Fermi (4xxM) v.s. Radeon MR 5xxx. The Final Word.

So...recently I purchased an NP8690, and went with the MR 5870. I had considered waiting a little longer, saving more cash and buying a Fermi-based notebook, but was turned off to nVIDIA after having a g96 core (featuring the infamous defect that plagued many 8xxxM cards).

We can all get the numbers online, what I want from this thread is a first hand evaluation of the 4xx series vs the 5xxx series, andopinions of buyers. If you have either, or are planning to buy either, please post your thoughts or reasons behind your choices. Not just performance, but power usage, temps, and price are relevant.

 

I recently bought an MSI GX640 with the Radeon 5850 (1gb ddr5 as well). I'm quite impressed with the performance. I recognize that it isn't quite as fast as the 5870 or fermi's . . . but the price to performance ratio of the ati's amazing.

This review on Anandtech pretty much covers my thoughts on the matter.

They concluded that the fermi is indeed faster in most (not all) gaming situations, but that it isn't a huge landslide improvement:

Likewise regarding price they had this to say:

So basically, at the price of getting the high end fermi right now versus the 5870 . . . you could buy a 5870 equipped and have enough left over to buy another next generation laptop a lot sooner. As anandtech points, the top end difference between cards isn't "that" high, so how can it possibly justify spending a huge sum of money more. Now . . . if money is not a concern at all, and you want the fastest equipment period, go for the 480M by all means, but if you have other needs/concerns, the 5870 just looks like a much better option to me.

 

Population of people with a 480M: 36
Population of people with a 5870M: 983,467

I'm not even sure if opinions matter anymore.

 

factor into that:

1) Fermi is much newer,
2) Fermi is much more expensive...as of yet...

 

I'd say if money is no option and you want the absolute fastest than the GTX480m in a single or SLI configuration is the best. Pricey, but the best.

If you want to save some money and want near similar performance go with the 5870.

I feel that both cards in single card configs are still too slow to be able to run full DX11 games a year from now (the power just isnt there) but the GTX480 does have much better tessellation performance.

Meh, in either case, you want the best its GTX480...if you want close to the best with still awesome performance, go with the 5870.

 

What you get when you spend $1200:

a) An Asus G73 laptop fully loaded and ready to go
b) An Nvidia 480M MXM card and some nice stickers

Nvidia's 480M population isn't getting ready to blossom. You can mince the 5-15% performance difference all you want but the above choice is not disappearing. (Waiting for someone with no money constraints and no sense of value to come in an argue differently).

 

I know you want opinions of people who have or are going to buy either card, of which i am not one of those, but my opinion is always value for performance rather than megabucks for performance, that's why i have a nice cheap 2nd hand AMD processor and 5870 in my desktop.... and why i would choose the 5870m any day of the week.

 

Better to skip the 480M altogether, imo. This 320 core mobile Fermi (revealed in Quadro form, in the new HP Elitebook) will be the one to wait for.

 

Aren't they based on the same GF104 chip, with the difference being a cluster disabled on the Quadro?

 

Hmm, perhaps I'm assumed too quickly. I would like to see this 320 core variant will be released as a cheaper and less power hungry alternative to the 480M.

 

I believe this is the case. They should have used GF104 all along, it's way more power efficient.