The Official Graphics Card and PC gaming Thread

great work sam, mighty impressive! Hmmm looks like I will need a big upgrde soon.

 

It'd definitely be worth waiting for the HD7 series I think, while they won't offer astronomical increases in performance, they should make a much higher performance level available on reasonable TDPs. I anticipate seeing a very similar level of performance increase from last process change (i.e. 40% above the highest geforce, 50% above the highest radeon), probably looking at around PR310-315 for the HD7970 (remember HD5870 is PR180, HD6970 is PR210, GTX580 is PR230), but more than that, the HD7950 will probably perform around the PR280-290 area, so 25% or so faster than the GTX580, but within the same 6+6-pin 150W power envelope that the HD6870 does now.
Likewise, the HD7800 series should offer near-identical performance in every regard to the HD6950/6970, but in small single 6-pin cards.

 

Finally pulled the trigger on the Dell U2410. Suckers headed my way You have no idea how long I've waited to announce this I don't even have it yet, and I'm happier then a fly on a turd. I rarely use photoshop at the moment, because my last monitor was barely adequate, and my current is too damned small. I can't wait to experience what I've no doubt been missing. Couldn't pay with paypal though(website bug). I'm quite upset about that. Thankfully I had enough funds in another account. But now I don't have much pocket money for a week :S

Wow, so Witcher 2 is a real resource pig eh? Looks like no matter how much I upgrade the GPU, there's still gonna be a handful (or more) of games that can't run at a decent framerate, while maintaining wow factor.

 

Red Orchestra 2 - Heroes of Stalingrad
Graphics Unified score: 265/295 (HD6850 Crossfire/GTX470 SLI -> HD6870 Crossfire/GTX560Ti SLI @ 1920x1080)
CPU Requisites @ 60fps:
Average:
Quads: QX9650 @ 4.25Ghz, X4 965 @ 4.0Ghz, i5 750 @ 2.7Ghz, i7 920 @ 2.7Ghz
Duals: E8600 @ 5.0Ghz, i3 530 @ 3.5Ghz (No AMDs fast enough)
Minimum:
Quads: i7 950 @ 3.1Ghz, i5 760 @ 2.95Ghz (No AMDs fast enough)
Duals: i3 560 @ 4.4Ghz (No AMDs fast enough)
No advantages to hex-cores detected


Another heavy-hitter, especially on the CPUs.

 

Due to an anticipated supply shortfall, the HD7 series 2011 release has been cancelled, and the cards will launch at a similar time to the GTX6 series in early-mid 2012. (likely March-May)

 

Well that's unfortunate. I was looking forward to a cutting edge GPU in february. I guess we'll see.
Looks like the bug on my PC may be gone. Things are responding much quicker. No lockups. I replaced the Velociraptor with a 1Tb WD1001FALS. They really do perform similarly. I'll know for sure tonight. I have two more tests to run, which will tell me without a doubt.

 

Hi Sam, I have a brand new i7 920 D0 CPU, that I got for free. Would it fit the bill for a good upgrade? I haven't done anything with it, because I wasn't sure if I wanted to spend money on a 1366 socket motherboard. However, if it's good enough to run games like BF3, then I'll go with it.

 

The i7 920 is still a decent gaming CPU. It works a lot better if you overclock it, but it's not far behind the best CPUs you can currently buy. I'd keep it.

 

thanks sam

 

Sam and Jeff. You two were one of the largest deciding factors in purchasing the Dell U2410. I thank you both, VERY much. The screen is nothing short of gorgeous! I may be nitpicking, but the white web pages seem a little warm at the moment. I think it's just fine though. Only running for 10 minutes, and I'm loving it! Zero dead pixels, zero stuck pixels. <---- very happy camper!

 

Color temperature too high? Because my 3008WFP was certainly too high when I first bought it, so I RGB'ed it down a bit.

If you bought your monitor direct from Dell, you are covered by a 3-year zero-dead-pixel guarantee. If a single pixel on your monitor gets stuck, a replacement monitor will be next-dayed to you.

 

You know, I'm just gonna leave it alone for now. I'll play with photoshop later. That will be the main testing ground of course

Blu ray looks fantastic! I'd say a good 10 - 25% better than my old samsung! And I liked my samsung a lot. It looks so friggin good. I can't wait to game with this beast.

I don't think I have any complaints really. The buttons were kind of finicky at first, but I think I got used to their quirks. Much like my touch phone. Made me laugh the first time. The light came on as my finger approached it.

Looks like my Wii Component cable may have a problem. Getting a static rolling bar. Man, I think 2 out of 3 of the cables I've had, have had problems. Unbelievable LOL!

Runs cooler than my samsung too. No more extreme heat dissipation!

 

how can you judge how much better a monitor is by percentage?

 

My mind is highly mathematical...

Seriously though, it is just an estimate. I wouldn't say it's twice the monitor, I wouldn't say it's slightly better either. I Guesstimated...

IT's probably closer to 33% better. At least with the Blu Ray watching

 

Remember how my 16Gb kingston Flashy would disrupt my printer, and associate slow to windows? Well, the Dell monitor is apparently remedying that problem. I wonder if it's ports are somehow increasing the signal(extender of some kind), thereby curing the problematic code.

 

Dell's USB hubs are powered, they do not rely on bus power.

 

But see, I don't think that's it. The code HAS to have changed somehow. I've tried hubs in the past. Same problem. Something about the Dell is different. I like it LOL!

Apparently at least two of my drives get better transfers too. Though that's probably because of the Back USB ports on the tower/Mobo

 

As far as I'm aware the drivers are different, but I'm not sure in what way.

 

I didn't use the drivers. Just let windows do it's thing No problems, so no need to install them.

 

No that's what I mean, the automatically installed drivers differ somehow. I've never used the CD either.