ATI HD 5870 review!

[-<Blatz_ztalB>-]

Thar she blows!!!

Review here at http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2009/09/23/ait-radeon-hd-5870-1gb-review/1.

[CrashHelmut]

Thar she blows!!!
Heh, not quite the most appropriate turn of phrase there. :P

Here's another preview/review from hardocp (http://www.hardocp.com/article/2009/09/22/amds_ati_radeon_hd_5870_video_card_review/1).

Some highlights:

Comprehensively faster than the HD 4890 and quite a bit faster than the GTX 285.


... so adding the HD 5870 added around 31W of power. This is very close to the specified 27W idle power consumption.

That is right, the Radeon HD 5870 is performing near twice as fast as the Radeon HD 4890 and only consuming 5 more Watts in doing so!


The ASUS EAH5870 will be selling for $379.99.

That's means we probably won't be seeing the card for under R4000 in SA, at least in the first few weeks after launch.

[Necro101]

So it looks like the Card is more or less equivalent to an 295, sometimes slower or faster depending on the game.

[Wesley]

So it looks like the Card is more or less equivalent to an 295, sometimes slower or faster depending on the game.

It'll be faster than the GTX295 when more mature drivers are available ;-) and to think; you only need a 550watt PSU with 40amps on the 12v rails to run one!

[McDangerous]

This card kicks friggin' ass. For the price, it's actually a bargain. If you compare it to a 4870X2 and 295, which require more power, and perform on par. It really is rather amazing. Well done ATi. I'm keen to get one, maybe next year July or December... First it's processor though...

It's a huge card! I found this comparison. Check it out, that's a 295, 285, 4870X2 and 4770... It Massive!! I don't even want to know how big the 5870X2 is going to be...

http://www.legitreviews.com/images/reviews/1080/size.jpg

[-<Blatz_ztalB>-]

Heh, not quite the most appropriate turn of phrase there. :P

haha ah crap, I see what you are saying now haha :p I meant as in "whale" lol.

Yep yep I'm prolly also gonna get it around then, I'm sure prices will drop even more once nvidia launches their new cards...which I have no idea when, but soon!

[Chevron]

haha ah crap, I see what you are saying now haha :p I meant as in "whale" lol.

Yep yep I'm prolly also gonna get it around then, I'm sure prices will drop even more once nvidia launches their new cards...which I have no idea when, but soon!

If nvidia are really lucky, which they haven't been, you'll see their new cards december, but most likely only next year.

[RaptoR]

If nvidia are really lucky, which they haven't been, you'll see their new cards december, but most likely only next year.

New graphics cards are launching next month....im sure nVidia will have some new ones in there somewhere.

[RaptoR]

Saw a more detailed review of this card in a mag today including frame rates etc, if the price is right this may even persuade me to buy my first ATI card :) (somewhere between $300-$400)

[X-Gamer]

R2700 for the HD5850 and R4000 for the HD5870, that's RRP from AMD SA, apparently.

"HD5870 worlds fastest graphics card, local pricing revealed" (http://www.mygaming.co.za/news/Hardware/4491-HD5870-worlds-fastest-graphics-card-local-pricing-revealed.html)

[goleastro]

Does anyone think buying the hd5870 from america will be better (it's cheaper) or will i get no waranty and other problems?

Otherwise i have no words to add because i have no voice from already screaming my lungs out (screams of joy)

[Tryxst3r]

Prices. (http://www.wantitall.co.za/radeon-5870/PCHardware/p1)

[X-Gamer]

Link useless.

[samwise]

R4000 seems a bit steep for me. I'm pretty sure the HD4870 was much cheaper on its launch date, or am I wrong?

I suppose if the new technologies within the card are groundbreaking then the steep price can be justified. I guess we'll have to wait until Direct X 11 games start arriving.

[jasong]

4870 was cheaper because it was competing on a level with the gtx 260 which at the time was like R3000. 5870 is competing somewhere way above the 285 and just below the 295 and is priced the same as the 285. Given that fact it's a very fair price. It's all a matter of the current equivalent market pricing.

[Wesley]

R4000 seems a bit steep for me. I'm pretty sure the HD4870 was much cheaper on its launch date, or am I wrong?

I suppose if the new technologies within the card are groundbreaking then the steep price can be justified. I guess we'll have to wait until Direct X 11 games start arriving.

New technologies? Gah, the new technologies don't really matter at this point pre-Windows 7 and Dirt 2. The HD5870 is simply the most powerful single card ever produced, that's why its so expensive.

