ATI 3870 - Cheap!, Low Power!, and still has Full Performance!

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by TteFAboB

Any recent nVidia card will give you trouble on some older games.

I have an 8800 on this PC only because there wasn't a comparable Ati product at the time I purchased it, but I'm keeping ATI on my second computer to be able to run all my old games with no glitches.

No problems here so far. I have the GF8800 GTS and I do play some older games once in a while and have had no problems. Games like Close Combat series, Deus Ex, Homeworld 2, Morrowind and few more.

[TteFAboB]

The games that glitch are X-Wing:Alliance and Rainbow Six Covert Operations. At least that I know of. There must be some misterious way to fix it, like you can fix the Radeon 9800 glitch with Medieval 2 TW by disabling the Smart A.I. feature or whatever it's called. I just never bothered searching for the solution, since I might aswell just play these on an ATI.

[SUBMAN1]

Interesting:



That is why you get such a FPS boost in Crysis on Nvidia. :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

Read the results here - http://iax-tech.com/video/3870/38705.htm

-S

[Rockin Robbins]

Subman are you trying to help people here or trolling? The answer seems quite obvious. Successful trolling comes from finesse. No biters here. I suggest baiting up at Bass Pro Shop.:rotfl:

The links are in the thread for people to make an informed choice. Even the wrong choice is a good one, so everybody wins. That's supposed to leave everybody happy.

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by Rockin Robbins

Subman are you trying to help people here or trolling? The answer seems quite obvious. Successful trolling comes from finesse. No biters here. I suggest baiting up at Bass Pro Shop.:rotfl:

The links are in the thread for people to make an informed choice. Even the wrong choice is a good one, so everybody wins. That's supposed to leave everybody happy.

No - I just read a forum full of people saying the 8800 GT kicks the butt of the ATI. That is BS too me due to the fact that every score shows it being about the same.

Then I came across why it supposedly works so much better in Crysis - NVidia (who is know for this sort of BS - they've been doing it for ages) disables something in their drivers to get a FPS increase over ATI. It's an old trick.

ANyway, this now explains my first post as to why the ATI looks so much better. On the plus side, I just found out the 8800 GT is capable of the same visual quality as the ATI (WHich I didn't previously think it was). But on the down side, I found out the FPS increase is due to trickery.

So, that does more to turn me off to Nvidia than the fact that the improvement in quality does to turn me on.

How does that knowledge effect you? It effects me negatively. That is why I posted it.

-S

[Dowly]

TBH, I dont see ANY difference on the water in those two shots. Nor have I noticed any difference on the crysis' forums where there are screenshots of both ATI & NVIDIA cards used. So, this said, what Nvidia did to boost the FPS is perfectly fine with me, like I said, I see no difference between the two.

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by Dowly

TBH, I dont see ANY difference on the water in those two shots. Nor have I noticed any difference on the crysis' forums where there are screenshots of both ATI & NVIDIA cards used. So, this said, what Nvidia did to boost the FPS is perfectly fine with me, like I said, I see no difference between the two.

That is because no one gets to sit side by side and play it it on the two different platforms. That is like me telling you that XYZ color exists, but you have never seen it, so you have no idea that you are missing it till someone told you.

It is a lighting / reflection thing. Kind of an important thing in my book. You can have a similar effect by lowering some of your detail settings to medium in game.

You can enable it to take a look by simply renaming your exe. Rename it to something else than crysis, and the NVidia driver won't pick it up. THis way, you will once again be able to play with full quality.

-S

[Nightmare]

Originally Posted by SUBMAN1

You can enable it to take a look by simply renaming your exe. Rename it to something else than crysis, and the NVidia driver won't pick it up. THis way, you will once again be able to play with full quality.

-S

I'm not even really sure you'll need to rename the exe. In the Nvidia control panel you can specify different driver settings per exe file. The latest drivers added a Crysis profile. Tweaking that profile can probably turn the "optimizations" off.

I don't currently own Crysis so I can't test this theory.

The difference in quality between ATI and Nvidia; I have compared the image quality between my friends AMD rig running a x1950XT and my current machine with the 8800GTS at the last LAN meet I was at (running side by side). The image quality in Half Life 2, Doom 3, and FEAR was almost identical with the exception that I could push the AA and AF harder on my machine than he could.

[Dowly]

Here's a quick test I made with the original Crysis.exe & renamed one.

Settings were all on 'High', 1280x1024 with 8xAA

Original on top, renamed on bottom.





















The only thing that was different (that I noticed off) was the sharpness. With the optimized drivers the game was abit more blurry. Oh and my fps was 2-5 better with the renamed drivers, so whatever Nvidia tried to do with the optimized drivers, it didnt work. :p

[Nightmare]

Anandtech has their review up here. While they had better results than the previous article, the GT is still the faster card.

The Final Word section sums the whole thing up nicely. Here's a snip:

Without a doubt, AMD is back in the graphics game. When the Radeon HD 2900 XT launched, we couldn't be more surprised at how poorly the product did. The lack of competition allowed NVIDIA to sit back and relax as the orders for more 8800-based product kept on flowing in. While the Radeon HD 3870 isn't faster than the GeForce 8800 GT, if AMD can hit its price point, it is a viable alternative if you're looking to save money...

[SUBMAN1]

That about sums it up too. Now off to play the retail version. Just picked it up since I was driving by a Best Buy. Bought the extra version since it has a sound track. I can probably use the sound track with the game The Movies when I get around to it.

-S

[elite_hunter_sh3]

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/593/1/

AMD Has R680 Running Stable in CrossFire



these are the current 3870s. SINGLE GPU, that card is the one that is performance wise weaker then the 8800 gt by around 4-7 fps average in most games.. what most of you havent seen (not 100% sure if everyone here knows..) is that there is a DUAL GPU version called the 3890 (unoffcial) or some people call it the 3870 X2,



this picture shows 4 3870s (single gpu version) on a motherboard with 4 pci-e slots enabling quad crossfire.


THIS however is the dual GPU version, since it uses a DUAL SLOT cooling solution
only 2 video cards can fit, BUT rumours are in a company is planning on making a motherboard that can enable 4 of these monsters in Crossfire

that is the DUAL GPU version, notice the mounting brackets where the GPUs are located, and the memory chips beside them.
the X2 IS THE 8800 killer

[JSLTIGER]

Not when you consider the fact that the X2 is basically the 3870 in Crossfire/SLI mode. The real question is then whether the 8800GT in SLI mode outperforms the 3870 X2. If it does than the 8800GT is the better performer. If not, the 3870 X2. However, to compare a single vid card to one that is essentially two vid cards is an unfair comparison.

[elite_hunter_sh3]

the X2 is 1 video card, but with 2 gpus... a video card is a video card.. and from what ive heard the X2 is faster, then the 8800 ULTRA, and 200$ cheaper...

[JSLTIGER]

Two GPUs means that there are two processors. You cannot compare a card with one processor to a card with two processors (which, by the way, are independent, each with their own RAM, they just happen to be on the same PCB). In order for a fair comparison, you need to compare a 3870 X2 with an 8800 rig in SLI.