gtx 480m or c/f 5870 - what do YOU think?

Hi all

Relatively straight forward question i hope.....

Which would be the better....

i) a single gtx480m or
ii) crossfire ati 5870 moility radeon

Thoughts welcome

 

What purpose?

Power: Crossfire
Future-proofing: Crossfire
Compatibility: Gtx
Battery life: Neither (both power guzzlers)

 

A single GTX 480M should handedly beat single HD5870M
- Recent leak shows the GTX 480M vantage score being 8% higher than mine, with clocks I use daily when I game.

A CF HD5870M will be nearing the specification of a desktop HD5870 with 1,600 stream processors.
- You will have to check Alienware's forum for more information and decide for yourself since only Alienware has this option. Not sure how well Alienware has implemented this and really taking advantage of it.
- It seems Alienware has actually limited the HD5870M as it's been undervolted.

 

- 5870MR CF is faster, if the game supports it.

- 480M will only be a bit slower, it's about on par with 285M SLI performance, so it's around 4870MR CF performance, and 5870MR CF is around 20% faster.

- the 5870MR CF is controlled using dell custom vbios, and you can't use any ATI drivers other than the Dell provided ones.

- for 480M, it's a single GPU, meaning you won't get any of the dual GPU problems, like possible stuttering, or games that don't support CF running slow.

 

ive read of the AW driver/vbios issue on some other threads - people saying that the cards arent being allowed to perform to their full potential by dell.
I have also read that there is also a BIG mistake by AMD in having drivers that support the 5870's and that they are aware of this.

Again, (doing alot of reading here!) have heard that some of the "leaked" results for the 480 are slightly ambiguous to say the least, in favour of Nvidia, who have used test which WILL favour it over other cards.

I think we all know about Nvidia recent track record in terms of rebranding old stuff (though i beleive the 480 is new) so it doesnt inspire real confidence until some REAL benchmarking has been done.

Im assuming here, that if Dell/AW/AMD get the vbios issue and drivers sorted, then the 5870's will fly......this being so, i would assume that they would easily beat a single 480m?

Thoughts anyone?

 

Just to clear up some misconceptions here since I'm partly responsible for them:

1. Dell Crossfire 5870M works as they should. AMD screwed up and did not include the proper code so that they could use ATi reference drivers. This will be corrected since I contacted Dell and engineering was made aware of it. Currently, the shipping drivers are old and do hamper performance of the 5870m crossfire a bit. However, this will be rectified once AMD corrects their mistake in the next mobile Catalyst release. Currently, in GPU limiting situations I've found the Crossfire 5870s beating Crossfire 4870 anywhere from 10-25% in avg fps and sometimes up to 30% or more in min fps situations.

2. The Dell vbios in no way limits the cards. They do run at 1.05v but that doesn't hamper the performance at all, if anything it makes them superior to all other 5870m's on the market since they run cooler and draw less power. I'd say they're probably golden samples that Dell has been accumulating over time. They can also be flashed (if you know how to do it) to higher voltages.

3. Performance wise, I just ran Unigine's Heaven 2.1 and scored about the same as a 5870 desktop card.

4. The GTX 480M will be about 5-15% faster than a single 5870M. Crossfire 5870M will handily beat it. 480M SLI will also beat Crossfire 5870M but at a much higher cost to TDP, form factor and price.

5. Crossfire is widely supported. I have yet to encounter a single modern game that it doesn't work with and I own a fairly large library of recent PC games. I've yet to encounter any form of stuttering or performance problem with Crossfire. It works very well.


Once again to reiterate, the Alienware M17x-R2 5870 Crossfire works as advertised and I'm very happy with it.

 

Joker,

Thanks VERY much for clearing that up for me - must admit, id read alot on here about these gpu's and being a relative "newbie", didnt fully understand - yeah i got the grasp basically but not being an expert, wasnt sure how this was gonna affect me and my order. I had thought at one point that maybe, i would be stuck with cards/drivers/bios that wouldnt be supported but its good to know that driver issues etc are to be remedied by AMD - how often do they release CCC updates?

 

+repped Joker, DELL needs to hire this man for an engineer already.

 

I'll second that.......but your a pretty handy guy yourself ! + rep to you too.....(shame i cant do it twice lol)

 

well when i read what ziddy said , whatever enthusiasm i had for m17x evaportated but good to know joker put it right.. just one thing , how much does a M17x with i7 quad , 5870 cf , 4GB RAM cost in US that is.

 

I'll put $50 on the "less than the same config with a single 480" red square.

 

Alienware M17x RGB with those specs is $2,500 with 250 GB of HDD, i7 Quad, 4GB of 1066.
- $2,300 for the 1440*900 screen.

 

Dead deal.

 

Sean those coupons last til June 16th.

You need to sign up for Dell EPP though. Price comes to $1,878.04 including the $50 off for signing up for EPP.

