You choose

Ok, I know i've made a few of these threads but this will be my last untill the new cards are released. Which would you choose out of these?

BTW I will be running at 1680 x 1050

4870 - http://www.microdirect.co.uk/Home/Product/39472/ATi-Radeon-HD-4870-1GB-DDR5-PCI-E-DVI-TV-Out-Oem

4850 - http://www.microdirect.co.uk/Home/Product/39438/HIS-ATI-4850-1GB-IceQ-4--DDR3-DVI-PCI-E

9800 gtx + - http://www.microdirect.co.uk/Home/Product/39206/Gigabyte-9800-GTX--1GB-DDR3-PCI-E-DVI-HDTV-Out

gtx 280 - http://www.microdirect.co.uk/Home/Product/38996/XFX-GeForce-GTX-280-1GB-DDR3-PCI-E-Dual-DVI---Far

here are some benchies - http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/gaming-graphics-charts-q3-2008/compare,769.html?prod[2114]=on&prod[2252]=on&prod[2060]=on&prod[2116]=on

Also will the extra heat generated by the new card be a problem? My pc was custom built and I don't know how good the cooling is. The fan is pretty loud, about a 360 loud and is normally 35 degrees celcius on idle in bios. any ideas? thx

EDIT- Just ran speed fan, on idle my gpu is 48, HDD 33, core 48. ( degrees celcius)

Why not consider ATI? "Because the driver supports is bad"?

Yeah, I've seen lots of varying points of view and people favour different companies, but I've been looknig at the benchies and they're pretty much even so I don't see the need for this. Although the power consumption, heat generation and price all differ.

One more question, do these things help at all? I'm considering it as my case has small fans I think, lol i'm not sure.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Antec-Super-Cyclone-Expansion-cooler/dp/B0007MGEO2/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1237053764&sr=8-1

of the choices given the GTX 280 I would choose without a doubt. XFX makes great cards. I have the XFX 4870 and it is great. at 1680x1050 the GTX 280 would be excellent. My XFX 4870 pushes all the heat out the back of the case and when I installed it my CPU temps went down 5C. XFX has great warrenty also.

Gross. Don't even consider ATI. I'd go with the 9800 GTX or the GTX 280. Both great cards. If i can run Crysis on High at 60 FPS with a 9800 GT, then you should be just fine. If you're worried about cooling, just try to avoid overclocking and leaving it on overnight. Put it on standby if you won't be using it for more than 30 minutes, and shut it down if it won't be used for over 2 hours. ALso, make sure your fans aren't interfering with each other. IF there's a fan that blows out air, amke sure it doesn't hit the stream of a fan sucking in air. Adam_the_Nerd

lol any actual knowledge there to back up that statement? I use ATI and they're great

i got that problem i got small fans 8cm so i bought one of these droped my temps down i put it on the side need to do some cutting tho http://www.microdirect.co.uk/Home/Product/38227/Akasa-Ultra-Quiet-22cm-Fan-with-5-Blue-LED-lightsdarkforces2009

thx for all your input. thx darkforce, are they hard to fit? Also how much did the temperature drop?

I would get a HD4870 they have the best price to performance ratio

Gross. Don't even consider ATI. I'd go with the 9800 GTX or the GTX 280. Both great cards. If i can run Crysis on High at 60 FPS with a 9800 GT, then you should be just fine. If you're worried about cooling, just try to avoid overclocking and leaving it on overnight. Put it on standby if you won't be using it for more than 30 minutes, and shut it down if it won't be used for over 2 hours. ALso, make sure your fans aren't interfering with each other. IF there's a fan that blows out air, amke sure it doesn't hit the stream of a fan sucking in air. Adam_the_Nerd

My main reason for being against ATI is simply because there are many games designed for nVidia, that seem to "crap out" when used on ATI cards. The witcher is an example of how annoying it is when a game doens't work properly because your card is ATI. Also, their driver support is absolutely horrendous. I am still unable to find updates for my 4 year old card, as it continually states that my card is up-to-date. Adam_the_Nerd

I was very much an ATI man before but now find the Nvidia a lot better for my games, as you say there is more games designed for Nvidia not that there cards are better but that fact makes the games look and run better than on ATI and a lot more stable. I had loads of problems with STALKER on ATI but on NVIDIA not one problem and runs better.

Nvidia may update their drivers often but they can be a pain in the ass, especially on 64 bit, so many times I had to redo my whole OS because I couldnt get past a stupid bug not letting me uninstall the old drivers. Also worth noting I just sent back one of the 260's due to a DOA, old card is artifacting and the first card I bought (7950GT) only lasted 8 months before artifacting and breaking. So I went ATI, go figure.