Excellent points. I think you've summed up AMD/ATI's quandry quite well.

Guru 3D has the 285 & 295 listed in there benchmarks for non DX11 games and it appears the lower end 460s sit just above/around the 285 while the 1gb versions sit comfortably above it and in some games comes close to the 295. OCing the 460 could possibly get you results similar to the 295 in some games from the benchmarks I saw.

They also have there SLI review up for anyone interested which is pretty awesome.

Really nice review. The GTX 460 sure does deliver. I would have loved to buy 2 of these but my mobo is CrossFire only.

May I ask whether the palit 1gb sonic edition's power result is the same as it's standard overclocked setting's result? I'm a bit insistive in my belief because the one review on DH showed power consumption in 10 watt range of hd5970, I think theirs was tested at 900mhz.
PS: I take your reviews most seriously and recommend to all others in my reach. My respects for everyone working to provide us these concise reviews.

Review on "DH" ? Trolling on your first post ?
A reference HD 5970 has a loaded power usage of 299w...How does a card with two 6 pin PCIe (75w apiece + 75w PCI-E slot for 225w maximum draw) pull 289w ?

Here's a picture to illustrate...


See how two (2) GTX 460's only draw around 60w more than a HD 5970 ?

BTW: As far as I'm aware, Bit-tech, Techspot and Tweaktown are the only reviews up of the Palit Sonic Platinum card. I also note that the while all GTX 460 cards reviewed have considerable overclocking headroom, 850-875MHz core seems to be the usual stable range...and while a 30% overclock is pretty damn good (enough to beat up on a HD 5850 at 1920 resolution), 900MHz is likely to give a GTX 470 a run for it's money and would certainly beat a HD 5870 in some nvidia favoured titles (Call of Duty, Far Cry 2 etc.)

Will the Palit 768 or 1g run on a 425w psu?

Would likely depend on the quality/efficiency of the PSU, what other components are installed, USB peripherals and whether you plan to overclock. Personally I'd say a 425w PSU might be cutting it a bit close.

Nice reviews, now I find myself on overclockers.co.uk looking at their credit options..

Just bought one of the Palit Sonic 1GB and it downclocks to 50 MHz Core, 100 MHz Shaders and 135 MHz on the memory! Explains the low idle power and temps!

Good review, but check the die size measurements - shouldn't 390mm be 39.0mm (size of the chip)?