The right price for the GTX200 family...

[cvearl]

Originally Posted by Heinz68

EVGA E-GEFORCE GTX 260 After Mail In Rebate: $305.99 CAD (+ $15 Next business day delivery)
That is the lowest priced 260 I found In Canada it is from NCIX.com (fully Canadian own) located in Vancouver BC.
Could not match the price locally in Toronto also locally I would have to pay extra 8% Ontario Provincial Sales tax.
You oil rich guys from Alberta don't have to worry about that. So quit complaining about the prices.

By the way if Newegg was shipping to Canada I would also have to pay the sales taxes they are collected at custom office on anything priced over $20.-
Canadian Sales Tax (GST) 5% plus 8% Ontario Sales Tax (PST) = Total 13% in sales taxes, aren't you guys from Alberta lucky paying only the 5%.

Hahaha. Us rich oil guys...

Trying to see if I can slip one under the wifedar....

C.

[particleman]

As the owner of both a 280GTX and 2 4870's in Crossfire, I disagree. The 280 GTX is worth as much as 2 4870's. With the 280GTX you get the fastest single chip solution available, meaning you avoid all the SLi/Crossfire issues. Also 2 4870's generate an incredible amount of heat and require a power supply even greater than that a 280GTX requires. I thought my 280GTX was a hot running card when I first bought it, but it is nothing compared to 2 4870's. The 2 4870s idle at 80 degrees all the time!

4870's in Crossfire has too many issues... I have had to totally rework the airflow in my case, it warms my entire room, it eats up a crazy amount of electricity, and doesn't work properly with some games.

I am much more satisfied with the $650 I spent on my 280GTX than the $600 I spent on my 2 4870s (the total cost is even more considering I had issues with my 975x board in Crossfire and had to get a x48 board).

With the 280GTX you just play what you want to play (assuming you don't get one with overheating issues). With 4870 Crossfire, you spend more time working on getting stuff working than playing.

[LordJuanlo]

Originally Posted by particleman

I thought my 280GTX was a hot running card when I first bought it, but it is nothing compared to 2 4870's. The 2 4870s idle at 80 degrees all the time!

I noticed the same, the card was much hotter than my 8800GTX, there is something wrong at the driver that does not make the fan spin. Be sure to apply this trick, now my card idles at 48-50ºC. If you have 2 cards you should apply this ASAP. Fan works great at 35% speed, almost silent

[Maverickman]

I agree with those prices. The GTX 280 keeps dropping and can be bought for $479 after rebate at Newegg. If it eventually gets to $399, that would be a great deal vs. the HD 4870. Of course, ATI can also drop its prices. I LOVE competition!!!!

[lee63]

Wow, I wish I would have waited I guess that's what I get for being impatient

[MikeC]

When the 4870 reviews came out, I made it a point to check performance at 2560x1600 with 4x AA. At three different web sites (AnandTech, HotHardware, and The TechReport), the overall performance of the GeForce GTX 280 was 20% higher than the 4870, but there were only a couple of cases where the difference would have actually made an impact during gameplay. There was no doubt that NVIDIA would need to lower the price of the 280 in order to sell them.

However, I don’t believe that those reviews include results with transparency antialiasing (vs. adaptive AA) enabled, which begins to stress graphics cards that only have 512MB of memory. With these settings, there are cases where the average frame rate in games like Dark Messiah and Oblivion will drop into the single digits on 512MB graphics card. With all these variables, it becomes difficult to determine what the price of the GeForce GTX 280 “should be”, but I’m glad to see them dropping!

[ChrisRay]

The GTX 280 offers 1 gigabyte of memory. Which is a very sound and future proof investment. I am already seeing alot of games suffering on 512 cards. Both the GTX 260 and 280 have alot of leg room in regards to memory.

I just dont see the 280 going for 400 dollars with 1 gig of memory under its belt. Thats the kind of thing you pay premiums for. Personally the card that continues to impress me is the 260. It basically has that and a bag of chips going for it at its current price range. It simply confounds me that people haven't seen the value of a 896 Meg 448 bit card for 299 dollars. Specially when games like Crysis are already exceeding 512 megs of memory at 1600x1200 with VH and AA enabled.

