best video card around the €150 mark?

vibe666

my new build is just about done, bar a decent graphics card so i'm wondering which way to go.

i'm thinking that just caue 2 is looking pretty good and after playing the demo at low res with all the details off on the radeon 4350 512mb i got to get my system off the ground, i want to see what its supposed to look like.

i'm thinking the budget should be aroud the €150 mark as i'm looking for respectable results without breaking the bank on something too crazy as it wouldn't get that much use to justify spending more than that.

current specs of the system are (all from komplett)

Upgrade Kit Intel - Core i5 750 (LGA1156, P55 chipset, 4GB)
Cooler Master Real Power M 620W
ASUS Radeon HD 4350 512MB DDR2 Silent
Corsair SSD Reactor Series 2,5" 60GB
24" 16:9 BenQ LCD

the card i have in mind right now is the ASUS Radeon HD 5770 1GB GDDR5 which looks like offering me the price performance ratio i'm after, but i wanted to check with the experts if they thought it would be up to the job.

i've heard rumours of nvidia bringing out new cards pretty soon and i was wondering if it would be wporth hanging on, even though i'm pretty desperate.

i'm wondering if there will be much offerings worthwhile from nvidia in the price range i'd be looking at, or maybe ATI will bring down prices to increase competition maybe?

not sure if thats likely to happen in a timeframe i could cope with waiting for though.

any advice?

thx.

youcancallmeal

For €150 an ATI 4890 or a second hand GTX280 would probably be your best option. The 5770 is an okay card but you would get more bang for your buck with the above mentioned cards. Another thing to note is the 5770 supports DX11 so if Just Cause 2 can take advantage of that it may look a little prettier!

The new nVidia cards won't be out for a while and they may be a flop which means ATI won't be pressured to drop prices, in fact even if they arent a flop ATI arent under any pressure to drop prices.

vibe666

thanks Al, i was thinking DX11 would be the deciding factor tbh.

JC2 is indeed a DX11 (and DX10) only game, so i think i mightget a bit more oomph with a DX11 capable card and at this stae i'm not sure if buying a non-DX11 card is a good idea.

if i'm going to be playing a few games on it, they will likely be newer ones so the DX11 compatibility would likely be a good thing to have.

Blazer

Forget about dx11 games..any new card you buy for €150 is gonna be crap anyway. And very few games will support DX11 for at least another year.
Way better off to get a GTX280 or ATI 4890 etc.
In fact prices are dropping all the time for second hand cards.
I recently sold my Geforce GTX295 for €190 only a few weeks ago.
I see ATI 4870's 1GB going for €110 so you'd be mad to instead spend the money on a second rate card.
In fact look at the card below..
It's an overclocked 4890 with the toxic cooling for €130...
Hands down this will beat any new card you get for 150.


http://www.adverts.ie/showproduct.php?product=201976&cat=8

There are plenty of other similarly priced cards on there.

marco_polo

Yeah don't think the HD5770 really has the grunt required for demanding, high res, high detailed DX11 gaming anyway so I wouldn't consider that as a great reason for getting it (Ultimately depends what sort of games you will be playing of course).

As you cannot afford a 5850 card currently (few can, me included:o), I too would look to get a DX10 card like the 4890 and look to upgrade to Dx11 in a year or more when the more powerful DX11 cards finally drop in price a little.

vibe666

sorry, should probably have mentioned i'd be looking for something to buy new, not secondhand and most likely from somewhere like komplett (pickup point 5 min walk from my job) and somewhere where i can get a vat receipt and a lot of the DX10 cards are already disappearing from komplett's shelves already.

Solitaire

Then a HD5770 it is, unless you can find (and have a PSU capable of handling) a HD4890. And on that note you can forget DX11 for the moment. At least until you can get a HD5850 for €150! (if only! )

lmimmfn

Solitaire wrote: »

Then a HD5770 it is, unless you can find (and have a PSU capable of handling) a HD4890. And on that note you can forget DX11 for the moment. At least until you can get a HD5850 for €150! (if only! )

you can overclock the 5770 beyond stock 4890 performance, overall its a much better card, low power, no noisy fan and its DX11( ok so wont run DX11 uber but if it runs DX10 as well as a 4890 when overclocked and dirt 2 performance will still be great in DX11, it also has the option of being much much better than a 5850 when crossfired ).

If i had the choice i would easily get a 5770 over a 4890 expecially when the crossfire option is available if needed later.

