[Raziel]

Alright, well, seems my old trusty 8800GTX is dying (games crash with artifacts, still got to test it more, but that's pretty much it).

Now, I'm on the market to get a new video card, I've always had nvidia cards, if Fermi based cards were out, I wouldn't be asking you what to do, but, with them probably not being released until at least february, this is getting complicated, so, what should I do ?

Wait for Fermi ?
Get a GeForce 295 GTX ? (which can be considered as old, no DX11)
Get a Radeon 5870 ? (I'm no ATi fan, but hey, as long as high end is considered, nvidia's got trouble for now)
Get 2 5870 and crossfire them ?

 

[-StrikE-]

I'd say wait for femi. unless you aren't interested in opengl and linux you could try ATi to, (yeah ati messed up opengl again in there latest driver beside the known memory leaks).

 

[bkwegoharder]

By the time you wait for fermi, AMD will have their refresh that will probably be enough to compete well enough against fermi, and by that time there will probably be some new big thing that is supposedly going to be revolutionary like the 6800 series or the GTX 400 series that people will tell you to wait for. You shouldn't wait for a card unless the card is coming out soon. For fermi you'd have to wait a few months. and by the time Fermi is out, there is going to be some new big thing that people will be looking foward to. Microsoft already has plans to release DX11.1 and AMD has plans to release DX11.1 cards. The cycle never freaking ends, so you might as well just go with the best that is out now.

So yeah I'm basically saying get the 5870, or the 5870 in crossfire.

 

[Princess Garnet]

Crossfire isn't worth it unless maybe except if you have a Core i7 setup. I've toyed with the idea myself a few times, but it's not worth it. I personally favor nVidia right now (but the amount I do is slight and has decreased since the past), but that has nothing to do with loyalty and alot to do with ATi's driver track record.

As for your situation, I was in a similar situation myself. I was building my new system, and I was deciding if I should get an 8800GT or wait for the GeForce 9 cards. I did the latter, but since they still had an unknown release at the time, I needed something in the mean time, so I picked up a GeForce 8600GTS, and then I'd upgrade to a higher end GeForce 9 series. Well, the GeForce 9 cards come out, and it appears their just the GeForce 8 series underneath, but more expensive, so I had to go out and get a GeForce 8800GT anyway, meaning I wasted money on the initial GeForce 8600GTS (not in the end though, since it went into a second PC I later built and sold). Sure, the 8800GT was an upgrade, and I'd have upgraded anyway, but had I known I wouldn't be getting a GeForce 9 series card, I could had gotten the 8800GT from the start. My point is, waiting is a game, and I use the word game literally.

If Fermi has no release date set, and all you know is that it "may be in February" (hey, I heard the same exact thing about the GeForce 9 series that November...), then I say pass on it and just get something now. It would be one thing if it was literally a month or less away, and benchmarks and prices were almost a sure thing, like how I intentionally purchased my CPU last since I knew the Wolfdale's would be coming out, and that wait did pay off, but you don't have a clue as to when it will be out, and the performance or price isn't set in stone either (I'm sure it will be good, but they said that about the GeForce 9 too...).

nVidia doesn't have their act together and the card isn't out. ATi doesn't have it's drivers together. I've said this before. As of this point right now, it's sadly more about choosing the lesser of the two evils at this point. Neither of them is doing anything seriously worthy as of late.

Overall, the point bkwegoharder is making is true.

I'd get either option one or two (either the GTX295 or the HD5870), whichever is faster and/or cheaper.

 

[Squall-Leonhart]

AMD's refresh aren't coming anytime sooner then fermi.

you can thank TMSC's new bout of yield failures for that.

Get a cheap GTS 250, from EVGA, and hope the step up program covers france

 

[Princess Garnet]

I was thinking of recommending something like that myself, even despite my experience playing the waiting game. If you go with eVga, if the new cards come out, what, three months down the line, I think you just have to pay the difference to trade in your older card for the new one. It's a win-win even if the new cards aren't super impressive, because you'll be covered for the cost of the first card. You just have to hope they're actually out in three months or you're stuck with the older one.

 

[Squall-Leonhart]

and if your lucky they do advanced swap.. so you get your new card before you have to send back the old

 

[bkwegoharder]

I don't see why anyone would geta GTX 295 since it costs 100 dollars more and it trades blows with the 5870. Plus it is basically SLI on a card so and there are still driver issues with both SLI and crossfire, a single card would be much more stable, and you wouldn't need to spend as much power on a strong psu. Plus, the GTX 295 is weaker than 2 GTX 275s in SLI and it also costs 100 more dollars as well.

Also with drivers, Nvidia and ATI have and have had plenty of problems. There is no need to just single out one company because you happen to be more comfortable with another.

