NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260 Core 216: Competition for the 4870
by Anand Lal Shimpi & Derek Wilson on September 16, 2008 12:00 AM EST- Posted in
- GPUs
Final Words
We tested seven games. AMD and NVIDIA split it, each winning three of them and virtually tied in the seventh. I hate to disappoint those looking for a one sided fight here, but this one is a wash. NVIDIA would want to point out that CUDA and PhysX are significant advantages that would put the Core 216 over the top but honestly there's no compelling application for either (much like the arguments for Havok and DirectX 10.1 from the AMD camp).
Our recommendation here is to first see if either card happens to run a game you care about better than the other, but if not then just buy whatever is cheaper. Today that would be the Radeon HD 4870, currently it's very tough to find stock-clocked Core 216s and those are priced above $300; even if we could find availability at $279, the 4870 is still cheaper. Until the price comes down, the Radeon HD 4870 still remains our pick at the $250 - $300 pricepoint. While NVIDIA has closed the performance gap, the part they used still maintains a price gap.
NVIDIA says they will have availability on the silicon but that only two manufacturers are going to have parts out of the gate on this, which does give us pause. If the GTX 260 had been originally released with 9 TPCs (216 SPs), then it would have been a better competitor to the Radeon HD 4870 and we wouldn't need this slight tweak of a readjusted part. It doesn't generally deliver near it's 12.5% maximum theoretical performance improvement, and really seems like its only a thinly attempt to win at a couple more benchmarks than usual.
Yes it does that, and yes the consumer does benefit even if the benefit is ever so slight. But what none of us benefit from is an over abundance of parts released at nearly the same price point with nearly the same name and nearly the same specs. NVIDIA really needs to stop this trend. ATI tried this a few generations ago, but thankfully (at least since the AMD merger) they seem to have cleaned up their act a bit. There is no reason to have a continuum of hardware with increasingly complex naming as the gaps between parts are filled in.
What we need is less confusion in the market place and a focus on fairly pricing competitive hardware. Trying to get around supply and demand by cluttering up the market with different parts that have similar names and slightly different pricing isn't a consumer friendly way to go.
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helldrell666 - Tuesday, September 16, 2008 - link
At 1920x1200 res. the 4870 beats the new 260gtx in all the tested games.the 4870 has only 512MB of ram so it's not fair to taste at 2560x1600 res.MrSpadge - Tuesday, September 16, 2008 - link
And if AMD put only 128 MB on that card people should only test it at 1024x768, because anything else is not fair?Come on, the lower resolutions are included in the detailed charts and the conclusion clearly says currently the 4870 is better.
MrS
helldrell666 - Tuesday, September 16, 2008 - link
Well,It's not fair to put the results at 2560res. on the top.They could've put the results at 1920 res. on the top.I think it's intentional,to show the 4870 in a worse case.
I know anandtech.they are AMD fanatics.simply, they don't like AMD.
Anyways, im waiting for the review of this card on techreport.com.
theoflow - Tuesday, September 16, 2008 - link
BUT CAN WE PLEASE GET A SYSTEM BUILDER GUIDE NOW???Thank you.
=)
JarredWalton - Tuesday, September 16, 2008 - link
I'll see about addressing that as soon as I finish my current article. I've been meaning to do one for months, but you know what they say about good intentions....Chaotic42 - Tuesday, September 16, 2008 - link
I would love to see one too, but if you're really going to do a new one, and I hope you do, please start doing them regularly. Maybe once per season or fiscal quarter? Monthly might be a bit much, but those system guides are fantastic.theoflow - Tuesday, September 16, 2008 - link
Cool thanks man. I'm itching to build a new rig, but been too busy to keep up with all the changes over the past year or so.MrSpadge - Tuesday, September 16, 2008 - link
Hi guys,I read somewhere that the first batches of 48x0 cards had a bug in their bios which prevented power play from working properly. This is supposed to be fixed since some time now and idle power draw should be decreased significantly.
I'd say contact AMD or a card manufacturer. If it's true they should be more than happy to assist you in obtaining updated numbers. The current numbers are just plain horrible and may keep people from buying the Radeons.
Regards, MrS
Mr Roboto - Tuesday, September 16, 2008 - link
Powerplay works fine on my reference VisionTek 4870 512MB.MrSpadge - Wednesday, September 17, 2008 - link
That's nice for you, but it still looks like it's not working on ATs card.Derek, did you hear me?
MrS