Are you running ATI 5870, 6870 or Nvidia 460?

[Hatch]

My 2cts : Wait till SOW comes out and use your current card or a very cheap on the new rig till then.
(If that's possibel).
No use buying a nice card now and realising SOW is more demanding when it come's out.
That'll save some budget for a super card to get all the eye candy.

At least that's why I 'm waiting

[klem]

I have decided to wait a month (until the supposed week 50 release) before deciding on the GPU and buying the package. It wasn't an easy decision.

Having unusually spare cash in the bank at risk from all of life's little foibles is like having a Ferrari on the drive but you can't find the key !

The 6000s out now are priced just at or above the 5000s they replace. I'm hoping the 6970/5870 situation will be the same.

I'd like to thank everyone for their comments and advice. And any more that may come. I'll keep you posted.

[klem]

Just reviving this thread to let you know what I've ordered and ask a question.

I've ordered everything I need except the video card. This is mainly because I want to beat the VAT increase (Jan 1st) and I don't expect any significant price changes for these parts between then and now. So I've ordered:

ASUS Sabertooth mobo
Intel i7 950 3.06GHz overclocked to 4.2GHz by supplier (o/c under warranty)
Prolimatech Megahalems Rev B,Super 6 Heatpipe Tower Cooler
6Gb Corsair DDR3 RAM
128Gb SSD for the OS and Flying software (IL-2, FSX, SoW)
Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit
750W Corsair HX PSU
Coolermaster HAF 912 case and extra 120mm top fan.

It's based around a Scan.co.uk "3XS SLIK i7 X58 950 BlackOps Bundle"....... modified. It will be built, o/clocked and tested by Scan.

I've taken advice from here and elsewhere to double the SSD size and up the Power Supply. I'll plug in my two 7800GTs for now until ATI release the 6970 when I'll be looking at price and performance. I expect it to outperform the 5870 and hopefully (from the 6850 and 6870 prices) will be in the same ballpark as the 5870. If that doesn't meet my hopes I'll go for the 5870. The 480GTX and 580 are outside my budget (which I'm already heading over) and the 480GTX also has a reputation for hot running.

I already have a new DVD drive and a couple of HDDs for other stuff (photos etc).

That's it. Come SoW, "six months" or whatever it's about as far as I can stretch so I've gone now.

It must be worth waiting for...
http://hw-lab.com/some-details-amd-r...es-leaked.html


OK MY QUESTION..
Does anyone have any indication that the 6970 release date is still on track, slipping again or what? Or info on likely price? Long shots I know.

[Flanker35M]

S!

Latest rumour on 69XX-series (single GPU) release is around 13th of december. The dual-GPU's(Antilles?) are slated Q1 2011.

[Triggaaar]

Originally Posted by klem

I'll plug in my two 7800GTs for now until ATI release the 6970 when I'll be looking at price and performance. I expect it to outperform the 5870 and hopefully (from the 6850 and 6870 prices) will be in the same ballpark as the 5870. If that doesn't meet my hopes I'll go for the 5870. The 480GTX and 580 are outside my budget

The 6970 will definitely outperfrom the 5870. It should be more expensive than the 480. It should be as quick or faster, as well as newer, cooler, quieter, use less power etc, so if the 480 is out of your budget, the 6970 will be - look at the 6950 instead.

[klem]

Originally Posted by Triggaaar

The 6970 will definitely outperfrom the 5870. It should be more expensive than the 480. It should be as quick or faster, as well as newer, cooler, quieter, use less power etc, so if the 480 is out of your budget, the 6970 will be - look at the 6950 instead.

Thanks Triggaaar,
I had in mind one of the two lower 69xx's.
http://img.hexus.net/v2/pmason/amd/6900/roadmap-2.jpg

The 6950 should outperform the 5870, as should any of the 69's, and comes with the new bells and whistles. The 6950 and 6970 look like having 2Gb RAM - but then the 6000 series are supposed to be cheaper to manufacture than 5000s. I would expect the 6990 to be near or perhaps more expensive than the 580 (I'm scared to look!) as it should outperform the 5970 but is cheaper to manufacture (?) but I'm not sure about the 6950/6970 over the 480GTX (£300 - £400 with 1.5Gb RAM, unless you mean the 480 price will get pushed down).