[Chuluka]

The Prophecy Shop has pricing on the HD5000 series. They aren't as expensive as I originally thought. Click here (http://www.prophecy.co.za/-c-37_52_58_1073.html?sort=3a&page=1)

[Wesley]

The Prophecy Shop has pricing on the HD5000 series. They aren't as expensive as I originally thought. Click here (http://www.prophecy.co.za/-c-37_52_58_1073.html?sort=3a&page=1)

Those are really nice prices. I must go and update the System Builder's thread sometime with the new cards and pricing. Such a pity that Gigabyte overcharges for their stuff though.

[CrashHelmut]

So, 5850 review is in, from AnandTech (http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3650).

Comprehensively beats the GTX 285 and HD 4890 in gaming performance. Excellent load power consumption (less than the 4870).

And if those Prophecy prices are accurate (and expect it to fall a bit in the next few months), this card will be an excellent price/performance option.

On the other hand, the NVIDIA cards are nowhere near competitive at the current price points, so perhaps we may see some price cuts on the GTX 285 in the future?

[jasong]

Wow...............................

'makes the 285 irrelevant'

:O

ATI are nothing but win these days.

[-<Blatz_ztalB>-]

HD 5850 price does look pretty tempting, but I always wait for non-reference coolers before I buy and by the time manufacturers release such cards, the prices will have dropped as well.

yays all round!

[Zen]

Don't cut Nvidia out so easily. (http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/15756/34/)

It looks like their card is going to be one hell of a beast.

[jasong]

i'm sorry but those specs sound like utter madness. I'll be surprised if it costs less than $600.

Up to 5gb ddr5, L1/L2 cache...512 shaders....good grief.

[CrashHelmut]

Don't cut Nvidia out so easily. (http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/15756/34/)

It looks like their card is going to be one hell of a beast.
Thing is, it seems that that GPU is being developed with GPU assisted computing in mind, more so than gaming (think NVIDIA's Tesla). Here is a post (http://www.hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1034692086&postcount=38) with more specific information.

Also, most expectations are that the earliest we will see a hard launch is late Q1 2010. Probably later we may see mainstream graphic cards based on versions of that GPU architecture.

I suppose what I'm implying is that it doesn't look like NVIDIA will respond to the new HD 5000 series from ATI until middle next year at the earliest, unless they cut prices on their G200 family of cards.

[Wesley]

i'm sorry but those specs sound like utter madness. I'll be surprised if it costs less than $600.

Up to 5gb ddr5, L1/L2 cache...512 shaders....good grief.

6GB GDDR5, actually. And this is Nvidia getting the one-up on the GPGPU market before Labarree hits next year. ATI is going to have a tough time fighting against the GTX300 series.

[Necro101]

Holy hell that thing is a monster. The price tag will likely be ginormous.

[jasong]

6GB GDDR5, actually. And this is Nvidia getting the one-up on the GPGPU market before Labarree hits next year. ATI is going to have a tough time fighting against the GTX300 series.

It all depends how they price it. Look at the PS3 situation - overspecced, overpriced and sold very poorly for the first couple years of its life. Nvidia could price themselves out of the market with this thing. Anyway I'm not going to spend $5-600 on a gpu anytime soon. Coupled with the increasing tendency to develop PC games at console specs, meaning that most gamers realistically won't need all that power.

[Wesley]

It all depends how they price it. Look at the PS3 situation - overspecced, overpriced and sold very poorly for the first couple years of its life. Nvidia could price themselves out of the market with this thing.

No no, this is the entirely wrong analogy to make. See, the Playstation 3 is a console, with a estimated life of about 3 years. Sony intends on supporting the console for up to ten years, but 7 is a more realistic expectation. The Nvidia GTX360 isn't a console, its a piece of hardware - a completely different creature. Even if its priced at $600, people will still buy it because those are the people who have to stay on the bleeding edge of technology and performance. Nvidia will never price themselves out of the market, because there will always be a huge amount of people wanting that performance and those bragging rights.

[jasong]

There will be people who want the bragging rights and will pay for it - just as there were people who bought the PS3 when it came out at $600. But there were a lot more people who bought the Wii at $250. I fail to see how the analogy is weak. The greatest profit for gfx manufacturers comes at the $1-300 mark - above that the market becomes increasingly thin. There's a reason Asus only produced 1,000 Mars 295's - the market simply doesn't exist for a + $700 gfx card. So would you rather sell 1,000x$700 cards or 1,000,000x$290 cards?