Solitaire

lmimmfn wrote: »

you can overclock the 5770 beyond stock 4890 performance

PICS OR GTFO!! :P

In theory you'd just need to crank up the memory speed to, oh, 7.8GHz I'd like to see WC try! :P

No, seriously, I would. Because at this rate a HD5770 will be going in my next build and I want to see if its worth watercooling the memory as well as the GPU!

lmimmfn

Solitaire wrote: »

PICS OR GTFO!! :P

In theory you'd just need to crank up the memory speed to, oh, 7.8GHz I'd like to see WC try! :P

No, seriously, I would. Because at this rate a HD5770 will be going in my next build and I want to see if its worth watercooling the memory as well as the GPU!

lol, i can only giving you the general opinion from reading around the forums. They are insane overclockers, thing is the new ATI cards have too much mem bandwidth( i.e. a 5850 wont gain much if anything in performance with the mem above 1100 even if the core is at 1000 ), while the 5770 is gimped a bit in that respect i doubt it needs insane mem OC to keep up with the core and in which case i doubt you would need water cooling on the mem, however......

If you get a reference card( make 110% sure you get a reference card ) so that the voltages can be increased in MSI Afterburner or whatever then the sky is the limit and maybe if you want to go uber WC might be the choice. On air though with a voltage OC and maxing out the core and mem it will easily beat a 4870/4890( even comes close to 5850 performance but struggles at higher resolutions )

Solitaire

Surprised - Cypress (or whatever they're called) always seemed a bit gimped clock-for-clock compared to their bigger brothers and even the last-gen GPUs. Although there were rumors that some sites *cough*Toms*cough* gimped the benches again... :rolleyes:

lmimmfn

Solitaire wrote: »

Surprised - Cypress (or whatever they're called) always seemed a bit gimped clock-for-clock compared to their bigger brothers and even the last-gen GPUs. Although there were rumors that some sites *cough*Toms*cough* gimped the benches again... :rolleyes:

clock for clock they are gimped but the reach much higher clocks, ill get some proper first hand info tomorrow and see how far they go.

Toms HW has gone to crap since the takeover, i stopped posting there

Solitaire

Wonder why they're gimped given there are few core alterations since the RV790 - most of the big changes were to deal with TSMC's 40nm issues and the side effects of those were more about increasing cost and power requirement than reducing performance. Logically a HD5770 should equal a HD4890 if the memory bandwidth was un-gimped! The HD58*0s seems much closer to the last gen clock-for-clock; a HD5830 OCd to 850MHz should roughly equal a HD4890 (yes I know it has 40% more shaders but they're persona non grata thanks to the lack of contributing ROPs!).

Now that's an idea for a board partner: make a non-reference HD5770 with a 256-bit bus! :eek: Unless AMD physically capped it...

vibe666

okay, i'm feeling a bit left out now. so what's 'gimped' then?

i'm thinking its got nothing to do with leather suits and face masks?

any yes, the thought had occured to me that if the gpu wasn't quite up to scratch at any stage down the road that it wouldn't be too hard to just buy another one in use as a pair.

I just ordered the Asus HD 5770 1gb CuCore from komplett anyway so fingers crossed i should have it in my sweaty mits in time for the weekend and some full on JC2 action.

if anyone is interested in the results i can run some benchmarks when its up and running. what's the best software to use for that these days? (its been a long while since i needed to benchmark anything)

nd

pixmania have the 1gb 5770 for 129

too late I know now that you've it ordered

http://www.pixmania.ie/ie/uk/4122063/art/sapphire-technology/radeon-hd-5770-1-gb-gddr5.html

Bodhan

Sorry to blunder in here, but what's a reference designed card?

youcancallmeal

A reference graphics card is a basic version which hasnt been branded by a 3rd party company (e.g. ASUS, EVGA, BFG etc). So for example a reference ATI 4890 would just have the stock cooler and ATI branding

Bodhan

youcancallme>al wrote: »

A reference graphics card is a basic version which hasnt been branded by a 3rd party company (e.g. ASUS, EVGA, BFG etc). So for example a reference ATI 4890 would just have the stock cooler and ATI branding

is that a better card to have than a branded one? I mean is there a difference?

marco_polo

Bodhan wrote: »

is that a better card to have than a branded one? I mean is there a difference?

