So, since i'm in the market for a graphics card soon, which to go with?

P3nnst8r has returned on the Graces of Brian Ashcraft

I wonder how fast it will set my tower on fire :-D

Anrui

@Brookespeed: If you gotta ask, you just don't know.

Seriously though, glad to see ATI back at the forefront of gaming. Their amazing bang for the buck single-gpu offerings (4850 and 4870) have allowed the unwashed masses to participate in the high perforamance pc gaming crowd, which is good for everyone.

PATSCRU

A week later...Nvidia will release another graphic card that is twice as powerfull as this one...then Ati will release a even MORE powerful one...and we get an infinite loop...good that the last one we will see is around...september 10.

Mike918

What does one need such a fast card for? Just wondering.

Brookespeed

So awesome.

.endejas.

I wonder how long will take nVidia to come out with a competitor.

pulyx

@the1sen: Hahaha, why do you think so many people go PC man, customization dude.......customization

vicsells

@Brookespeed:
2560x1600

regnez

mac version? maybe? PREEEEETTY PLEEEEEEEEAAASE???

I was attacked by a wild turkey when I worked at a gas station. Everyone was in their cars - no one was pumping gas. Then I saw this crazy, gigantic turkey attacking people when they opened their doors. I corralled it and he pecked me, so I punched it in its face - that bewildered it - then I locked him in a cage.

the1sen

What's the latest thing measurement for how stuff goes nowadays anyhow mister?

strider_mt2k

I know it will be a little while yet, but I really can't wait until video gets to the point audio is nearly at, where we wont' be paying for better-quality because our senses won't be able to SEE any better, but rather paying for smaller 'packaging' to fit inside of our (hopefully tiny) phone/PC/consoles!

jackrabbix

Looks like a typical ATI card that will only shine for a few weeks and ends up to be an nVidia's bitch again.

xCruciaLx

@Brookespeed: Because there isn't a console out there that can even dream of delivering the visuals these modern PC cards can.

Some people out there want their Widescreen TV's or LCD Monitors to be the bottleneck. There is nothing like it.

diabolusunknownTheSecond

Guys, Nvidia just came out with their news chip, this spanks it.

Technogen

@Evangelion: You were gonna say Crystal Chronicals, werent u?

Icwutudidthar.

P3nnst8r has returned on the Graces of Brian Ashcraft

sweet! Now I can run Cry.... Oh wait, never mind. I almost fell for that banhammer bait. :(

Evangelion

@Brookespeed: Rendering my 3D animations for one.

SinAmos

Anyone know the approx cost of this? Hm?

ヨシダさん 25

@P3nnst8r has returned on the Graces of Brian Ashcraft: How did you know? :)

Evangelion

4870x2 can probably take the GTX 280 by BFGtech which is currently the best single video card out right now. Especially since I expect the 4870x2 will be cheaper than the GTX 280. Maybe not an overwhelming defeat but the difference will be negligible.

syko21

Oh, it wasnt a blackhole it was just an Einstein-Rosen bridge and warped it to who knows where.

Technogen

@SinAmos: And rendering my 3d animations, for two.

rudeadly

Damn, hate it when comments get sucked in to the blackhole.

Nvidia just came out with their newest chip a month ago, I dont think they are going to have another card up their sleeves so soon. They will have to play catchup on the multi-gpu cards.

Technogen

Nuts! I just put a Radeon HD 3870 in my MacPro...

SigmundTheSeaMonster

@rudeadly: And rendering my 3 pea soup for three.

SinAmos

The HD 4870 X2 beasts on all other products. The GTX 280 is obliterated, and it came as a surprise to me. I was buying nVidia stuff only, as nVidia was better than ATI. However, this is the first time ATI beat nVidia in the flagship GPU since 2004. Four years it took for ATI.

And I'm not a fanboy for either company. I buy the better product, of course.

- PR-0927

PR-0927

Wait. You can't say CRYSIS?

LOL! I got that game for my asshat stepfather for Christmas, and I warned him that he may not even be able to play it. The man went out to buy a $400 graphics card for his PC the very next day.

philbert

Wait, so can these X2 cards still be put in 4-way CrossFire X, or does having 2 GPUs on the card limit how many you can slap together?

DisposableInterloper

won't nvidia respond w/ a gtx x2? would ati then release a x3?

Weihovah

Maybe the Nvidia 300 series will see a large performance gain, unlike the 9 series and the 200 series, because of this "new" competition. Oh wait, the 300 series is a die shrink. Great.

e-friend

I have a 10% off coupon at best buy, going there when they open to pick up one of these in Visiontek flavor.

And then be pissed for a week and a half until I go back home to my desktop. Dammit Asus, you should have put a massive PCI-E slot in this laptop. I don't care how little sense it makes.

mhlaxp

This was the card that Maximum PC put into their latest Dream Machine, and they seemed to agree that it was the better choice over the 280. Now if only I had the money to afford anything close to this... I guess for now I'll just play Orange Box on my 6800 GS while hoping and praying that by the time Starcraft 2 comes out I'll have one that can play it.

Woden501

Just to correct my previous comment.... the 4870X2's get SPANKED in Crysis... with Crossfire'd 4870X2's only getting a single fps higher than a single GTX 280.

Seriously found the HotHardware review kinda funny. it's like they're completely ignoring the fact that it's dual-GPU cards versus single GPU cards... but they seem to think that the 4870X2 is king because the highest separation it could achieve at 1920x1200 (which is a more common resolution for people to play at that 2560x1600) is almost EXACTLY 19fps..... in HL2: Episode 2.... where you're already getting well over 100fps no matter which recent card you use, so who gives a crap about 19fps.

