Any idea on when price drops may happen for the 5870?

[benmenftw]

Hello there, I am looking to upgrade/replace my Ati radeon hd 5770, but I need to keep my upgrade's price to no more than 175$. Really the one I am looking at is the Ati radeon hd 5870. Although as you know it is unrealistic to expect to find one in my price range and I want the new gpu in time for October. Do you think there will be a price drop on the 5870 by then? I mean I know about how the new series of Ati and Nvidia gpus are coming this year but how much would you guess the price would drop on the 5870 or 5950?

Regards, Benjamin

 

[dividebyzero]

Short answer is they wont drop in price- at least not significantly or widespread.
Dropping the prices on 5870 and 5850 cards cannibalizes the potential sales of 6870 and 6850 cards. You will probably see spot specials from selected retail and etail stores but they will be of limited stock and for a limited time period (from a few days to a week duration) unless the manufacturer or vendor has excess stock to get rid of -such as MSI's undercutting of other board manufacturers recently.
For your $175 budget I would suggest you look at the Asus DCII 5850. A stock 5850 is around 12-17% slower than a 5870 - not a huge real world difference. The DCII also has very good overclocking potential, and should reach (or surpass) 5870 levels of performance without any difficulty. I would not expect 5850 prices to drop much below this price, and I doubt you will see sub-$200 prices for 5870's -a least not widespread, before both disappear from store shelves.

My advice, if you are looking for the best bang-per-buck is to keep checking back with the big etailers for these special deals, or to look at the secondhand market (if a 5870 is a must have) -make sure the seller has good sales feedback, and preferably that the card is still covered by warranty. Local pickup or buyers insurance (using PayPal or similar) would be in your best interest also. Steer clear of volt-modded cards- they tend to have had hard lives.

 

[benmenftw]

So could I see price drops in 6870's?

 

[klepto12]

you might try looking on ebay there are great deals on cards that are barley used.

 

[dividebyzero]

So could I see price drops in 6870's?

Generally the trend in graphics card prices is that prices are maintained at, or around the same level throughout it's lifespan. The biggest drop in prices usually occurs when the initial launch (reference) model is superceded by the custom (or in-house designed) versions of the cards - different cooling, non-reference power regulation and board components, a different PCB construction etc.

This trend has been glaringly obvious since September of 2009 and the introduction of the HD 5xxx series, although AMD and Nvidia essentially stopped competing head-to-head in graphics card models during the latter part of the HD4xxx /GTX2xx production run. AMD and Nvidia have not been direct competitiors at the same performance/price point since the HD 4850 and 9800GTX, with the noteable exception of the GTX 460 1Gb and HD 5830 -the latter was essentially an afterthought my AMD (a salvage part of a salvage part) just for the sake of having a model at the $US200 price point.

Don't expect direct head-to-head competition in future. Neither AMD or Nvidia can afford an open price war now of in the foreseeable future. More to the point, such a price war serves little purpose while both companies command a sizeable share of the market

 

[Relic]

DBZ is right, it doesn't make much sense for them to drop the price so much risking sales of their newer cards. However you can still find pretty decent deals if you increase that budget. Currently I found this 5870 on Newegg for $199 after MIR, if my memory is serving me right I also think they had a special deal a couple weeks ago with one going for ~$185 after MIR. Same story goes with the 5850's if you are looking at them as an alternative.

If you absolutely cannot increase your budget beyond $175 before MIR your choices will likely be limited to the 6850 at least for the time being. I would say the closer we get to October the better chances you have at getting more bang for your buck besides special limited deals with one of those cards including the 6870 which right now goes for around ~$215 before MIR.

By the way what resolution do you currently game at?

 

[benmenftw]

Oh well good news my budget is actually at 200$ now. Thank you for the advice everyone!

 

[red1776]

For your $175 budget I would suggest you look at the Asus DCII 5850. A stock 5850 is around 12-17% slower than a 5870 - not a huge real world difference. The DCII also has very good overclocking potential, and should reach (or surpass) 5870 levels of performance without any difficulty.

I will attest to this as well. I have The Asus EAH DirectCu 5850's in my setup for that very reason. I have long suspected that Asus and MSI get the pick of the binning litter. The DCU 5850 will surpass the 5870 in performance. In fact mine are running real close to the 6950 numbers without any heat or stability issues. I run 4 of them at 1020Mhz core in crossfire!, thats amazing. if you want this card however, you better jump on it. The 5850's are not being replaced as they run out of stock it appears.

with the noteable exception of the GTX 460 1Gb and HD 5830 -the latter was essentially an afterthought my AMD (a salvage part of a salvage part) just for the sake of having a model at the $US200 price point.

Isn't that the truth. usually they pull back the core speed , or fuse a shader cluster. The 5830 they fused half the raster units (from 32 to 16)

This trend has been glaringly obvious since September of 2009 and the introduction of the HD 5xxx series, although AMD and Nvidia essentially stopped competing head-to-head in graphics card models during the latter part of the HD4xxx /GTX2xx production run. AMD and Nvidia have not been direct competitiors at the same performance/price point since the HD 4850 and 9800GTX,

You really think thats the case Chef? (at least in public perception?) I still always see the VGA buying decision (here at TS for example, and with my customers) as a "should I get the 6970 or the 570 for example.
I do think Radeon is making an earnest run at making Eyfinity , multi screen gaming mainstream.

 

[benmenftw]

Well I may have to pass on that deal red because as of right now I have no money to put into, but once I get done selling my old games on ebay that should put me around the 175-200 dollar mark.

 

[dividebyzero]

You really think thats the case Chef? (at least in public perception?) I still always see the VGA buying decision (here at TS for example, and with my customers) as a "should I get the 6970 or the 570 for example.

The HD6970/GTX570 is probably the exception that proves the rule I think -hence my use of "essentially". The rest of nvidia's and AMD's lineup tend to dovetail on price/performance for the most part (single cards only of course)
HD6990>GTX580>GTX570/HD6970>HD6950 2Gb>HD 6950 1Gb> GTX 560Ti > HD 6870 > GTX460 1Gb etc.
The GTX 570 and HD 6970 presents probably the best insight into brand recognition/awareness. The cards have similar performance and characteristics, so the main differentiator becomes "the brand" and the added-value factors: PhysX, compute, Eyefinity. This Xbit review published today of SLI/Crossfire scaling shows how close these cards actually are. Taking the results (as well as others from around the web for different settings/games) into account as a whole, you would be hard pressed to single either out as significantly bettwe than the other. Not a given with cards (or SLI/CFX setups) from lower down the food chain.

I do think Radeon is making an earnest run at making Eyfinity , multi screen gaming mainstream.

I agree. Personally the bezel thing and display problems with onscreen HUD's and inventories etc. keeps me away from setting one up for myself, but the feature is definitely entering the collective gaming conciousness.