 

[Squall-Leonhart]

its not singling out, when ati's drivers are on the decline yet again.

 

[bkwegoharder]

More linux issues? If that is the problem then yeah both ATI and Nvidia have issues with linux support.

 

[tuanming]

If you have money to burn then get the 5870 or 5870 x2 (crossfire) first. By the time fermi released, you can sell the 58xx series and get the fermi. These cards work best on a pci-e 2.0 certified motherboard.

 

[Raziel]

More linux issues? If that is the problem then yeah both ATI and Nvidia have issues with linux support.

As far as I'm concerned, never had any issue with nvidia under linuxx, can't say the same about ATi, I've almost always had troubles setting up compiz with ATi cards.

Anyway, tested a bit more the card today and now it only crashes on one game (Force Unleashed), so, either the game uses a part of the card that's deffective, or there's one big bug in it that makes it look like your card is dead

So, I guess I'll just wait and see, and won't play Force Unleashed

 

[wlee15]

As far as I'm concerned, never had any issue with nvidia under linuxx, can't say the same about ATi, I've almost always had troubles setting up compiz with ATi cards.

Anyway, tested a bit more the card today and now it only crashes on one game (Force Unleashed), so, either the game uses a part of the card that's deffective, or there's one big bug in it that makes it look like your card is dead

So, I guess I'll just wait and see, and won't play Force Unleashed

Wouldn't it be ironic if this ending up to be a driver problem.

 

[Cid Highwind]

There's quite a few 8800GTX cards biting the dust these days, so it wouldn't surprise me if yours kicks the bucket as well.

For your new videocard you just have to ask yourself what you want to do with it. If you run a lot of OpenGL based applications and Linux it might be worth to wait and get a temp card. I've been with ATi for a few years now and I notice nothing of the driver "hell" as some want to make it out. Of course, OpenGL is hardly used by games anymore and I don't use Linux. Their Control Center isn't the nicest app, my advise is to either ignore it or don't install it at all, and to set up ATi Tray Tools.

Right now I wouldn't wait on Fermi, there's too much uncertainty around it. However, there might be a queue on ATi's 40nm cards as well for reasons Squall pointed out. If you want to get an interim card, why not go with an ATi 4k series, cheap and powerful, and you can see how the drivers are, so that you can make a decision based on first hand experience by the time the new stuff will be released.

 

[-StrikE-]

More linux issues? If that is the problem then yeah both ATI and Nvidia have issues with linux support.

Nvidia doesn't have them mainly cause they keep there linux drivers open source for linux from what i know, but ati on the other hand has a lot of issues with linux and they don't provide an open source.

 

[Raziel]

Wouldn't it be ironic if this ending up to be a driver problem.

I don't think it's a driver issue, since the artifacts are still present upon reboot (though they're gone if I completly shut down the PC then boot).
When the first crash occured, I was on a beta driver release, so I grabbed nv's latest official drivers, same crash occured, as well as with the latest beta drivers available, 195.39.

But I've been able to play without any problem to PES 2010, then again, the game probably isn't as demanding as Force Unleashed, that may be why.

 

[Squall-Leonhart]

could always try applying a bios with slightly lower clocks, or voltages :\

 

[fivefeet8]

Also with drivers, Nvidia and ATI have and have had plenty of problems. There is no need to just single out one company because you happen to be more comfortable with another.

Lack of a control panel profile system definately pushes more problems toward AMDTi. I agree both IHV's have their share of driver problems, but the stronger DevRel by Nvidia helps immensely in their favor. The recent benchmarks of Bordelands prove as another example. And Nvidia drivers now encompass their entire line of gpu's(mobile/desktop).

If I was in the market for a video card now, I may be more inclined to go the AMDTi route for the hardware though mainly because I can deal with software deficiences to some point.

 

[bkwegoharder]

Yeah, that is one thing I don't like, their control panel. That is really the main complaint most people have about AMD drivers. It is the control panel giving only a little bit of options. It is too user friendly and even though it is idiot proof, they kept a lot of really good options hidden away like Temporal anti aliasing. In terms of compatibility and stuff, it is basically a mixed bag between Nvidia and AMD.

 

[Lasnap]

ive never really delt with ati sence this is my second grapgics card that hasnt been from intel sence i was dealing with a lot of intergrated crap for years sence i was just using the computer for basic stuff must of the time. not aht im into gaming i need that dedicated card. the other graphics card that ive had was a geforce fx5500 when i was playing fate when it first came out and that was proably the newest game i was playing at the time becuase i was doing a lot of diablo 1 and 2 back then and a lot of muds as well. so i cant really say anything about ati but nvidia has giving me some issues like taking away my dualview with a few of their drivers. but the control panel is quite easy to use for me and gives me quite a bit of control over everything.