I know you were interested in G73, with a single HD5870M with Ram, HDD, accessories and warranty almost the same, still slightly less than what you get with Asus, it's $1,767. But it is a Alienware...casing etc.

 

Yeah, Dell next business day warranty, RGB LED display, aluminum shell, better cooling, crossfire support. It's hard to beat when you factor in these EPP discounts. Even if I didn't own an AW I'd still opt for one with these discounts in place. Anyone can use EPP, Dell doesn't check. Here's a couple Heaven 2.1 benchmarks I did to wet everyone's appetites for some dual 5870 action

 

Unfortunately, over here in the UK , there dont seem to be ANY discount codes floating about...i searched for days with no luck......haggled and haggled some more with the Dell rep before placing my order which came in at £2200 or about $3200.

I wonder if I could re-order and import from the US to the AND use those codes or are they just for US residents - im thinking Dell US wont even process and order for me, more likely to bump me back to the UK to get a huge markup.

Also, after reading the attached thread about the discount, it really does look like a refresh is about very soon as those codes expire in conjuction with E3.....although my order isnt due to arrive till 21st, and i have till 30th to cancel/return, it does pee me off that Dell wont tell me anything....considering im blowing over 2 grand on a laptop, i think thats a bit unfair to try and unload old stock IF they know new stuff is only weeks away.....B***ARD's lol

 

Just done the maths on this one and even if i could get those discounts, they are gonna be nullified by shipping costs and UK customs adding 17.5% on top for importing.....looks like im stuck with good ole UK inflated prices.....wish i was an American now! lol

 

I don't care about the TDP to be honest, as long as I can OC the cards a bit and the laptop can cool them adequately and they perform like they're supposed to/expected to, I'd rather have dual 480M's. But since this poll is only pitting dual 5870's against a single 480M, I have to say I'd take the dual 5870's.

On a side note, unfortunately those coupons don't work for Dell Canada.

 

Are people forgetting the fact that Nvidia finally dropped the bomb on a 256-bit, GDDR5 equipped mobile graphics card?

If one isn't enough, the Sli equipped x7200 will scream along, smoking the vast majority of gaming desktops. I'd reckon it's time to get an external 2560x1600 display if you haven't already and plan to get an x7200.

Nvidia took their full fledged GF100 GPU and squeezed it down to mobile specification, but the guts are just the same as the GTX 480. Ati took the simple route and used their mainstream GPU; it just made sense.

 

FYP....... =)

 

hold it hold it! I'm not getting anything till august so i'm just researching.. its 90% for G73 and 10% for M17x for me.. depending on which one i can find cheaper and my only soucr of G73 is gone so not good.

 

It's not "full fledged" GF100 it's a generously cut down GF100 salvaged from the reject pile. Compared to the desktop GTX 480 the GTX480M (desktop GTX465) has got 128 less cores, 16 less texture units, 16 less raster units, and a 256 bit bus instead of a 384 bit bus. It's not like we're talking just a downclock.

Honestly the GPU is cut down enough where it could be considered it's own lower model GPU.

 

More than simply being specific, I was pointing out a contrast in business philosophy.

 

gtx 480m sli isnt an option on the m17x right now - well not in the UK anyway....only available on the clevo x7200 if what ive read is correct.
Dont know if AW will refresh with this as an option but i would imagine would need some pretty radical redesign of the cooling system etc so i wouldnt forsee it being an option for quite some time......but, that said, im a noob so what do i know! - AW prolly have it tucked up their sleeve and undoubtedly will release it the day after im permitted to return my order!!!!!

 

@_@ oh stevie.... I'm hearing birdies say the M17x revamp is coming late August, very beginning of September. Keep in mind the starting basic config for both Eurocom and Style Note x7200 in 480SLI is $2900-3200 like I said in the other thread, AW will undoubtedly be in the same price range or a little higher.

Don't kill yourself over the decision now, you said yourself you werent a heavy hitting gamer.

 

Actually, im happy with what ive got on order..(thanks to Joker putting my mind at ease with his comments)...there is always gonna be something new or better out the next day so if i waited for the next thing, id never get a computer
Although, that being said, dont think any of us like to think that they are blowing a few grand IF there should be something better JUST around the corner
Althought not a heavy gamer now......who knows how it will grab me.....(just hope its not by the testicles innit?)

 

the x7200 isn't out from what i've heard...

 

How about browsing the U.S Alienware site and configuring one for yourself??? The price is updated as you add components and guess what? You don't have to purchase it.

 

If it was 480M SLI then I would have definitely gone with that but its single vs crossfire. One more question guys, doesn't the 128 Memory Bus Width affect the performance in 5870?

 

It doesn't affect the performance too much since it comes equipped with GDDR5 VRAM, but compared to the 256-bit memory bus along with GDDR5 VRAM on the Geforce GTX 480M there is a performance gap between the two. Unless the only reason Nvidia decided to include a 256-bit memory bus on the GTX 480M is to account for the 2GB VRAM.