[CrashHelmut]

The Nvidia GTX360 isn't a console, its a piece of hardware - a completely different creature. Even if its priced at $600, people will still buy it because those are the people who have to stay on the bleeding edge of technology and performance.


...the market simply doesn't exist for a + $700 gfx card.
I do want to reiterate something that I noted in a previous post. NVIDIA stated that they are concentrating the new Fermi GPU architecture on general GPU computing. Think of hardware assisted simulations, ray-tracing, etc.

Who knows how big that market is, but I wouldn't be surprised if a $1000 card is not at all unreasonably priced.

[Chevron]

No no, this is the entirely wrong analogy to make. See, the Playstation 3 is a console, with a estimated life of about 3 years. Sony intends on supporting the console for up to ten years, but 7 is a more realistic expectation. The Nvidia GTX360 isn't a console, its a piece of hardware - a completely different creature. Even if its priced at $600, people will still buy it because those are the people who have to stay on the bleeding edge of technology and performance. Nvidia will never price themselves out of the market, because there will always be a huge amount of people wanting that performance and those bragging rights.

That was actually a perfect analogy. The people that buy top of the range cards are far far far fewer than people that buy cheap. You are really under estimating your market because you fall into it. Most people just want something that works.

[Wesley]

There will be people who want the bragging rights and will pay for it - just as there were people who bought the PS3 when it came out at $600.

Still, wrong analogy. People bought the PS3 at launch so that they could brag about it, and also for the Emotion engine and so that they wouldn't be left with their now redundant PS2. For most, it was bought out of necessity rather than staying on the bleeding edge of games and technology (although that's a pretty good reason).


But there were a lot more people who bought the Wii at $250. I fail to see how the analogy is weak.

People bought the Wii because they wanted the Wii, not because they couldn't afford a PS3. They knew it was inferior, and if they wanted something better they could have just bought an Xbox, which turns out cheaper and has about the same range of titles as the PS3. They bought it because it was fun, and maybe they were secret Nintendo fanboys. Research even shows that the majority of owners buying a Wii already owned a gaming computer or another console.


The greatest profit for gfx manufacturers comes at the $1-300 mark - above that the market becomes increasingly thin. There's a reason Asus only produced 1,000 Mars 295's - the market simply doesn't exist for a + $700 gfx card.

Again, you're wrong here. The market that produces the most profit is the high-end market, where the manufacturers can price their products as high as they want because they know that no-one has anything strong enough to compete. If you remember the days of the first AMD dual-core, it retailed around R4500, and it would be whipped by today's R600 chips. It was the first dual-core, and because there wasn't anything faster AMD could charge as much as they wanted or deemed necessary. Why else do you think you can now find an HD4870 for under R1500 now? Its such a low price, and yet they're still making a profit.

While companies do make a lot of money through volume sales of budget parts, they don't make as much as they would with high-end products in smaller numbers. The budget parts are being sold much closer to cost price as well, and this logic is the same reason why Ferrari, Lamborghini, and Bugatti only make high-end supercars - they make tons more money that way.


There's a reason Asus only produced 1,000 Mars 295's - the market simply doesn't exist for a + $700 gfx card.

No, ASUS only produced 1000 because the card was an absolute monster, and having a limited edition product that was essentially two overclocked GTX295s sandwiched into a box with 4GB memory would have earned them a killer profit, and a lot of publicity. Honestly, they're even thinking of making more, but thats probably due to ATI's Eyefinity technology becoming a major threat in the market. And if they do, it'll be much less than the R14500 they were asking for here.


That was actually a perfect analogy. The people that buy top of the range cards are far far far fewer than people that buy cheap. You are really under estimating your market because you fall into it. Most people just want something that works.

Please read above Chev. The PS3 isn't an apt analogy because there is only one PS3 (there are now two models with differing hard drive sizes, but that doesn't count as a different model because performance is identical) and if you want one there is only one that you can buy (the older models have now been phased out in favor of the PS3 Slim) . Its not a mainstream, high-end, or budget product; its an all-rounder, and its intended for the masses, therefore the analogy is weak and incorrect.

[jasong]

Still, wrong analogy. People bought the PS3 at launch so that they could brag about it, and also for the Emotion engine and so that they wouldn't be left with their now redundant PS2. For most, it was bought out of necessity rather than staying on the bleeding edge of games and technology (although that's a pretty good reason).
1: PS2 had emotion engine, not PS3. 2: Nobody bought PS3 out of necessity, esp not at launch. Who on earth needs a $600 console?



