My experience with HD 4870

[Heinz68]

http://img513.imageshack.us/img513/8837/hd4870powercoloruo6.jpg
Finally got some time to play with my new PowerColor HD 4870.
First impression, the card looks nice but that is really not much important since I hope not too see the card much more after closing the case.
The card is 1 inch shorter than my 8800GTX but it doesn't make so much difference with the 4870 power connection on the back off the board, the 8800 card has them on top.

Did step by step un-installation and installation including the DriverCleaner, CCleaner and using the Catalyst 8.7 beta driver.

Boot up looked OK, set the 1920x1080 (my monitor native resolution) and here the BIG problems started.

The picture had very deep purple haze and no sound at all. The sound problem must be conflict with my motherboard Realtek audio chip, believe the video board is also using Realtek audio chip and that most likely can be fixed by installing one the the old audio cards I still have but what about the picture, it sucks.

Decided too replace the DVI cable with HDMI cables and got a sound but only on the monitor speakers (no system or Logitech attached speakers sound). WOW beautiful desktop, never remember seeing better picture but still BIG problem, the picture was centered in the middle with about one inch black frame around and that was at the 1080p native resolution.

Well decided to use the HD 4800 series HotFix driver also not official driver but recommended for system with stability problems.

Problem solved, now everything looks great thanks god, was starting to get a little upset. :) Now.
EDIT:
Based on others experience I probably should have try the Catalyst 8.6 first, looks like it's faster than the HotFix Driver.
Now I'm not going to bother with it. Waiting for the official driver.

[KasuCode]

Glad to hear things are going great now with it. Enjoy your new card.

[Heinz68]

Thanks KasuCode.

Here is a picture off the idle speed temperature, the case temperature was at the same time 30C.
At idle the fan runs at low speed, if somebody likes lower idle temps it can be set with the
"Profile Fan-Control Hack" posted on this forum.
http://img210.imageshack.us/img210/8928/idlespeedtemppl9.jpg


Here picture off the ATI Overdrive in the action, tried the over-clock on couple games and no problem.
This is nice and easy over-clock. With GDDR5 the 1100MHz Memory Clock is multiplied by 4 = (4400MHz data rate).
I believe this is going to be a great card for overclocking with some after market coolers and some OC tools with voltage adjustments. I'm not going to bother with that since this card is going to be most likely traded for HD 4870x2 soon.
http://img530.imageshack.us/img530/1048/ochd4870oq3.jpg

[LordJuanlo]

Yes, better wait for official 8.7 and stay with the 8.6 hotfix now

[cvearl]

I am diggin my 4870 as well.

Just wish my temps were as low as yours. I know you COULD have the different BIOS. A beta tester at Rage said he has seen a few out there depending on mfg.

I have the HIS HD4870. It idles at 80c steady and the case I am in is a low flow Antec Sonata III so that could be the reason. The room is 25C Ambient.

C.

[ASUSEN7900GTX]

wonder if one should have waited for the ICE Q HD4870 thhose are pretty cool?

must say i am positively supprised by this card plays COD4 maxed out never could with th eold system :)

GO ATI for once there is competition again between ATI/Nvidia this gives ATI some rel boost since they had hard to do anything Nvidia put up until now.

so great card even greater with2 of them :D

[Riptide]

My HIS also idled @ 80c out of the box.

[Tr1cK]

My HIS also idled @ 80c out of the box.

+1 on my 4850.

Overall, I like it a lot and can't wait for new drivers that are more optimized for the 4800s.
I've seen a few games that don't even push the GPU close to 100% usage according to GPUZ sensors.

[K007]

Crank the fan up -.-

[Riptide]

I used the XML hack and have the fan @ 40%. It's a bit noisy but knocked those temps down to 50c @ idle.

I'm in the market for a better cooler but am waiting on seeing either some more reviews or opinions from the end users.

[Tr1cK]

Anybody else keeping GPUZ open to see the temps and GPU load while playing?

I think I'll make a list of games that do/don't hit 100%.