ElementalDragon

I'm sorry... but matt, you really need to learn the definition of "destroys" when it comes to this kinda stuff. Going through the benches.... a single 4870X2 BARELY edges out a single GTX 280... not even 20fps higher in pretty much every single bench.... and performed damn near identical in the hulk known as Crysis. Granted.... at the time of the GTX 280's release, had this card been out, it may have been the better thing to lunge for in my opinion. But seeing as you can now pick up a GTX 280 for right around the $399 mark after rebates and such.... $150 less than the 4870X2 is supposed to be.... i don't really see that extra money being worth it for a negligible boost in framerate, especially when a lowly 8800GTX is enough to keep pace with the vast majority of games on the market now... barring Crysis mind you, even though it can still hold it's own there too.

ElementalDragon

And yet the 280 still beats it in crysis. Its all optimizations, it just goes back and forth. It's the quality of drivers that keeps me with nvidia.

kreed

@ElementalDragon:

Nvidia defense force i see..

last time i checked, most of the benchmarks were just previews. When the 4870x2 comes out, there should be updated drivers to improve the cards performance to make it much more worth it..(according to what some reviewers say)

These cards have not even been released yet, and although the starting price will be around $550, it doesnt mean it will stay that price. I would say, after a month, the price should drop down even lower than the GTX280s. I mean the 280s started at 600, and now they had to lower their price because nvidia started to finally see competition...You seroiusly think ATI will keep their prices at 550 forever? ..nope.. of course they'll lower it later...thats what competition is all about...and thank goodness for that ;]

wahrugene

when i was building my current machine, the 8800gt was kicking ass and taking names. but i wouldn't cough up the premium early adopter fee. so i picked up a couple of 8600gt cards for the price of 1 8800gt. now the 8800 is passe', and i am 3 generations behind on video card tech. YET having just vista benchmarked my system, i score a 5.3 out of 5.9.
i think i can wait till x-mas, and get a couple 280's for a reasonable price. and then play crysis on high.

godwhacker

I love how all graphics card stories have such a great potential for banhammering.

Can we use this card to render eyesight for the blind? We have to be close...

wolfenstein-3d

And the great thing... unlike nVidia cards, this one won't make Vista bomb out every 2-3 hours.

Posavoie

@Posavoie: My 8800GT has never made Vista bomb out.

GeekyNerdGuy

@Brookespeed: HD and 3D rendering and editing for one thing ...

GeekyNerdGuy

@xCruciaLx: uhhh...not to sound like a fanboy...but...idk about that.

Haven't heard anything from nvidia and as far as i am concerned, the 4850/4870 beat out their current lineup hands down.

dandaman247

@Posavoie:

2 8600gt's in sli on my machine, nary a hitch on vista ultimate

godwhacker

all ive heard about nvidia is them recalling a crapload of defective gpus :) i run my 3870 with pride. oh yea and crossfire x is ace.

to sum. all i see nvidia doing is putting more obnoxious logos on game startups :D. plus, no one really wins with "the biggest baddest-est gpu evarrrr" thats kinda how technology works...with competition and new tech...

dedalus987

The problem with this card is that no one can get the power out of it yet. If you paied that amount TODAY it would be a total waste of money.

More games are designed for Nvidia. Until that changes, you're better off with Nvidia.

JEmlay

@godwhacker:

well 8600family were not even that great, even in SLI..you should have got the 8800gt..or gts512mb ;[

wahrugene

wahrugene: yeah... because ATI are the ONLY ones to say that performance will improve with later drivers. Fairly certain NVidia has done that their fair share of times as well... and i'm fairly certain that the majority of those times, even that was a negligible increase. And i'm not saying that the 4870X2 will be $550 forever. Yes, the price will drop... but i'm not seeing it in a month. or at least probably not as much as the GTX 280 and 260 did. Then again... who knows. In a month, they might announce the ATI Radeon HD 5xxx series coming out in the next few months. I mean.... they DID burn through 4 series of cards in what... a bit over a year?

Posavoie: uuh... i'm also running Vista Ultimate x64, and haven't had a single problem with my 8800GTX. At first i did (meaning when Vista was first released), but i'd say not even a month later i realised that the problem was due to Vista not liking my BIOS settings (as i'm fairly certain many have noticed Vista was picky about BIOS settings prior to SP1 for some reason or another). I've been running solely vista now for quite a few months... lately shutting it off at night (computer is in my room after all. don't need a space heater in the summer), but at first leaving it running while the computer was downstairs. Not once since the beginning have i gotten the "Driver stopped running and has been recovered" since those first couple times. You also have to realise that the whole message that i just stated was Vista preventing the oh-so-lovable BSOD from occuring due to that driver stall.

dedalus: i didn't hear of any RECALL. I've seen them saying that GPU's are defective.... but that's all i've seen from it. Had my 8800GTX since they were released, and still have zero problems with the way it functions. If there is such a recall, a link would be nice. Like i said... my 8800GTX is running fine right now... but if there's a remote chance of it failing in a month or a few... why not try for a new card?

ElementalDragon

I've just set up a new Dell XPS with a 1GB ATI Radeon HD 3870 X2 (the one down from this one I suppose). Cheap as chips and absolutely stunning. Every game and application is now set with maximum video effects and it runs perfectly.

Toto

My SINGLE 8800GTX is running just fine and I still haven't experienced any problems with my computer or the fps... as for the 4870, I think i'll wait awhile until I don't have to sell my soul to get a card that will run Crysis on 2 SCREENS!