Comment Thread for GTX 480 and GTX 470 Reviews

[SKYMTL]

Sky: Just confirm....when you were running th GPU "looping" you were using "Auto Fan Speed" correct?

Bingo!

 

[rjbarker]

^^^ Yeah that says it all right there, hell if I ran my 280's looping GPU Benches such as Vantage or Furmark with "Auto Fan" I can guarantee I'd be in the mid 90c range for sure.....it all makes perfect sense really

 

[belgolas]

My 260's can reach 90c in furmark on a hot day. I believe my old 4870 could reach 90c too. The 4870x2 I had could reach the same as the GTX 480.

Truth is you are never going to get the same temps running just a game. Furmark runs 10-20c hotter than any game.

 

[rjbarker]

Truth is you are never going to get the same temps running just a game. Furmark runs 10-20c hotter than any game.

Exactly and would you leave your Fan Speed at "Auto"? I doubt it....I've got several Profiles set-up in Precision....and when I run Furmark I crank it up to 100%....if you don't, of course your going to have heat issues

 

[CREllis]

I’d just like to say Hi. I am brand new to the forums, and I would like to get a few opinions on which direction I should go in. I will first like to apologize to the ATI supporters, that I still have a bad taste in my mouth from my previous issues with ATI Drivers. I understand that there are some good reasons to chose an ATI card right now, I… just… can’t… do it.

I am currently on a 32-bit Vista Operating System
E8400 @ 3.5
3GB of ancient DDR2 RAM
8800 GTX SLI
On a 780i Board

I was thinking of upgrading to Windows 7 64-bit
1 more GB of DDR2 RAM
And either: GTX 260 SLI or a single GTX 470

The questions are:
two GTX 260s or the GTX 470?
Does my CPU and/or RAM hamstring my system enough to warrant an entire rebuild? (Not really into doing that right now)

My 8800s are finally starting to show their age, and I’m thinking in the $300-400+ range to spend on the card(s) to replace them.

I’m not really into benchmarks. I want to see pretty and playable games.

[EDIT: Forgot the other information that might help you help me make a decision]: I play on a 24" 1920x1200

 

[ipaine]

Exactly and would you leave your Fan Speed at "Auto"? I doubt it....I've got several Profiles set-up in Precision....and when I run Furmark I crank it up to 100%....if you don't, of course your going to have heat issues

Hell my 8800GT gets up to 74 or so even with my dual slot cooler if I just leave the fan on auto, and that is just playing Dragon age. I can't imagine letting it run furmark with just the auto setting.

Now I just have to figure out how to get another $200 squeezed out of the normaly budget and into my computer budget, without my wife noticing. Then the 470 will be mine. :biggrin:


Oh I'm sure I have said this before, but if not I'll say it again, great job on the review Sky. :thumb:

 

[burebista]

And Sky, any comment on whether or not ATI throttles FurMark? I have been reading that in a few places.

I'm not SKY :bleh: but if they said that it's probably true.

For Cypress based cards, AMD has hard-wired the protection and has implemented a hardware solution to the VRM problem, by dedicating a very small portion of Cypress’s die to a monitoring chip. This chip monitors the VRM. If the chip detects a dangerous situation (overload), the chip will immediately throttle back the card by one PowerPlay level. Once the dangerous situation has disappeared, the card goes back to its performance level.

TBH I don't mind if nVidia will do the same. For me it looks like throttle on Intel CPU's.
I don't "play" Furmark or Linpack TBH. :biggrin:

 

[YukonTrooper]

Well, I gave in and put in my first pre-order for anything, ever. I'll have a GTX 470 in my rig just as my finals end. If I pre-ordered quick enough and I'm near the front of the line, that is. I went with the PNY for that reason, though, since they're a less popular brand. GTX 260 216 for sale in ~3 weeks!

 

[belgolas]

I’d just like to say Hi. I am brand new to the forums, and I would like to get a few opinions on which direction I should go in. I will first like to apologize to the ATI supporters, that I still have a bad taste in my mouth from my previous issues with ATI Drivers. I understand that there are some good reasons to chose an ATI card right now, I… just… can’t… do it.

I am currently on a 32-bit Vista Operating System
E8400 @ 3.5
3GB of ancient DDR2 RAM
8800 GTX SLI
On a 780i Board

I was thinking of upgrading to Windows 7 64-bit
1 more GB of DDR2 RAM
And either: GTX 260 SLI or a single GTX 470

The questions are:
two GTX 260s or the GTX 470?
Does my CPU and/or RAM hamstring my system enough to warrant an entire rebuild? (Not really into doing that right now)

My 8800s are finally starting to show their age, and I’m thinking in the $300-400+ range to spend on the card(s) to replace them.

I’m not really into benchmarks. I want to see pretty and playable games.

[EDIT: Forgot the other information that might help you help me make a decision]: I play on a 24" 1920x1200

It all depends. Do you want DX11 and good performance or do you want slightly better performance with dual 260's? Dual 260 will performs better but does not have DX11.

I would go with a 470 as it is just 1 card and if you ever wanted to later you could possibly get a second if games started to be too demanding.

 

[sideeffect]

They "overclocked the architecture"? What in the world are you talking about? It naturally runs hot. If you don't like that, keep your ATI card and stop finding reasons to justify your purchase even after a faster card is released.

I'm not justifying my purchase and have no need to. I also buy Nvidia cards if they are better. I could even sell my current card for as much as I spent on it new. Just in my opinion something is not better just because it performs slightly faster at stock speeds while using 50 - 100% more power depending what review you believe and running a lot hotter. It is also easy to surpass the performance of the 470 using a 5850 at a mild overclock and the power consumption and heat generated is still a lot lower.

Also you were comparing Auto fan speeds using the ATI cards as well the difference is that the ATI card fans were running a lot slower and quieter and still managing to keep the cards cooler.