Replacing my 9800GTX

[Democrab]

UPDATE:

 

Guys, I'm an idiot.

 

Basically, I bought a brand new Sapphire 512mb 4870 on eBay because it was really cheap at £85. But, once it arrived I installed it in my system, and I've been getting the classic Sapphire 4870 bios problems; such as freezing in games, blue screens of death in games, artifacts, etc, etc.

 

I've tried a BIOS flash of the motherboard, I've also tried the "working" solution of flashing the cards BIOS, which didn't work either. I've also tried the Catalyst profile fix, the Rivatuner fix, the underclocking fix but nope, it appears my card has the unfixable bad factory BIOS. So now I'm going to have to try to get a refund, or get a replacement from ATI.

 

 

I'm annoyed. There must be a moral in this somewhere, but I've yet to find it.

RMA it, happens to everyone usually.

 

No matter what brand, even nVidia gets it. (Looking at SyphonPayne here)

 

Try flashing it a few more times, then ask Sapphire if they'll replace it.

[Guest]

For the fcks sake

ATI=Cheapest gaming cards

NVIDIA=For rich b*tches and STILL they SUCK

[Fozzy Fozborne]

In case no one mentioned it, do NOT buy the GTS 250. It is literally a rebranded 9800GTX+ for a bit more money, thank you NVidia. If you can afford the 260GTX, go for that (preferably the 216 model). If you can't swing that, the 4870 is still a very good card as is the 4890.

 

Having said that, they are coming out with a new generation of cards that might be worth the wait (then again, NVidia might release the 6th version of the same card under the GTX 3XX model number).

[Starion]

I've now bought another 4870, a Sapphire Toxic Vapor-X 4870, the 1gb one without the notorious freezing issues.

 

I put in the card, played GTAIV, and after 15 minutes - BAM! big freeze, just like with the other 4870.

 

Now I know the cards aren't the issue, because they were both brand new. I'm now starting to think it's a compatibility problem with my motherboard, because that has an Nvidia chipset. It's certainly not the power supply, it's on the list of recommended power supplies for the 4870.

 

It doesn't matter now though, I'm selling everything off and I'm building a whole new set up with a Radeon 4890.

[Wolf68k]

For the fcks sake

ATI=Cheapest gaming cards

NVIDIA=For rich b*tches and STILL they SUCK

You're right, ATIs are cheaper than nVidia cards...and you exactly what you paid for, a cheap POS card.

[Democrab]

I've now bought another 4870, a Sapphire Toxic Vapor-X 4870, the 1gb one without the notorious freezing issues.

 

I put in the card, played GTAIV, and after 15 minutes - BAM! big freeze, just like with the other 4870.

 

Now I know the cards aren't the issue, because they were both brand new. I'm now starting to think it's a compatibility problem with my motherboard, because that has an Nvidia chipset. It's certainly not the power supply, it's on the list of recommended power supplies for the 4870.

 

It doesn't matter now though, I'm selling everything off and I'm building a whole new set up with a Radeon 4890.

Wouldn't be the motherboard, that would be GTAIV's sh*tty coding...

 

Wolf68k: Actually, the ATI cards are just as high build quality, drivers, etc as nVidia's... Maybe that was true a while ago, but now they're equal except in cost. (Eg. AU$280 for a HD4890, AU$550 got a GTX 285)