I was just talking about how I forgot that not that long ago AMD was performance king. Along with that thought, it wasnt too long ago when ATI made the best video cards. Since then, Nvidia came out with some really good cards and took over that title. Nvidia has been tops for so long that I forgot all about ATI. Wasnt even keeping up with them anymore, mainly cause I thought it was over for them. This morning, if you hadnt already noticed, there has been tons of reviews and benchmarks of ATI’s new Radeon HD 4870 and I have to tell you…

ATI IS BACK!!!

Dont get me wrong, thier new cards arent tops, but they are right up there with the big boys, even beating out Nvidia’s $600+ dollar GTX 280 on some benchmarks. that is saying a lot, especially since this new card from ATI (or should I be saying AMD) is about $300 bucks cheaper. When you look at price vrs performance, ATI’s 48XX series of cards looks to be the video card to get.

Right now, in the 48XX series, you have the HD 4850 (available now) which sells or $199, and the soon to be released HD 4870 for $299. As far as specs, heres a snippit I got from Anandtech.

ATI-AMD-Radeon-HD4850-HD4870-specs

Now that you know what you are working with, here is a quick little benchmark chart (one of many) also from Anandtech. (click here for the full Anandtech review)