The Official Graphics Card and PC gaming Thread

Distilled water picks up impurities over time which turn it conductive - it can also gain algae, cause galvanisaton and corrosion. Proper cooling fluid includes chemicals to prevent all these problems. Plus it comes in UV-reactive colours to look nice...

Oh and Rich? Allan at Driverheaven pulled that off with his skulltrail board and three GTX280s, he got 50-70fps, 30 in the heavy bits... I'd say that's playable! (This was Very high settings, Vista DX10)

 

See, sam kept knocking it because he had to turn down the most important eye candy settings. Shaders and shadowing are some of the most impressive parts of the game. They create the mood and atmosphere and basically make everything look "pretty". I made a point earlier in this thread that maybe Crysis should be given a second chance when video hardware caught up. It really has now. Almost everybody building even a super budget PC can enjoy Crysis at some higher settings.

I think that we should ignore the rough areas of Crysis. As they are honestly few and far between. 95% of the game looks absolutely stunning and is fully playable for me at some decent settings, albeit the game looks crap out of native res. Crysis has gone WAY beyond any other game to date in technology, graphics, and sheer scale. It employs every single one of the latest graphics features. Bump mapping on almost everything, advanced night and day HDR, beautiful water with refraction, physics based particles, parallax occlusion mapping(which BTW looks amazing), motion blur, limited amounts of bloom, dense lifelike foliage, insane geometry and textures on everything.

When turned up, Crysis is a graphical tour de force. It blew me away like no other game has or will. It's far ahead of anything I have seen yet.

 

The shadows in Crysis are still rubbish even on high settings - you need them very high to work properly, and the fact that the game doesn't support AA properly is a bit of a downer. However, the rest of the game is unmistakably pretty. On the more realistic side though - look at what I had to buy to run it looking like that.

 

Matt black? It's Matte.

I have a CM Stacker 830, and it is a beautiful case. Pull MB Tray, loads of room, for when graphics cards get even bigger than the GTX280. It has wheeles on it, and the best USB ports I have seen. Doesn't rattle. Must be why it is rated so high

 

Sorry, my mistake. Forgive me if I do occasionally make a typo, I'm only human!

I have absolutely no qualms with the Stacker whatsoever, it's a fabulous case. I'm somewhat doubtful GPUs will get any bigger than the current ones as that will mean they don't fit in a large proportion of cases out there, probably the majority. Then again, knowing how things are going so far, it could happen.

 

Which is why I was so reluctant to sell the Thermaltake Armor. The 4870 is a big card and two of them need some breathing space. That plus a potentially hot OC'd quad means I need all the room I can get. I don't need to worry about ventilation. The Armor's stock fans are pretty quiet and move plenty of air.

Hopefully the prices for the 4870 will drop more because I really don't feel like spending another $285. I have yet to see how performance is, but I'm hopeful that one will be enough for anything I can throw at it. Maybe if something newer and more demanding comes out, I can justify another 4870.

 

$285?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814129113
lol

 

I got the Sapphire... dammit... It's at $274 now....

WTF????? I hate when that happens!!! >.<

OH YEAH! AND A FREE GAME TOO!!! WTF????

 

My 4870X2 came with Assassins Creed, and it's not even retail... and it was £255...

It's not what you know, it's who you know guys!

 

i got my 4850 at £105 delivered, with grid

 

You guys suck...

I wish I could have waited a week...

 

I paid £327 for an X1900XT, and broke a £135 HD3870 with no warranty... I think perhaps I deserve a little break... heh

 

FINALLY someone that gets it!!!! hehehee. ;P

...gm

btw....even tho I've "offended" you GFX boys... what would you recommend for a moderate gamer and just NORMAL every day use??? I'm serious.. looking at getting something in the next couple of months.

 

How much are you looking to spend? Who knows what happens in the next few months? The GFX cards change VERY fast. Or at least the pricing does. And 8800GT should serve you well. Only about 120 and perfect for moderate gamer. Especially because it was perfect for heavy gamer 2 months or so back lol.

I got my 4850 for 160BTW.

 

Honestly I would prefer an ATi GFX card. Unlike Russ I had issues at first with ATi then went to nVidia and had MORE problems than with the ATi. lol. it's luck of the draw I guess. right now I have a coulple of X1650 cards and they seem just fine as far as I can tell. ;D

I guess I'll ask the same question again in about 6-8 weeks. lol.

.....gm

 

Well you can get a 3870 used pretty cheap these days. Around 80 bucks shipped if you look around in the overclock.net forums. That would probably be your best bet. A 4850 seems overkill for your purposes.

 

thanks boozer... good info and taken in i promise.

....gm

 

Likewise on all of those cards. The 8800GT is still very fast and is way more than worth it for the money(as well as recently having fallen from high-end status). The 3870 is decently fast and still a good buy due to very low prices. And the 4850 is unmatched in its price range.

Any one of those cards will easily max most games at 1680 x 1050 and some at 1920 x 1200. Honestly, unless you play Crysis at my resolution or higher, the 8800GT or 4850 are your "all bases covered" cards. And the 3870 isn't too far behind.

 

Personally I'd avoid the HD3870. Either pay a bit more for an HD4850 or go with something like an HD2600, for the simple reason that the 3870's drivers aren't that nice, they can't play older games due to 3dfx incompatibility issues, and have some quirks with clock speeds.

 

You know if the prices aren't too different between the HD4850 and a HD2600XT then the HD4850 it is... lol. ;D

Thanks for the info guys.... more to chew on but narrowing it down as I go.

.....gm