.

ajaat said:
Man,if you wanna spend more than $150(not much) for 6870 you can get the amazing 560Ti or the 7850(recommended),also if could find a 6950 and also for the same price as 7850,you can flash it's bios to make it 6970 but at this time they are hard to find.So,Overrall it's the 7850 I recommend and for under $150 or same I would suggest 6870 or 6850.
I hope this helps.

I know but I don't have the money and neither do my parents so I have to go cheap for a while until I have the money.
Also, @s3anister finally someone who realizes that you can play games nowadays without a quad core or eight core processor. I can play Skyrim with an average of about 60% CPU usage at the highest. Just had to throw that in there.
Graphics card Expert

lxxjordan23xxl said:
I know but I don't have the money and neither do my parents so I have to go cheap for a while until I have the money.
Also, @s3anister finally someone who realizes that you can play games nowadays without a quad core or eight core processor. I can play Skyrim with an average of about 60% CPU usage at the highest. Just had to throw that in there.

Yeah depending on what games you're playing two cores are all you need and the i3-2120 is an excellent performing gaming CPU. It's too bad it can't be overclocked because I'm positive if it could be OC'd we would see very interesting benchmarks where an i3 is similar to an i5/i7 in performance for games that only use two cores. Regardless, there are no games that effectively utilize more than four cores so six/eight core CPUs are a moot point.
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