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ASUS EAH4850/HTDI/512M Radeon HD 4850  (Source: Newegg)
Newegg has HD 4850's available now

Yesterday, AMD’s Radeon HD 4850 video card was making headlines. The card promises good performance and will fight for the middle of the road market alongside NVIDIA’s freshly announced price change for the GeForce 9800 GTX and new 9800 GTX+ GPU.

The initial HD 4850 video cards that are hitting the market will use GDDR3 RAM, though AMD has publically said that its RV770 will work with GDDR5 and GDDR5 versions are expected at a later date.

Both NVIDIA and AMD are known for their paper launches of products that are announced and get gamers excited, to be unavailable for weeks or months after the initial press releases are sent out. This time AMD is on the ball and the HD 4850 graphics cards are already sitting on store shelves.

Newegg has HD 4850 cards from Sapphire, MSI, Gigabyte, ASUS, and Diamond available for purchase now. The Sapphire Radeon HD4850 retails for $199.99 and has a $20 mail-in rebate. The Sapphire card appears to lack any software or games bundled with the card.

Likewise, Newegg has an ASUS HD 4850 card for a low $169.99 after a $30 mail-in rebate.

Specs show that all cards contain 800 stream processing units, 512MB of GDDR3, a 256-bit memory interface and support for Crossfire. Core clock speed for the cards is 625MHz. Despite the significantly increased number of stream processors on the 4850 compared to the 9800 GTX+, NVIDIA maintains that the GTX+ significantly outperforms the 4850. Hands-on reviews will provide the tale of the tape.

The HD 4850 wasn't expected to hit store shelves until June 25.

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Holy sh*t.
By therealnickdanger on 6/20/2008 12:29:50 PM , Rating: 2
That's what I paid for my HD3850 only last fall. Well, I'm very shocked it is already being offered with a MIR? That seems premature.




RE: Holy sh*t.
By therealnickdanger on 6/20/2008 12:34:39 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
That's what I paid for my HD3850 only last fall

Hmm, now mine is $90:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...


RE: Holy sh*t.
By nosfe on 6/20/2008 12:36:59 PM , Rating: 2
yes, quite right, and where is my radeon 9500pro that i paid 100$ last.... err 5 years ago?


RE: Holy sh*t.
By amanojaku on 6/20/2008 12:52:51 PM , Rating: 2
In the garbage, with my $400 9800 Pro that is outclassed by my $130 Radeon 850 Pro.


RE: Holy sh*t.
By BladeVenom on 6/20/2008 1:36:54 PM , Rating: 5
You should have gotten a Voodoo 5 card. No better Voodoo card ever came out.


RE: Holy sh*t.
By Moishe on 6/20/2008 2:48:25 PM , Rating: 3
darn right... I got one and I've never regretted that decision. It still runs UT like a champ. heh


RE: Holy sh*t.
By therealnickdanger on 6/20/2008 6:25:44 PM , Rating: 5
I wish I could get as excited over a game as much as I did over original UT. That was just such a fun game!


RE: Holy sh*t.
By Noliving on 6/20/2008 11:04:29 PM , Rating: 1
Voodoo 2 was the best ever!


RE: Holy sh*t.
By StevoLincolnite on 6/21/2008 7:33:35 AM , Rating: 2
It's a pity we never saw the Voodoo 5 6000 with the external power supply dubbed as "Voodoo Volts".
I blame the entire "Single Pass Multi-Texturing debacle" for the downfall of the mighty 3dfx, and the huge silicon...


RE: Holy sh*t.
By just4U on 6/22/2008 1:02:48 AM , Rating: 2

quote:
That's what I paid for my HD3850 only last fall


quote:
Hmm, now mine is $90:


Do you have any idea how great that is guys? Setting aside this new launch that kind of performance in that value segment is amazing!


RE: Holy sh*t.
By spe1491 on 6/20/2008 12:39:38 PM , Rating: 2
I wonder if the rebates are to counter the price drop of the 9800GTX... Makes me think AMD probably expected NVIDIA to drop the price and had the rebates waiting.


RE: Holy sh*t.
By nosfe on 6/20/2008 12:41:30 PM , Rating: 4
well of course nvidia dropped the prices, it's not like they had any choice, the 9800gtx was completely trashed in price/performance by the 4850


RE: Holy sh*t.
By Locutus465 on 6/20/2008 1:01:43 PM , Rating: 2
Wow, yeah I paid that much for my 3870 not all too long ago... Not much of a reason for me to upgrade yet so I'm going to be holding off for a while loner, but this card looks like one hell of a buy for the money.


RE: Holy sh*t.
By mmntech on 6/20/2008 1:38:36 PM , Rating: 2
Yep, me too in back in February and it was on sale for that price. The HD 3850s were regularly going for $199 in the Great White North not too long ago. Ironically I bought it just for Mass Effect but never got the game thanks to EA's jackassery.

It's good for gamers. I was starting to get worried there when last gen's $200 cards weren't performing too well compared to the previous cards. It looked like PC gaming was getting prohibitively expensive again. Fortunately ATI has decided to fill in the gap with cheap cards that perform well. It's like the Radeon 9000 days again. I'm still an nVidia man but I'll buy whatever offers the best price-performance ratio.


RE: Holy sh*t.
By pattycake0147 on 6/20/2008 4:38:50 PM , Rating: 1
I was just on Newegg and all of the MIRs have been removed.


RE: Holy sh*t.
By RamarC on 6/20/2008 5:21:39 PM , Rating: 2
pulling the rebates ticks me off. i just ordered the powercolor 4850 with a $25 rebate about 1pm for $199 (bundled with a free 2gb microSD card). still, i can't wait to swap out my x1950pro for this new baby.


RE: Holy sh*t.
By SoWUT on 6/20/2008 6:08:27 PM , Rating: 2
I feel your pain, I just purchase a 9600GT for around the same price just a month ago.


RE: Holy sh*t.
By Omega215D on 6/21/2008 1:48:34 AM , Rating: 2
Looks like many people I've spoken to still say ATI is horrible compared to nVidia with their overheating cards and lousy drivers. looks like I ran into nVidia fanboys in COD 4. They wont even believe that ATi can come out with a card that performs better than a 9800GTX.


RE: Holy sh*t.
By abzillah on 6/21/2008 5:30:19 AM , Rating: 2
Me too. I built a system for a friend of mine a week ago and I was telling him to wait for the ATI card to come out, because it will be good and even if it doesn't beat nVidia, it will cause nVidia to drop prices. He didn't listen to me and instead ordered a 8800GTS, and when he finds out about the 4850, he will regret not listening to me. I mean, I don't mind him wanting an nVidia card, but he should have listened because he could have saved money or he could have gotten the 9800GTX for the same price. Well, it's not my money.
But talking about money, I have to watch how I spend money and try to save some money. We all should try to save some money, little by little it will add up to a lot over time.


AMD will survive.
By Mitch101 on 6/20/2008 2:09:20 PM , Rating: 5
Even if your next CPU is a penryn/yorkfield/wolfdale/Nehalem etc sitting next to it will be a Radeon 48xx vi