Chris

[lee63]

Well if they drop any more I might get a 3rd

[Xion X2]

Originally Posted by ChrisRay

The GTX 280 offers 1 gigabyte of memory. Which is a very sound and future proof investment. I am already seeing alot of games suffering on 512 cards. Both the GTX 260 and 280 have alot of leg room in regards to memory.

I just dont see the 280 going for 400 dollars with 1 gig of memory under its belt. Thats the kind of thing you pay premiums for. Personally the card that continues to impress me is the 260. It basically has that and a bag of chips going for it at its current price range. It simply confounds me that people haven't seen the value of a 896 Meg 448 bit card for 299 dollars. Specially when games like Crysis are already exceeding 512 megs of memory at 1600x1200 with VH and AA enabled.

Chris

The question, though, is if this "512 meg" ceiling is overadvertised by Nvidia and its promoters in order to redirect consumers toward the GTX line.

I've looked at a lot of benches so far and very rarely seen a case where this is a disadvantage for the 4870. I think that people are overlooking the amount of total memory bandwidth it has (which is actually more than GTX260) and focusing too much on VRAM capacity. At higher resolutions with high amounts of AA applied, overall memory bandwidth also plays a key factor in how a card scales.

Something else that's being overlooked in the VRAM discussion is the improvement ATI has made with AA. It appears the 4870 handles it better than the GTX line which would also play a factor.

Oblivion at 1920x1200, 8xAA:



Source: Anandtech (www.anandtech.com)

[Redeemed]

Originally Posted by cvearl

As a long time PC Gamer I have been having a blast watching all the new cards hit the scene and the recent price drops. It's been an exciting month!

After now reading a bazilion reviews for the AMD 4870 and 4850 and getting a 4870 myself, I have turned my attention to the GTX200's. Mainly because I like to own one of each camp and the GTX260 has been of great interrest to me. I enjoy being able to compare cards side by side.

That said, I still have a huge problem with the pricing structure out there. Even in light of price drops. The GTX200's HAVE to come down more!

I have been reading reviews on the GTX200's alot. They are great cards! The release of the 4000 series from AMD do NOT make them any less of a card. However, given current market conditions in the various segments, they are too costly still for what you get.

Here is my take on where the current line up needs to be to be a good value and competative. My suggested MSRP's...

9800GTX - $189
GTX260 - $299
GTX280 - $399

I did not include 9800GTX+ becuase it offers nearly nothing over the existing 9800GTX besides a touch lower power consumption. The 9800GTX was fine with a simple price adjustment. That was all that was needed.

Anyone not agree with this? And do we think nVidia will be able to?

C.

Those prices seem alright excepte for the GTX280... I think it's should be closer to $499 honestly... it's a pretty powerful card... just not $650 powerful if you follow my meaning.

After the 4870X2 is released the GTX280 will not longer be the performance champ IMO. So it should be priced accordingly. I also don't think the 4870X2 will be significantly faster than the GTX280, therefore it should not cost significantly more. I can see the GTX280 going for $550 tops, with the 4870X2 going for right about the same price, if not $600.

Though, if nVidia did drop the price on the GTX280 to $400 I'd be extremely tempted to buy two (and eventually a third). Afterall, I did shell out $900 on launch day for my two 640MB GTSs and to this day the performance those two cards offer is still hard to beat. You want to talk about a good investment, Chris. I'm sure the same could be said about the GTX280s (and even 260s) if the price is right. Though if nVidia dropped the GTX280 to $400, they might have a hard time selling the GTX260 if it stayed at $300. In that case the GTX260 might need to come down to about $250 to remain attrative. Anyhow, at these price points I'm sure nVidia wouldn't be making any money on the cards, so I doubt they'll ever go that low in the near future. Atleast not untill GT200b (the die shrink).

What surprises me, is that nVidia has dropped prices like crazy on the GT200 cards, yet AMD hasn't allowed their prices to budge. If they don't lower prices soon, with the rate nVidia is slashing prices the 4800 series might lose their advantage.

[Redraider]

Originally Posted by Redeemed

Though, if nVidia did drop the price on the GTX280 to $400 I'd be extremely tempted to buy two (and eventually a third).

You must be running out of room in your barn out back with all these GPU's you plan to own.



Nough said.