560m and 485m owners - NFS Shift 2

I'm on the verge of buying a sager, and I want to know from 560m and 485m owners what these cards are capable of doing in NFS Shift 2: Unleashed? I want to ideally be able to play them on high at native res without much skipping (my 260m is 1680x1050 @ medium EVERYTHING). Those of you who have them, chime in and tell me what can be had with the 560m and 485m.

Thanks

Jason

 

Both should max it. 560m on ultra might be a bit lower framerate than you're used to but still be playable.

 

I'm running shift2 maxed out without AA:

Daylight,15 cars: minimum 45fps,max 74,average 58.7
Night,15 cara: minimum 35fps,max 55,average 42
Solo: average 64.5fps

Note that althought I'm not using AA, I've manually edited the config file to further increase object quality,shadows,tracks,SSAO by set them to value 3 or higher.

On my g53sw 15" screen AA is not needed at all @ 1080p, hardly you'll notice any jaggies, unless you force yourself to stop the car and look around.
Keep in mind as well that I'm running my gtx460m at 830/1660/1620.
Enabling AA to first value (normal) cuts 2 fps, maxing it out cuts around 4-5 fps.

So if I do some math, the gtx560m is the same old gtx460m speaking of raw power but with higher clocks; that should give you the same fps reading in Shift 2.
But if you consider that the card can quite push it's stable oc to 900mhz you could actually obtain 2-3 fps more than me, and they are already quite high.

So if you don't want to spend more money on a gtx485m/580m stick with a full gtx560m (either 1,5 or 3gb VRAM version, stay away from 1/2gb) and oc it a bit, you'll be really satisfied.

 

Maxed out = All High, right? Or is there an "ultra" / "very high" setting I dont know about?

 

I wouldn't worry as much about the GPU as much as your setup. This game has horrible keyboard controls and it's controller response needs some work (which developers won't do anymore). This is really a game where you need a wheel etc, IMO. Just my input on Shift 2, though the game itself is still very arcade like.

 

Yup, all very high. But you can switch to ultra manually changing the settings in the config file. Just up the values from 2 to 3, some effects like dirt on the road and other "ultra" effects are only used in replays.
In this way you'll bring them into gameplay as well.
Also I've did some races with AA on Normal and I further confirm that all I loose is 1-2fps from the ones I posted.

I agree with keyboard is a mess..handling has been adjusted with latest patch and if you want to really play the game stick with an xbox controller.

 

+rep for the patch.

there really is a very high selection? mine only goes to high on my 260m

 

Heres some screenshots i did for you. Note that ive manually resized them to 50% just to show you a general detail view and fps reading.

This is with ULTRA + Normal AA



This is with ULTRA + Max AA (Totally maxed out, 1080p)



This is with ULTRA + No AA




Hope it helps. Gpu clocks are 830/1660/1620.

 

Keyboard handling always sucks on this game... what's the patch do exactly?

 

Patch has improved alot of areas of the game but I don't have a changelog at hand.
Plus the game is easily moddable, just search for shift 2 minimod.

 

Can't you get the 6990M? Its better then both of them

 

After the fiasco with my 600m and MR9800 from 2005 to 2006... i won't set foot on ATi. (fiasco: driver install nightmares)

 

With the loss of the 485m from Sager's ranks, unless a MIRACLE happens to the 580m, it'll be the 560m.

Jason

 

Don't let bad experiences ruin your world. Just as there have been awful radeon experiences of every kind, there have been awful nvidia disasters.

Don't let that stop you getting any of them, instead, inform yoursefl of current offerings directly from owners and make a better decision. Purposely gimping yourself when you can get a better deal that might not have the issues you encountered previously, only due to misinformation will only end up in you loosing in the long run. Get the best out of your money.

my nVidia 9500m GS sucked and had a permanent downclocking issue. my 9800m GS was amazing. my GTX260 was a bit of a disappointment due to very high tempts, low overclocking stability and drivers crashing every 15 mins depending on which driver I used. Changing drivers was a hit or miss.

Will that stop me from getting a new nvidia GPU? not at all, and I was even considering changing my machine for a GTX570m, but then I developed other plans in mind.

the 560m is a great GPU, but like the HD5870m, it can only take you so far before you see the bottleneck. And I love my HD5870m, but the GTX570, GTX485/580 and HD6970/6990 are simply much better choices specially at 1920 res. Not to mention that they are already at their end regarding current games, since you have to scale down settings to maintain high fps.

For price, I am considering a GTX570 or HD6970 depending on which one is easier, cheaper to find.

 

My only concern with the 6990m is that the drivers will be like they were to install years ago. A nightmare. I don't want to deal with that, especially as there's been about 5 years between then and now.

 

And two different driver teams, two different companies, it's not ATi, it's AMD. Basing your judgement on something from 5 years ago is COMPLETELY 100% irrelevant to what AMD Graphics is today.

I think it's sad when people make these type of assumptions.

There are just as many games that are now AMD titles as there are Nvidia and majority of DX11 games are AMD games. ACTUALLY, SHIFT 2 IS AN AMD GAMING EVOLVED TITLE!

 

Nope, Shift 2 much like shift 1 is an nvidia Title.

 

Thats the thing. You can go ask owners o the HD6990 and see how nightmareish is to change drivers. I can't tell you myself because I have 0 issues changing drivers, just download the new ones and bam. No need to do anything fancy.

 

Shift 2 is featured on AMD Gaming Evolved. It does not use hardware PhysX like ALL Nvidia titles do. Nor is this game plastered by Nvidia logos like ALL Nvidia titles have. The game ran just as bad on Nvidia as it did for AMD and it's SLI support was terrible. Definitely not a The Way It's Meant To Be Played title.

 

The fact that is featured doesn't mean anything mate. It's also featured in nvidia geforce website but that doesn't make an official game by any means like Dirt 2 or 3.
No logos plastered around as you said.
Afaik the engine is a revised version of the first one with added shader features such edgeAA and so on.
I remember however that the engine still relies on Physx libraries for physics, thus making the game an nvidia flavored oriented title.
Either way we can't really affirm that is either green or red team title, they said that it has been developed with the help of both teams, so regardless the gpu the game should perform equally good.
And I'm talking about achieving 60fps solid on a laptop without using AA, pretty good performance on a medium end card such my gtx460m.
That's why i posted my settings and screenshots. If he wants to save a few bucks he can go for a gtx560m without being bothered as much.

 

Lol...
I wouldn't be put off by a bad experience from 5 years ago.
It's illogical and nonsensical (to say the least).
I just installed the latest AMD drivers on my friends laptop that has a
5470m, because when someone installed Win 7 on his laptop, they conveniently forgot the GPU drivers (the idiot).
Installation went on without a problem.
Just download and install.

6990M is a much better bang for buck than 560M and 485M... unless of course you need CUDA (that would be the ONLY reason why one could get an Nvidia card - for using it to render images via the gpu directly in 3dsMax for example - or programs that were optimized for CUDA in general).
3d and Physx are just a gimmick that's simply NOT worth it.

Also, you want to talk about nightmareish experience with driver installations?
Nvidia had more than enough of that for both desktops and notebooks, but as I said, you are basing your experience on something that happened 5 years ago and holds no ground today.