9800gx2, 9800gtx, 8800gtx, or 8800 ultra

My friends looking to build a new computer soon and im not quite sure what i want to put in for a video card. The four i were looking at were:
9800 gx2
9800 gtx
8800 ultra
8800 gtx

Out of these, which performs the best at a resolution of 1680x1050 for gaming? He was concerned about the 9800gtx having half the ram of the 9800gx2, is this a problem at this resolution?

I would buy none of those TBH. A lot of new graphics cards are coming out / have come out very recently.

ATI 4850 ~ 170-200$ ~ About equal performance to 9800GTX

GTX 260 / GTX 280 - Brand new Nvidia cards (super expensive, the 280GTX is 650$+)

ATI 4870 - Should drop in a few weeks and perform far above the 9800GTX, probably 20% faster give or take.

9800GTX+ - A new flavor of the 9800GTX, which will be around 230$ and drop in a few weeks. It's rumored to perform above the 4850.

If I had to buy a card RIGHT now, I'd pick the ATI HD4850. It is very cheap and performs very well at high resolutions. My 2nd choice would be the 9800GX2.

The 9800GTX is overpriced atm, it's going to drop to 200$ very soon (buying it right now is pretty much flushing 100$ down the toilet). The 8800GTX and 8800ULTRA are pretty old and outdated and overpriced compared to other options.

You really got to do research and read a lot of reviews, a lot of this is speculation on my part. This summer is going to be absolute insanity as far as GPU releases and price changes are concerned.

The HD4850 is actually faster than the 9800GTX, it's even snapping at the heels of the GTX 260 for half the price and even beats it in some situations: http://techreport.com/articles.x/14967/1

Plus Intel boards support CF so you can overclock and have a good graphics setup! Hooray!

He was concerned about the 9800gtx having half the ram of the 9800gx2, is this a problem at this resolution?

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The GX2 actually has the same amount of RAM per GPU, so it will be just as limited at higher resolutions with AA AF ast the 9800GTX.

When the HD 4870 comes out it should be on par if not better than the GTX 260.

The Radeon hd 4850 is definitely a considered option now. How does buying two radeon hd 4850's and having them in crossfire compare to one 9800gx2? 2 radeons would still be a bit less then the gx2.

Shakka said:

The Radeon hd 4850 is definitely a considered option now. How does buying two radeon hd 4850's and having them in crossfire compare to one 9800gx2? 2 radeons would still be a bit less then the gx2.

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Checkout this review by Anandtech - http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3338&p=14

Shows HD4850 crossfire vs a lot of other graphics card configurations with multiple game benches.

Needless to say, HD4850 crossfire has a very high price : performance ratio.

Just keep in mind you'll most likely want an X48 motherboard if your friend decides to go with the HD4850 crossfire setup.

X38 still has 16x + 16x CF, so ye'll be fine with that. Or the 790FX if he goes with AMD.

790FX is only AMD processors though

The Phenom 9850 is really not a bad CPU, and neither is the 5000+ X2 Black edition for $75.

WorshipMe said:

The Phenom 9850 is really not a bad CPU, and neither is the 5000+ X2 Black edition for $75.

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Nothing beats the E8400 / E7200 for overclocking / gaming / price : performance

Tell your friend to go Intel Shakka

I'm betting the 5000+ X2 does actually win on price to performance if you take the time to add everything up. A simple multiplier change can equal 3.0GHz, and 3.2 is pretty easy too.

But as this is an Intel thread, I'll shut up.

Yeah this graphics card will be accompanied by either a q6600 or a q9450. Although he will be using it for gaming, he wants a quad core for future programs. Also, having a dual monitor setup (one for gaming, one for browsing) doesnt affect fps right?

I don't completely agree that the HD 4850 is better than or even equal to the 9800GTX. At stock clocks, sure it's got a slight edge, but there's many things to consider other than stock performance. Here's three things to consider:

-I hear the price of a 9800 GTX is coming down to $200 when the 9800GTX+ comes out, so that negates the price edge that the HD4850 has over the 9800GTX.
-The 9800GTX overclocks like a beast (stock core clock at 675, I've hit 850 in triple sli so far, and I think there's still room to go).
-From what I've seen from the HD4850, they don't overclock very well at all. This may change with the release of retail cards, who knows.
-The single-slot cooler of the HD4850 doesn't really do a great job of dissipating heat from the cards. Plus the single-slot design of the cards doesn't remove heat from the case, blowing hot air right back into your case.

-From what I've seen from the HD4850, they don't overclock very well at all. This may change with the release of retail cards, who knows.

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With the Beta drivers you can't increase the fan speed (load around 90c), I think 8.6 fixes this. Plus CCC can't go past a 700 clock speed which all cards seem to attain easily.
Here's another review showing it to be plenty faster than the 9800GTX and even slotting in between the 260 and 280 at times: http://techreport.com/articles.x/14967/1