[Heinz68]

My 3DMark06 = 10055 the highest I ever got on this system.
With the 8800 GTX the highest I got was 9248.
Both cards are being hold back big time by mine about two and half year old system.
At that time this setup beat the best Intel had to offer. Than 6 monhts later the Core 2 came and the game was over :)

This benchmark is very much CPU depended. Look at the fastest system on the ORB, the graphic card was HD 3870x2 and the CPU Intel Core 2 Etreme QX965o at 5707 MHz.
The score 32601 3DMarks.
http://img503.imageshack.us/img503/3657/orb3dmark06nh0.jpg

[Heinz68]

Crysis Benchmarking
Res 1920x1080, AA4x, Quality-High, DX9
PoverColor HD 4870...Average FPS 26.45, Min FPS 13.45, Max FPS 34.64
BFG 8800 GTX OC.....Average FPS 20.21, Min FPS ..8.75, Max FPS 22.93

I say that is nice improvement and off course both runs were hold back by my two and half year old system.

PoverColor HD 4870
http://img187.imageshack.us/img187/5444/crysisbench4870kj1.jpg

BFG 8800 GTX OC
http://img523.imageshack.us/img523/3770/crysisbench8800gtxocqi6.jpg

[fugu_fish]

I installed my HD 4870 last night. Everything went well. I used the CAT 8.6HF drivers. A little strange that the drivers didn't prompt a reboot. Didn't do any proper benchmarking but Age of Conan ran a lot better at the same settings. I really do miss the game profiles of the Nvidia drivers. I guess ATI Tray Tools lets you do per game profiles. Age of Conan does not like CCC forced AA settings. I'm also idling at 80C. Have to look into the "fan hack". I have an Antec 900 case with all the fans (3 X 120mm 1 X 200mm) set to high. It moves so much air that the intake grill gets covered with dust in just a couple of hours.

Overall, I'm very impressed with this card. Although the G80/92 came a long way in the image quality department, ATI still holds that title IMO.

[K007]

oh...didn't know about game profiles not available in ati drivers...wait..they have to be..how does cf work then...

[NiukNiuk]

Add me to the list of happy HD 4870 owners ^^
I've finished installing it on my new rig, and I'm impressed by its performance/price (well I came from an agp x1950 pro...).
And I'm also idling at 76-78°c
I used the "fan hack" to adjust the fan speed, and contacted sapphire asking if this was a bug from the drivers/bios or powerplay function, and here's what they answered:

The temp for your HD4870 is normal behavior from AMD official announcement, GPU temp is between 77~88C in 2D and 3D mode. I will not suggest you editing CCC profile, becauses of PowerPlay function. Please wait for AMD update new bios for this card or try use other third party application software to adjust it fan speed. Thank you.


Well except from this issue (I'm waiting for some 3rd party air cooling solutions), everything is perfect and runs awesome on my new 24" monitor ^^

[fugu_fish]

oh...didn't know about game profiles not available in ati drivers...wait..they have to be..how does cf work then...


This from Wikipedia:
If an OpenGL game does not have a Crossfire profile, the Catalyst AI system will set the rendering mode to Scissor by default, with no way to change it to a more suitable or faster mode, such as AFR. However SLI allows the rendering mode to be set for each application manually, even for games which do not have an existing profile. It should be noted that setting Catalyst AI to 'Advanced' allows manual mode setting for Direct 3D games, but not OpenGL games, to AFR.

I haven't set the Cat AI to advanced yet. Still an ATI noob. Last card was a 9800 Pro. It may not even work for a single card.

[ATOJAR]

Im gonna be getting a HD 4870 in about 2 weeks, hopefully it will be a nice upgrade from my current card! ....


By the sounds of the temps on the things though im definitely getting a aftermarket cooler!

[Tr1cK]

Mine idles in the 50s after the BIOS flash.

[methimpikehoses]

Mine idles in the 50s

+1

after fixing the profile

[LordJuanlo]

Mine idles in the 50s after the BIOS flash.

Where can I get the info to do it?

[Tr1cK]

Where can I get the info to do it?

I think it was techpowerup forums.

[Tho Jo Smale]

This from Wikipedia:


I haven't set the Cat AI to advanced yet. Still an ATI noob. Last card was a 9800 Pro. It may not even work for a single card.

Yeah,


You don't really need profiles....or rendering settings for a single card....only X-fire.


JC

[brady]

Yeah,


You don't really need profiles....or rendering settings for a single card....only X-fire.


JC

What about the X2? Will we need profiles for that? If so, then I'll pass on it. I just can't stand multi-GPU setups.

[nekrosoft13]

oh...didn't know about game profiles not available in ati drivers...wait..they have to be..how does cf work then...

there are CF profiles but you can't change them, see them or make them.

really crappy if you ask me.