Why?

[Yellowhello]

Didn't know there were 256MB 8800GT's... interesting...

[Stormcrow]

Originally Posted by yellowhello

Didn't know there were 256MB 8800GT's... interesting...

The 3870 is the best deal for a budget range decent GPU, in my opinion. It can't top the 8800GT, but it has a nice price to performance ratio.
Now that I think about it, I have seen a few reports of Evga 7800GTXs and such crapping out, and people getting 7950GTs in return. I'll see if I can dig a few up.

[screwballl]

I have had good luck with BFG myself... had a Ti4200 that was problematic so they sent a replacement. The replacement had the GPU fan die after 12 weeks so they sent another replacement.... since the Ti4200 was out of production at that time, the next card they sent was actually a FX5200 which completely died after 2 weeks. After that they sent a FX5200Ultra which ran fine until I retired it for a ATi 9600XT which is still running strong in my XP3000+ box to this day. It had to have been the cards themselves as this 9600XT has been running for at least 3-4 years now strong and never needed a replacement.
Before they sent the last one, they said that I would need to have a professional tech look at the motherboard or power supply to see why these cards died so easily in this system. I explained that I was a certified computer tech and worked at a local computer shop at the time (a bit of fluffing as I was/am not certified). They dropped that line of reasoning and sent it right out.

It is all dependent on the manufacturing company's support (XFX, BFG, eVGA) and not the nvidia/AMD warranty.

[azianai]

personally my only gripe with BFG is that you do anything with the stock coolers and they void your warranty.

[gvblake22]

Originally Posted by azianai

personally my only gripe with BFG is that you do anything with the stock coolers and they void your warranty.

Most companies are like that, it's too much of a liability to just let everyone RMA the cards they messed up experimenting with custom cooling. I tried sending a 6800GT back to XFX after some "cooling adventures" and they would not accept it and sent it back to me.

[azianai]

Originally Posted by gvblake22

Most companies are like that, it's too much of a liability to just let everyone RMA the cards they messed up experimenting with custom cooling. I tried sending a 6800GT back to XFX after some "cooling adventures" and they would not accept it and sent it back to me.

Well with the new 8000 series XFX and EVGA both state lifetime warranty even if you OC the hell out of the GPU. Can also swap the sink out too

[One4yu2c]

Originally Posted by azianai

Well with the new 8000 series XFX and EVGA both state lifetime warranty even if you OC the hell out of the GPU. Can also swap the sink out too

The caveat is that if you cause any physical damage during the process (which is really the only real risk of swapping a heatsink/fan), the warranty goes out the window. You're also screwed if you fail to register online within 30 days of purchase, so there's tradeoffs with each company.

If you have a BFG card and it ultimately ends up failing completely unrelated to the third party heatsink/fan (we'll assume it cooled better than stock), then I personally wouldn't be morally opposed to putting the original heatsink/fan back on and RMA'ing the card.

[azianai]

Originally Posted by One4yu2c

The caveat is that if you cause any physical damage during the process (which is really the only real risk of swapping a heatsink/fan), the warranty goes out the window. You're also screwed if you fail to register online within 30 days of purchase, so there's tradeoffs with each company.

If you have a BFG card and it ultimately ends up failing completely unrelated to the third party heatsink/fan (we'll assume it cooled better than stock), then I personally wouldn't be morally opposed to putting the original heatsink/fan back on and RMA'ing the card.

Neither will i, but i've bought 3 8800GT's from BFG and all performing lower than expected, and a 8800GTS from them as well. Personally gonna just stick with XFX till they figure the stuff out (BFG)

[One4yu2c]

Originally Posted by azianai

Neither will i, but i've bought 3 8800GT's from BFG and all performing lower than expected, and a 8800GTS from them as well. Personally gonna just stick with XFX till they figure the stuff out (BFG)

If that's the case, I'd work on troubleshooting when stuff like that happens. These top-tier companies are using essentially the same parts/reference design, and the differences come down to binning (when offering OC'd versions), bundles, and warranty - BFG's cards are not inferior to others when talking about the same model.

[Lead Head]

Most manufactures seem to rely on the fact that you will replace the card with something new within a few years.

Much like Chrysler and their new life time power train warranty, you think they are still going to be making 5.7 HEMIs and 6 speed autos 30 years from now?