Complex questions. First off, I game on a 24" monitor @ 1920x1200. My
old box with WinXP, DX9 and 2 gig of RAM DID run Crysis with everything
set an Medium with good results. My recently upgraded box still with 2
gigs (soon to be 4 as soon as NewEgg ships my Mushkin), Vista64, DX10.1
and Catylyst 8.9 I have to set everything on low or it starts to drive
me nuts. I used the same Radeon HD4850 in both and even though DX10 is
visibly better looking I'm disappointed in the performance drop. Anyway,
they're both good cards and even though I try to support AMD every
chance I get the GTX260 is apparently superior in every respect.
Brian Weeden wrote:
I'm upgrading the video card in my gaming rig and have the choice narrowed
down to two in my price range, the Nvidia GTX 260 or ATI HD 4870. Both seem
to score fairly identical in most benchmarks so I guess the decision might
come down to extras. For me, noise and cooling are a big issue. My PC case
is right next to my desk in my office and I can't stand loud fans. What's
the experience from the group with either of these cards and fan noise vs
temp?
I am leaning towards the 260 because I have heard better things about their
drivers as opposed to ATI's. My last 3 cards have all been ATIs and while
they have served me very well in terms of hardware I've always had some sort
of issue with the driver. For example, x1950 I currently am using doesn't
seem to be able to control the fan speed properly using the ATI Tool so I
have to manually set it high for gaming and low otherwise.
I don't plan on going dual cards if that makes a difference between the two.
----
Brian
