VR-Zone

Hot on the heels of accusations of (more) unethical tactics from Nvidia, the GTX 465 is finally here. A poorly kept secret, the GTX 465 has been previewed and even available at e-tailers well before release date. Not surprisingly, there are no major surprises with this release. In terms of performance, the GTX 465 fits in somewhere between the HD 5830 and the HD 5850. On average, the HD 5850 ends up about 10% faster. Nvidia's problem however, is that the HD 5850 is just $20 away, sometimes even less with rebates. European prices are virtually identical.

It is clear that on a price/performance level, the GTX 465 is slightly inferior to the HD 5850. However, things get ugly for Nvidia once we consider the price/performance/watt metric. Like its siblings, the GTX 465 is a power hog - using up about 100W more than the HD 5850 at Load. In short, all logic will suggest the HD 5850 is a no-brainer in the ~$300 range.

Why would one opt for the GTX 465, then? Reviewers never fail to highlight the benefits of CUDA, 3D and PhysX - a pattern in agreement with the recent accusations mentioned earlier. Then there are ATI exclusive features such as Eyefinity or 7.1 Bitstreaming to consider. Of course, the GTX 465 seems to be strong in heavy tessellation - but we don't know when such amounts of tessellation will make it to mainstream gaming. Ultimately, it depends on the end user as to exactly how much these features matters to them.

From a gaming perspective, however, there's no doubt that ATI's products have the upper-hand.

You can find a list of reviews compiled by our forum member adrianlee here.