In general board partners make changes to the reference design, add better cooling, slightly higher memory and gpu clocks etc, so apart from the occasional hiccup the cards from the branded cards tend to be much better, especially after a couple of revisions.

Solitaire

youcancallme>al wrote: »

A reference graphics card is a basic version which hasnt been branded by a 3rd party company (e.g. ASUS, EVGA, BFG etc). So for example a reference ATI 4890 would just have the stock cooler and ATI branding

Not quite; the reference cards would have the stock cooler buried under a mountain of silly stickers so you can hardly call them "unbranded" :P

So long as all the stuff underneath the branding is the same as normal its most likely a reference card. A non-reference card has altered cooling or PCB layout. The first is fine but the second (usually revealed by changed colour or more likely shape and size of the main PCB) can reduce costs or improve reliability, but sometimes at the cost of high-speed stability, which appears to have happened with the HD5770. Even overvolted Asus cards have been hitting a brick wall around 900-920MHz while naff reference cards have been known to exceed 1GHz on occasion.

lmimmfn

Reference cards of new tech cards are much much better, reason is to increase yields they allow voltage setting through software( to allow them to reduce volts if they need to to increase yields ). Extremely important when overclocking and can get so much more out of the card( basically the voltage regulators are better ) if you can overvolt from software, non reference cards replace these with the ones with fixed voltages.

A more expensive card like the Toxic 5850 which has mega cooling etc. is gimped over the stock 5850 because it doesnt allow overvolting whereas a reference card will

Same with nvidias 260, the 192SP one required more power but also allowed software overvolting, the newer 216SP 260 while a much better card overall( on power consumption and performance ) had this removed.

A mate bought a 5850 toxic but i get much better performance from my cheaper 5850 with overvolting.

lmimmfn

Oh feck forgot to mention TRY NOY TO GET REV B 5770's, they dont have software overvolting. They overclock great but the software overvolting will allow a greater OC.

There are now 3 versions( dont ask me where the names come from lol ):
Rev 1 - batman - http://idhp.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/idhp-AMD-ATI-Radeon-HD-5770-and-5750-DirectX-11-GPUs-1.jpg
Rev 2 - egg - http://www.neths.it/images/XFX_HD5770_3.jpg
Rev 2.a - and whatever the new one is called - http://i40.tinypic.com/2vikrd1.jpg

I put those revs on myself as there are only 2 revs( batman and the new ones, egg and the latest one with a different cooler ).

Only the Rev 1 above supports software overvolting.

Rev 2 and 2a apparently are super quiet, if thats youre thing.

Solitaire

If I got a Rev1 it'll be getting some cheap WC gear...

I know about the Rev2, was avoiding it as it seems to be a cheapy cut-down version based on the HD5750's PCB design.

lmimmfn

Solitaire wrote: »

If I got a Rev1 it'll be getting some cheap WC gear...

I know about the Rev2, was avoiding it as it seems to be a cheapy cut-down version based on the HD5750's PCB design.

haha nice one, 2 5770's in crossfire outperform a 5850 by quite a marigin on stock, overclocked they should run like demons lol, but yeah the new revs are more like the cut down 5750's which sux, cost cutting no doubt( prob why they removed software overvolting also, as the 5850 fan is quiet enough and the fan is not needed tbh until you open it up with overvolting )

they are dual slot cards so you would want slim WC.

Id love to WC but im too clumsy and would destroy my rig haha

Just as an example with overvolting on my 5850 i can hit 21000+ in Vantage( without physx ), without it and with overclocking it hits around 18600, thats with the 10.3 beta drivers. Quite a margin. Max i can hit with Physx is 22100+

vibe666

lmimmfn wrote: »

Oh feck forgot to mention TRY NOY TO GET REV B 5770's, they dont have software overvolting. They overclock great but the software overvolting will allow a greater OC.

how do i know which one i've got?

it's the one in tis pic



i've got it now anyway and it's in the pc and performing well (by my standards) so i'm happy enough for the money.

stuck on just cause 2 and stuck everything up to max detail and it looks pretty amazing on my 24" 1080p LCD.

so my final system specs are (all from komplett):

Intel Core™ i5 Quad Processor i5-750
MSI P55M-GD45, P55, Socket-1156, DDR3
Kingston ValueR. DDR3 1333MHz 4GB
ASUS Radeon HD 5770 1GB GDDR5
Cooler Master Real Power M 620W
Corsair SSD Reactor Series 2,5" 60GB
plus a 1tb sata drive for data that I rescued out of a dead usb enclosure.

