Blameless

The 275 and 280 are very close. Get which ever is cheaper.

55nm also has more leakage and less die area (meaning higher power/heat density), so the power/temp difference is pretty minimal.

Same number of shaders + high potental shader clock = higher performance in shader limited games.

You can OC both cards, and there are certainly games where an OCed 280 will beat an OCed 275.

Yeah, and I had an OC on my vanilla 65nm 260 that would match a stock 280. Doesn't mean the 260 is a faster card.

Now clock the 285 to the same speeds as your 275.

I paid $185 (USD) for my GTX285, but that was a one time deal.

So, I generally agree. I would not have bought a 285 if it was full price.

Conley

Not another flamewar.

The GTX 275 overclocks to speeds faster than GTX 280 because of the 55nm architecture vs 65nm on the GTX 280. It also usually performs better at stock, though I'm not sure why.

GTX 280 was discontinued for a reason. The GTX 275 replaces it, and runs faster too.

I spent forever researching this, because I was in the same dilemma a while ago.

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Blameless

[quote=Conley;6583113]
The GTX 275 overclocks to speeds faster than GTX 280 because of the 55nm architecture vs 65nm on the GTX 280.[QUOTE=Conley;6583113]

Yes, the 275 will certainly OC to higher speeds. However, where fill rate, texturing, and memory bandwidth are concerned, the 280 still wins, because it has more ROPs, more TMUs, and a higher bus width.

The 275 does have a decisive advantage in shader performance, and this is very important. Still, shader performance is not everything, and there are situations where memory or ROPs will be the limiting factor, and in these situations, the 280 will be faster.

It has a ~200MHz faster shader clock out of the box, and the same number of shaders.

Because 65nm GPUs cost more to make than 55nm.

Conley

That's all true, but in almost every review, I see the GTX 275 winning at stock versus the GTX 280.

55nm also runs cooler than 65nm.

EDIT: Here's one of the most recent reviews I can find. GTX 275 edges GTX 280 by about 50 frames total. That margin will increase once overclocking comes into play.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...n,2326-16.html

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stevenma188

It's all up to what resolution you will be gaming at. If you are gaming beyond 1920 x 1200, get the GTX 280. Otherwise the GTX 275. Same thing applies if you like to crank up AA and antisophic filtering, as those things take up more vmem.

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kilrbe3

Spot on, someone has done their research on the 275 I see

Well done my apprentice
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sgdude

they are pretty similar. If you are gonna OC-GTX 275. if you arent, GTX280. As the 275 will oc a good amount higher, but out of the box its only clocked slightly higher. I got the GTX 275, but thats just because the 280 is EOL so i couldnt step up to it.
Either card is great though.

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brettjv

The 275 doesn't overclock higher solely because it is a 55nm part vs the 65nm 280. It overclocks higher because the smaller fab size allows nvidia to put more voltage through it while still generating similar amounts of heat. It is the voltage increase that provides the higher OC headroom.

Why do you think that people seek out the 65nm version of the gtx260 216? It's because it has the software programmable voltage regulator, along with a better heatsink, and with this combination of features, one can coax a better OC out of the 65nm part.

Saying that 55nm parts OC better than 65nm parts is a over-simplification of the situation. GPU voltage, along with the GPU cooling system's capabilities, factor heavily into this equation.

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Conley

Yes, and unless a company is going for an energy saving card, they're going to take advantage of the ability to put extra voltage in to it. It should be obvious that a better cooling system will generate better results. That's just common sense.

Thank you for explaining it more thoroughly, though.

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manolith

275 faster than the 285??? Now I am very confused!

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