GTX 260 or HD 5870?

[Darcy 63]

I am upgrading from a dual core Nvidia 7950x2 (vista 32) to and HP i7920 2.66hz (Win 7). I know I should spend more on the CPU but right now I am going with this one. I have spent a lot of time reading the posts about the 5870 and the vsync problems and I totally confused. Would I be best to get the GTX 260 or would the ati 5870 make me happier. Also would I see quite an improvement in FPS and overall smoothness? I know I will never be able to run the sliders full. I run REX, GEX, radar contact, TrafficX LDs 767. Thanks for any helpDarcy

[Guest stranex]

I am upgrading from a dual core Nvidia 7950x2 (vista 32) to and HP i7920 2.66hz (Win 7). I know I should spend more on the CPU but right now I am going with this one. I have spent a lot of time reading the posts about the 5870 and the vsync problems and I totally confused. Would I be best to get the GTX 260 or would the ati 5870 make me happier. Also would I see quite an improvement in FPS and overall smoothness? I know I will never be able to run the sliders full. I run REX, GEX, radar contact, TrafficX LDs 767. Thanks for any helpDarcy

Hi Darcy, not sure if it's any help but I seem to be having problems with my Gigabyte Gtx260 super o/c running on an i7 860 and Win7 64. Not saying it's neccesarily the card but I do suffer from the following no matter which driver I'm using.....Stuttering when fps slider set at anything other than 60 with vsync set (not having vsync results in much tearing)Autogen being drawn at close distance no matter what slider/cfg settings I haveI'm sure a lot of gtx260 users are very happy but I've not had good results...so far.....

[Darcy 63]

Thanks, anyone else having good or bad luck with the GTX 260. How about those with the 5870 what are the issues. ThanksDarcy

[ahsmatt7 1,199]

Thanks, anyone else having good or bad luck with the GTX 260. How about those with the 5870 what are the issues. ThanksDarcy

Everything was going great with my setup on my old monitor with my max res being 1280x1024. I upgraded to a full HD monitor now running 1920x1080. MY GTX 260 is well.....eehhhh. Id rather have something with my pop. Autogen does come up quite close and ground textures always are blurry except right under the plane. That may be how FSX runs the LOD radius thing but mine is set at MAX. I have an OCed i7 920 and 9Gigs of RAM. Its slow though. ALL in all, Id go with the best buy or best card you can get....save up if you have too. Hope I could help.

[Guest stranex]

Everything was going great with my setup on my old monitor with my max res being 1280x1024. I upgraded to a full HD monitor now running 1920x1080. MY GTX 260 is well.....eehhhh.

Hmmmm, what do mean exactly by ehhhhh?!? What problems ate you seeing with the gtx260 and what make/model is it? Starting to think my rash decision to get the 260 rather than wait for the 275s to come into stock was the wrong thing to do!

[ahsmatt7 1,199]

Hmmmm, what do mean exactly by ehhhhh?!? What problems ate you seeing with the gtx260 and what make/model is it? Starting to think my rash decision to get the 260 rather than wait for the 275s to come into stock was the wrong thing to do!

I was seeing great perf. from FSX and other titles like crysis, farcry2 and others and after the switch, It cut the perf. by half. I know since the resoultion is higher it has to work harder but a graphics card like this shouldnt have that big of a drop....should it? its the ASUS model.

[TheFamilyMan 279]

I was seeing great perf. from FSX and other titles like crysis, farcry2 and others and after the switch, It cut the perf. by half. I know since the resoultion is higher it has to work harder but a graphics card like this shouldnt have that big of a drop....should it? its the ASUS model.

You've increased the number of pixels your gtx 260 must to process by 88% when you switch to a 1920x1080 monitor, which is a pretty big hit. That large increase will definately wreak performance havoc for AA processing and other stages of the 3D rendering as well. Unless your gtx 260 was breezing by in the 100+ fps, it's no wonder that it took such a performance hit. Go check hardware review sites, such as TomsHardware, to see how their tests of gtx 260s faired at different resolutions.BTW I upgraded recently to a 22" 1680 x 1050 rather than a 24" 1980 x 1080 mainly to minimize the performace hit on my system when it had a 8800 gts 512. I sure hope others realize this when they upgrade to wide screen monitors.

[Guest Nils79]

I'm a happy GTX260 user and i see no difference if i reduce the resolution in FSX (first monitor @1920 x 1080, second monitor @1680 x 1050). But at the moment i would wait until the new Nvidia cards have been released and then i would decide if they are worth a try and the existing cards should become a little bit cheaper.

[Tabs 2,790]

I just got a smoking deal on a GTX260 SP216 to replace my 4870, I will let you all know how it is when it gets here.

[jwenham 1]

260 superclocked user and very happy with its performance.

[TheFamilyMan 279]

Note that the GTX 260 comes in two flavors: 'plain' and '216'. I'm not even sure the 'plain' is still being shipped; it has less shader processors and its performance is somewhat weaker.

[TechguyMaxC 516]

The original GTX 260 with 192 shader processors (SPs) used the original GT200 chip, which was manufactured on TSMC's 65nm process. The newer 260 has 216 SPs and uses the GT200b chip, which is manufactured on TSMC's 55nm process. You'll be hard-pressed to find any original GTX 260s for sale new right now. Even the 55nm GTX 260s are starting to become hard to find.

[Guest Nils79]

maybe soon on Ebay :(

[Tabs 2,790]

Got the 260 today - extremely happy with it. The image quality is far and away better than it was with the ATI 4870 - having properly working AA that eliminates the tree shimmer and stuff is huge. FPS is about the same as it was with the ATI, but I wasn't expecting a boost there, just in IQ, which it definitely delivered on.

[Darcy 63]

Great Thanks for the input. After going back and forth I have decided to stay with Nvidia and buy the GTX 260 with my new system.Thanks everyone for your help!Darcy