KitGuru KitGuru.net – Tech News | Hardware News | Hardware Reviews | IOS | Mobile | Gaming | Graphics Cards
The GTX460 has always impressed KitGuru, it has walked away with several of our ‘Must Have' awards in recent months. The eVGA GTX460 FTW is pretty much the pinnacle of GTX460 engineering, not only can it keep up with the HD5870, but it runs cooler, requires less power and doesn't make a racket in the process.
Let us look at the results from our testing today:
| Test | eVGA GTX460 FTW | HD5870 |
| Unigine Heaven Benchmark | Win | Loss |
| Stone Giant Benchmark | Win | Loss |
| 3DMark Vantage | Loss | Win |
| HQV Benchmark 2.1 | Win | Loss |
| Resident Evil 5 | Loss | Win |
| Tom Clancy HAWX | Loss | Win |
| Far Cry 2 | Win | Loss |
| Metro 2033 | Loss | Win |
| Alien V Predator | Loss | Win |
| Lost Planet 2 | Win | Loss |
| Total | 5 Wins | 5 Wins |
| Price | £200 inc vat | £290 inc vat |
When we look at the results the eVGA GTX460 FTW has the edge with the Tessellation heavy Unigine Heaven and Stone Giant Benchmarks. It was almost neck and neck in 3dMark Vantage, but the HD5870 took the lead by a few hundred points thanks to a stonking result in Feature Test 6.
The games were a pretty mixed bag, nVidia favourites such as Far Cry 2 ran significantly faster on the GTX460 FTW while AMD friendly titles such as Resident Evil 5 switched the lead. Tom Clancy HAWX was pretty much neck and neck, with the HD5870 delivering higher minimum frame rates for a slightly smoother experience in the intensive sections. We were however quite surprised to see such a huge lead for nVidia with the DX11 based Lost Planet 2, it was not only noticeable in the results tables, but it felt far superior when actually playing it. Clearly AMD have some work ahead of them on a driver level with this game.
So the outcome is pretty much split down the line, however we need to look at the current pricing of both cards. The eVGA GTX460 FTW (which means ‘for the win' by the way in case you are still wondering) is around £200 inc vat in the UK (if you can find it in stock anywhere) whereas a basic HD5870 is still around £300. After a bit of searching we did find an XFX reference card for £280.99 inc vat which is a very good price – that is a £60 price drop from earlier in the year.
Right now, if you want a powerful gaming card, the GTX460 is a fantastic product which always hits the top of our shortlist. There are certainly cheaper versions than the eVGA ‘FTW' version we tested today, but just remember that while most GTX460's overclock really well, you might not hit these heights. Every card will overclock to different thresholds – eVGA do handpick these cards so they are guaranteed to hit the best speeds. If you can't find the ‘FTW' model in your area, then be sure to check out the ‘Superclocked' version which we are sure can be pushed quite close – its only £180 inc vat.
KitGuru says: The GTX460 in a highly overclocked state is not only a challenger for the mighty HD5870 but the eVGA is one of the finest cards available on the market today. The only downside for nVidia is that there is absolutely no need to aim higher in the Fermi range … unless breaking benchmarks or running the most demanding engines at 1600p is top of your list.
Briliant idea for a review Zardon. that little bugger can fairly fly! fantastic value for money.
very impressive card. I love the looks too, its so simple in design without colours and stickers all over it.
Christ, those 460s are killer. Surprised me how good it is in some of those engines. Is lost planet 2 any good ?
460GTX is the only good card nvidia have released all year. after that shocking 430 earlier this week its nice this was up to redress the results.
Good balanced reviewing. Z
I rarely see eVGA cards for sale in my region. Are they having supply issues?
I love eVGA products, such a shame to see BFG die t his year 🙁 hope this card seels a lot for them, but I cant buy it, even if I wanted. its not listed over here in Canada anywhere.
Well that was a right kick in the nuts for AMD there. stonking performance all round. This card would have dominated, but it seems far too late for me to be a big seller, especially with 6870 and 6850 about to hit the scene 🙁
If nvidia had gotten the 460 to launch in march/april it would be owning the market, sadly after a few months sales, id suspect they are startign to dry up now, with people hanging around for 6850/70. Too many mistakes for nvidia this year.
Oh yeah, the rest of their range sucks too, which isnt helping consumer confidence.
id still prefer the HD5870, but the pricing in the market is all over the place.
Lets have a look.
HD5870, great card but under pressure from 460. so it seems expensive.
HD5850, its getting whipped by 460
HD5830 – dead
HD5770 – big seller, good pricing
HD5670 – again, great media card, good seller
GTX480 – overpriced, too hot and the performance leader, but no one cares, apart from people out to break 3dmark scores.
GTX470 – dead
GTX465 – who cares
GTX460 – too late, but leading the way, making the 470 and 465 mean nothing anymore
GTS450 – crap
GT430 – overpriced and rubbish.
Pricing is all wrong with both sides ! Nvidia have the GTX460 priced too low and the other 450 and 430 too high !
just ordered the superclocked from scan. great price.
the 460 continues to surprise me great cards for their price
Just ordered one of these from Scan for just over £180. Gonna have to make up another PCI-e power cable as my 600w PSU only has one output for GFX. Simple job with a few molex connectors and a PCI-e plug. Will be interesting to see the improvement over my 8800GT 😉