Passive 3850 or 8800gt a worthwhile upgrade?

Boomerang Rapido · Post by **Boomerang Rapido** » Fri Aug 22, 2008 9:58 am

I'm building a new system, and was planning to use a Radeon 4850 for the GPU.

However it seems I can actually get a passively cooled 3850 or a regular 8800gt for half the price. I will be playing some Crysis, NFS series, GTA4 etc. But nothing at max res/quality.

Would either of the above cards be a worthwhile upgrade (from a 6600gt) in order to save a bit of money? Or would I be better off just sticking with what I have for the time being ans getting the 4850 once I fell like spending the extra 50$ ?

mrzed · Post by **mrzed** » Fri Aug 22, 2008 10:34 am

You are always better off waiting if you have the option. It's not like prices will ever go up.

But any of the cards you mention would be a big step up in performance from your 6600GT.

lm · Post by lm » Fri Aug 22, 2008 11:09 am

I completed Need for Speed Most Wanted and Carbon on max resolution and max settings that the games itself supported, using 8800GTS 512MB. Would have wanted to use 2560x1600 which is my native resolution, but the games didn't let me, or maybe I just don't remember correctly.

They ran just fine, and they probably will on 3850 as well, even though it's a bit slower.

Not going to get NfS ProStreet, and NfS Undercover is not out yet. GTA IV also isn't out yet.

Why not just wait until NfS Undercover and GTA IV come for the PC and buy the card then?

psyopper · Post by **psyopper** » Fri Aug 22, 2008 1:44 pm

What is the native resolution of your monitor? If you are running a standard aspect ratio monitor like 1024x768 or 1280x1024 you are likely to see very little difference between the cards. The edge will always go to the 8800GT over the 3850.

If you have a native resolution over 1600x1200 or are running a widescreen monitor (or are planning on upgrading soon to a widescreen monitor) then you will not likely be happy with either choice - you should look at the 4850 or 9600GT as your entry point.

As pointed out, anything on the market newer than 12 months old (8800GT or better, 3850 or better) will easily outperform your 6600 GT. Most will do it with equal or less power.

thejamppa · Post by **thejamppa** » Fri Aug 22, 2008 1:49 pm

when you start going 16x0 resolutions HD 4850 will be a good candidate with 9800GTX+. I had HD 3850 256MB. But I got today HD 4850 aswell 22" WideScreen. 1680x1050 is pretty demanding.

but under those resolutions, even 1440x900 HD 3850 is decent choice and 8800GT is somewhat better. For 4:3 regular both are fine cards.

I am planing to turn my old HD 3850 into passively cooled card and put it on my main rig to replicate the HD 3200 IGP as HD 3850 has exceptional power effeciency. And it will be a good light card for my mainrig which has 19" Trinitron CRT.

Boomerang Rapido · Post by **Boomerang Rapido** » Fri Aug 22, 2008 9:59 pm

Well I'm running a 19 inch widescreen monitor with a 1440x900 native resolution, so by what you're saying neither of those cards would be a good choice?

I'm not planning to upgrade the monitor in the near future.

thejamppa · Post by **thejamppa** » Sat Aug 23, 2008 4:34 am

1440x900 most games run fine in both cards. You may some newer and heavier games need to disable some graphics and AA's etc. But i am sure that both cards are fine for that resolution.

twoscoreandfour · Post by **twoscoreandfour** » Mon Sep 01, 2008 5:00 pm

The 3850 also has pretty great power consumption numbers, so if that's important that tilt things in its favour

shleepy · Post by **shleepy** » Tue Sep 02, 2008 7:15 pm

You can run the HD4850 passively (e.g., with an Accelero S1... and I think Gigabyte or some other company started selling passive HD4850's recently, too), or semi-passively with a 120mm fan nearby. In terms of performance, it will be an enormous improvement over a HD3850 or the like.

~El~Jefe~ · Post by **~El~Jefe~** » Tue Sep 02, 2008 8:25 pm

you probably would do best with a 3870 or 4850

i have 3870 playing STALKER on full 1920x1200 cranked, bf2142 full cranked... thats a decent amount of gaming power. it can play crisis but its a stupid game that is programmed horribly.

only thing I have to say is that age of conan is broken with 3000 series ati, but Funcom is a terrible company with great games.

my idle wattage is miniscule. something to consider. for a nice poofy boost you can get 260gt. thats actually coolish idlling. the 3870 is dirt cheap and super easy to cool. it just got overshadowed fast by the 4850. the 4850 has a chunk more power draw though.

Boomerang Rapido · Post by **Boomerang Rapido** » Wed Sep 03, 2008 2:22 am

Thanks for the advice guys, but I already made my decision

I put together the new system over the weekend and I ended up getting the Radeon 4850 from Asus. Still have yet to try and really push the card though.

The stock cooler is surprisingly quiet though. I don't expect to do any cooler/fan mods any time soon.