 

Even though it uses both a 256-bit interface and GDDR5, the VRAM is only at 600MHz in the GTX 480. It seems like Nvidia hasn't been able to get the kind of clock speeds with GDDR5 that AMD has due to I/O controller issues, which is why they went with the 384-bit bus for GF100.

If we were comparing only memory bandwidth, Nvidia's 256-bit + 600MHz would still be a 20% advantage over ATI's 128-bit + 1000MHz, but these are different architectures and the way in which they use their memory bandwidth is not the same. It's true that memory bandwidth is a limitation for the MR5870 (see benchmarks of the 5770 vs the 4870 for evidence), but that's far from the whole story.

Since the GTX 480M is simply a smaller GF100, it seems that clocking their GDDR5 higher with a smaller bus to get good bandwidth wasn't really an option. Considering that the top GTX 480 has a 384-bit bus, it makes sense that Nvidia would just use more of the lanes of the bus rather than attempt to go with higher clocked GDDR5; I can't say how these approaches compare for power consumption, though.



I find it hard to see how the 2GB of VRAM is anything other than a gimmick, though.

 

[\quote]
Took you some tinkering to get to that point though

Yeah smoking as in, your-desk-will-be-set-on-fire and your-hands-will-be-barbequed. A single card is somewhat plausible, but SLI 480's is just ridiculous. At their full potential they would generate too much heat and require too much power to still be considered mobile.
You may as well buy a desktop.

 

I can't stand this "You might as well buy a desktop." argument. Essentially what I want is an easily portable desktop, which no desktop is, since it is a hassle to transport a monitor, and wiring every time you want to use it is a huge waste of time.

The most ironic part is this argument is coming from someone who already owns an dual 5870 Clarksfield M17x.

 

Couldnt agree more - not every one wants a desktop - i personally like the portability factor a notebook provides....it may not be ultra portable due to size/weight but im hardly planning on running a marathon with it strapped to my back now am i?

I think its a case of "different strokes for different folks" - oviously a fully maxed out desktop will easily beat ANY laptop but for those of us who want portability/flexibiltiy and without having to sacrifice much in performance, then a good gaming notebook is the way to go.

There ya go, my 2 pennies anyway........

 

Maybe I said that wrong.

What I meant to say was that if you want that kind of heat and power draw, get a desktop that can handle it better.

I MUCH prefer a laptop because I'm a minimalist.

 

At more than half the cost too!

But CF HD5870 now seems like an excellent deal if whoever is buying has some patience. CF HD5870 from Alienware with some of their promotions easily will crush the price of any GTX 480M equiped notebook and get very nice performance. Vantage 15,000 vs 9,800 with plenty of cost savings. Almost zero downside to this.
- Alienware's CF HD5870 really puts a shame to nvidia's costs.

 

I don't understand what's with all the "too much heat" comments either, the heat will be handled by the notebook manufacturer, it's none of our business if it could be handled well. And the most ironic thing is, X7200 is 10.6lb, even lighter than the M17X and X8100.

 

Oh contrare, it is our business if the heat will be handled well, we are the consumer that buys their product. You must be the king of speculation on these forums by now, you have no evidence that the card will maintain temps well at this point, call me a person biased in favor of empirical analysis rather then speculative commentary.

 

No doubt that the heat released by the card will be higher than 5870MR, however, that's not saying much, because the end result is the heat released by the card + cooling system of the notebook, the same 5870MR on a 8690 could have a max temp of 72C, but on another notebook, it could be as high as 90+C. We look at the package as a whole, and not speculating on how high the card's temp will be just based on the TDP figure.

nobodyshero, good luck with all the post starting with a personal attack, way to go man.

Ah... You don't even have evidence that the card can't maintain temp well in the first place, and disapproving such speculations suddenly makes me the king of speculation? Irony much.

 

lol...how many times did you edit that post? My guess is the card will maintain reasonable yet hotter side temps at normal clocks but start roasting away and throttling the system when overclocked. I mean see how useless that speculation is? Give it a rest and stop proclaiming things until we get some more real statistics.

 

Exactly once to point out the irony.

Let me get this straight, so I am the one proclaiming/speculating stuff because, I, disapproved of the unproven speculation that the 480M will run hot, and my disapproval became the biggest speculation in the world because it's carved in stone that the 480M will run hot?

Please take a deep breath, release all your fanboyism if there is any, and think of your posts again carefully and see who's the one assuming things here.

 

Too quite frank, the 480m will run warmer than any previous GPU. But we already know Clevo is using more copper than ever have in the D900f, because you need the updated chassis. And the x7200 is a new, revamped design altogether.

 

Too be quite frank, the 480m will run warmer than any previous GPU. But we already know Clevo is using more copper than ever have in the D900f, because you need the updated chassis. And the x7200 is a new, revamped design altogether.