For comparison, the 6870 is cheaper than it's rivals 5850 and 5870 (about £185/195 vs £180/250 vs £250/300). So I would hope the 6950 will sit around or below the 5870 price, and the 6970... ????


Anyway if I can afford the 6970 I'll get it, otherwise the 6950.

[Triggaaar]

Originally Posted by klem

Thanks Triggaaar,
I had in mind one of the two lower 69xx's.
http://img.hexus.net/v2/pmason/amd/6900/roadmap-2.jpg

That image only has three 69s on it. The 6990 is a dual card, so the 6970 should not be considered a 'lower' card. There's room for a 6930 later, depending on how the cards stack up against nvidia.

I would expect the 6990 to be near or perhaps more expensive than the 580 (I'm scared to look!) as it should outperform the 5970

It definitely will outperform the 5970 (or they wouldn't release it), and it will be more expensive than the 580. It's a dual card. The 6970 will be closer to the 580 in terms of price and performance.

but I'm not sure about the 6950/6970 over the 480GTX (£300 - £400 with 1.5Gb RAM, unless you mean the 480 price will get pushed down).

Although prices always fall, that's not what I meant. You said you'd look at the price and performance of the 6970, but that a 480 was above your budget - that's £300. You won't get a 6970 for less than that in the near future. By the time SoW comes out, who knows.

For comparison, the 6870 is cheaper than it's rivals 5850 and 5870

The 6870 is cheaper than the 5850 and 5870 because it is aimed at a lower section of the market. The 6870 is slower than the older 5870 because the 5870 was a high end card, and the 6870 is mid range (replacing the 5770). I appreciate that when buying a card now, with a given budget, you might compare the 6870 and 5870, but it's not a useful comparison for predicting the price of the next cards.

I would hope the 6950 will sit around or below the 5870 price, and the 6970... ????

When the 6950 is released, it will be faster than the 5870, and more expensive (5870 price will drop). It should be a good card, not long to wait and see.

[klem]

Thanks Guys,

Originally Posted by Triggaaar

That image only has three 69s on it. The 6990 is a dual card, so the 6970 should not be considered a 'lower' card................

I meant lower relative to the 6990/5970

Originally Posted by Triggaaar

You said you'd look at the price and performance of the 6970, but that a 480 was above your budget - that's £300. You won't get a 6970 for less than that in the near future.

With the XFX 5870 around £260 I could squeeze to £300 if I felt it was worth it but not for a 480GTX with its power and heat issues. It does seem to outperform the 5870 by something like 5-15% depending on make/game/settings but I'm hoping the 6950 will match or beat it for less money and perhaps even the 6970 price won't be far off. It's hard to tell from a 'roadmap'.

Originally Posted by Triggaaar

The 6870 is cheaper than the 5850 and 5870 because it is aimed at a lower section of the market. The 6870 is slower than the older 5870 because the 5870 was a high end card, and the 6870 is mid range (replacing the 5770).

I don't think that's true, from the performance roadmap I think the 6850 replaces the 5770 and 6870 replaces the 5850. Also, this from Tomshardware on the 6000 series...
"But there’s one more critical component to performance, and that’s clock rate. Despite the re-use of 40 nm manufacturing, at 900 MHz, the less-complex Barts GPU runs much faster than the 5830, or even the 5850. This means geometry throughput is almost 25% higher than the 725 MHz Radeon HD 5850 because it’s limited to one primitive and one vertex per clock cycle. At the same time, the 6870’s texture unit and ALU deficit (compared to the 5850) is offset by a higher core clock, resulting in roughly the same overall performance."

Now I'm no expert so talking primitives and vertexes doesn't mean much to me so I just look at the performance charts (and not necessarily just benchmarks). In terms of market section we shouldn't let price=performance. The 6000's are in a lower price bracket for about the same performance or to put it another way more bang for the same buck.

Originally Posted by Codex

I'd use my current GPU until SoW was out"

That's more or less what I am doing. If the right card comes out at the right price before SoW and if there's not much chance of the price dropping by much and if I could see I couldn't afford the next level up (they don't drop dramatically in a year) I'd just go ahead and buy it. But, really, we could be waiting another year for SoW.

[Codex]

Going by previous production runs you'll be hard-pressed to get the card you want after release date. There's always a huge gap between supply and demand for new cards. If you can find a good seller myabe you should look at pre-ordering your card. If it was me though, I'd use my current GPU until SoW was out.