Again, you're wrong here. The market that produces the most profit is the high-end market, where the manufacturers can price their products as high as they want because they know that no-one has anything strong enough to compete. If you remember the days of the first AMD dual-core, it retailed around R4500, and it would be whipped by today's R600 chips.

Show me the numbers and then we'll talk. For every 1 i7 975 that Intel sells, they will probably sell 10 E5200's - pulling the numbers out of my gat I know but I doubt it's far off the mark.



While companies do make a lot of money through volume sales of budget parts, they don't make as much as they would with high-end products in smaller numbers. The budget parts are being sold much closer to cost price as well, and this logic is the same reason why Ferrari, Lamborghini, and Bugatti only make high-end supercars - they make tons more money that way.

LOL you think Bugatti/Lamborghini makes more profit than Ford/Toyota? They aren't in the same league - do your reading. Bugatti is a division of VW, they actually make a net loss on each car sold but it gives status to VW so they keep them on. Luxury manufacturers work on much smaller scales of distribution so it enables them to still make a profit.

Example: In 2007 Lamborghini made sales of 467 ml euros, net profit of 47.1 ml euro. (http://www.zercustoms.com/news/2007-Lamborghini-Profit.html)

In the same year Toyota made a net profit of 13.7 bl dollars (http://www.businessweek.com/autos/autobeat/archives/2007/05/toyotas_profit.html)

That's 47 million euros vs 13.7 billion dollars.



No, ASUS only produced 1000 because the card was an absolute monster, and having a limited edition product that was essentially two overclocked GTX295s sandwiched into a box with 4GB memory would have earned them a killer profit, and a lot of publicity. Honestly, they're even thinking of making more, but thats probably due to ATI's Eyefinity technology becoming a major threat in the market. And if they do, it'll be much less than the R14500 they were asking for here.

1: The Mars was 2x285 not 2x295. 2: If they could have made a killer profit then they WOULD HAVE - get real. Do you think they just decided not to make a ton of money so that they could garner some kind of useless elite status?



Its not a mainstream, high-end, or budget product; its an all-rounder, and its intended for the masses, therefore the analogy is weak and incorrect.

The PS3 was marketed and priced as a luxury commodity.

[jasong]

I do want to reiterate something that I noted in a previous post. NVIDIA stated that they are concentrating the new Fermi GPU architecture on general GPU computing. Think of hardware assisted simulations, ray-tracing, etc.

Who knows how big that market is, but I wouldn't be surprised if a $1000 card is not at all unreasonably priced.


That's fine, they're welcome to go after the commercial gpgpu market and I wish them the best with it. For me, I just want a reasonably priced well-performing graphics card, not a slice of bleeding-edge lab equipment.

[Chevron]

1: PS2 had emotion engine, not PS3. 2: Nobody bought PS3 out of necessity, esp not at launch. Who on earth needs a $600 console?




Show me the numbers and then we'll talk. For every 1 i7 975 that Intel sells, they will probably sell 10 E5200's - pulling the numbers out of my gat I know but I doubt it's far off the mark.




LOL you think Bugatti/Lamborghini makes more profit than Ford/Toyota? They aren't in the same league - do your reading. Bugatti is a division of VW, they actually make a net loss on each car sold but it gives status to VW so they keep them on. Luxury manufacturers work on much smaller scales of distribution so it enables them to still make a profit.

Example: In 2007 Lamborghini made sales of 467 ml euros, net profit of 47.1 ml euro. (http://www.zercustoms.com/news/2007-Lamborghini-Profit.html)

In the same year Toyota made a net profit of 13.7 bl dollars (http://www.businessweek.com/autos/autobeat/archives/2007/05/toyotas_profit.html)

That's 47 million euros vs 13.7 billion dollars.




1: The Mars was 2x285 not 2x295. 2: If they could have made a killer profit then they WOULD HAVE - get real. Do you think they just decided not to make a ton of money so that they could garner some kind of useless elite status?




The PS3 was marketed and priced as a luxury commodity.

Well said.

[goleastro]

Well said.

I totally agree. . . Thumbs Up

[X-Gamer]

True dat!

+1 to Jasong.

Oh and the First PS3 models had the emotion engine to maximise compatibility with PS2 games.
Just so you know.