i think its time to go home and play some more just cause 2!

lmimmfn

vibe666 wrote: »

how do i know which one i've got?

it's the one in tis pic



i've got it now anyway and it's in the pc and performing well (by my standards) so i'm happy enough for the money.

stuck on just cause 2 and stuck everything up to max detail and it looks pretty amazing on my 24" 1080p LCD.

so my final system specs are (all from komplett):

Intel Core™ i5 Quad Processor i5-750
MSI P55M-GD45, P55, Socket-1156, DDR3
Kingston ValueR. DDR3 1333MHz 4GB
ASUS Radeon HD 5770 1GB GDDR5
Cooler Master Real Power M 620W
Corsair SSD Reactor Series 2,5" 60GB
plus a 1tb sata drive for data that I rescued out of a dead usb enclosure.

i think its time to go home and play some more just cause 2!

very nice system btw, congrats
It looks like you have the newer cooler, but a modified one with that cross shape on top of the fan, its worth a try checking the software overvolt anywat.
You'll know if you can software overvolt buy downloading MSI Afterburner, install it, in the install directory there will be a file called MSIAfterburner.cfg. Edit it and at the end of the file there is:
[ATIADLHAL]
EnableUnofficialOverclocking = 0
AccessibilityCheckingPeriod = 0

change it to:
[ATIADLHAL]
EnableUnofficialOverclocking = 1
AccessibilityCheckingPeriod = 0

Save and run MSI Afterburner and see if you can slide the Core Voltage slider, click apply and make sure it doesnt reset. If it doesnt reset you've got a cracking overclocker .

vibe666

lmimmfn wrote: »

You'll know if you can software overvolt buy downloading MSI Afterburner, install it, in the install directory there will be a file called MSIAfterburner.cfg.

thanks.

will the MSI tool still work with an Asus gfx card (on an MSI mobo), or do i need to get an Asus version?

i reduced the detail on JC2 a bit to pick up the framerate a little and it's as smooth as silk now, rather than just decent.

lmimmfn

vibe666 wrote: »

thanks.

will the MSI tool still work with an Asus gfx card (on an MSI mobo), or do i need to get an Asus version?

i reduced the detail on JC2 a bit to pick up the framerate a little and it's as smooth as silk now, rather than just decent.

yeah MSI Afterburner works for every card, its done by the guy who does Rivatuner and MSI wanted everyone to be able to use it( free advertising for them after all ), its a great tool though. link - http://downloads.guru3d.com/MSI-AfterBurner-1.5.1-download-2497.html

vibe666

installed it and made the config change but the core voltage thing was still greyed out.

i did find an option in the settings under safety properties for unlock voltage control and that enabled it.

i slid it all the way from 1125 to 1350 and hit apply and nothing exploded.

how do i know if it's worked?

what would you recommend I do based on what it's at now?



changing the voltage didn't seem to have any effect though, but then i don't really know what i'm looking for.

lmimmfn

vibe666 wrote: »

installed it and made the config change but the core voltage thing was still greyed out.

i did find an option in the settings under safety properties for unlock voltage control and that enabled it.

i slid it all the way from 1125 to 1350 and hit apply and nothing exploded.

how do i know if it's worked?

what would you recommend I do based on what it's at now?



changing the voltage didn't seem to have any effect though, but then i don't really know what i'm looking for.

oh yeah i forgot that changed for version 1.4, yeah if you check the Unlock voltage control tickbox in the properties it will aloow voltage changes.

The voltage control makes higher clock speeds stable as it has more juice
It seems to work for you, heres an example of someone overclocking the 5770 : http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/255932-29-help-overclocking-5770
hes using voltage 1125, 900 core and 1425 on mem( maybe try 900/1350 first and test if its stable ).

just keep increasing the mem and core until it crashes, then increase the voltages more( making sure the max temps while gaming never go above 79C ), and test with some games. Rinse and repeat until you get the max for everything while staying below 79C. Once you find the max, decrease it slightly on mem and core while leaving the voltage, that will increase stability.

I get on average 15-20% performance improvement in all games with my 5850 and overclocking it with the voltages and mem/core.

vibe666

cool, i'll give it a go this evening when i get home.

i know this is a totally arbitary scale, but it's quick and accessible without having to download anything.

I'm quite liking that the slowest part of my system now is my super nippy SSD.