Which 8800GT (stock cooler V gigabyte one)

[Sukh]

Its a decision between two cards:

Computer hardware and software at amazing prices, available online from Scan Computers UK

Or

Computer hardware and software at amazing prices, available online from Scan Computers UK

Going to order sometime later today and want to know if it is worth spending the extra for the different cooler?

[hovick]

for the extra 15 quid you can get an accelero s1 which is garantied to give very good temperatures. If youre not going to be overclocking the stock fan should be fine, as long as youre happy to live with slightly toasty temperatures.

Why the 256mb version? My understanding was that for that price range, ati had the dominant card.

[staffsMike]

I wouldn't bother with the 256mb one.

Either the 512mb version or the ATi HD3850pro (£100) for me

Coolerwise I would probably not go for the stock cooler from what i've heard about temps and noise but I don't know about the gigabyte cooler.

[s_kinton]

It also wouldn't bother with a 256mb version. That amount of memory just isnt enough in dx10, as soon as you put the detail up high the card is crippled by lack of vram.

The 320mb 8800GTS in Crysis is a good example. Great powerful card, but not enough memory.

[Sukh]

So no to teh 256mb 8800gt?
Should i be aiming at the 3850 Pro or the 512 8800gt?

[Robbie G]

Well the latter is a much faster card but it's also 50% more expensive.

[hovick]

8800gt 512 is the card of choice at the moment. Good balance between price and performance. If your budget can stretch that far, it would be hard for anyone not to recomend it

[MSIC]

I have to disagree with the emphasis on the 512MB 8800GT by everyone; it completely depends upon the resolution of the monitor that you want to display on.
If it's a 1280 x 1024 monitor (ie 17" or 19" 5:4 ratio, old fashioned type) then the 256MB card is fine.
If it's a 19" widescreen 1440 x 900 then it's also fine.
If it's bigger than these, consider a 512MB card, but even then be aware that you will be paying more money for faster framerates, so it's your money, your decision.

The 3800 series Radeons are also very good value for money though.

[Sukh]

The problem is I cannot find a 8800GT in stock at a reasonable price. People say amazon: &#163;120 and the like, but no one has it in stock for <&#163;140

[Robbie G]

I have to disagree with the emphasis on the 512MB 8800GT by everyone; it completely depends upon the resolution of the monitor that you want to display on.
If it's a 1280 x 1024 monitor (ie 17" or 19" 5:4 ratio, old fashioned type) then the 256MB card is fine.
If it's a 19" widescreen 1440 x 900 then it's also fine.

That might be true now, but it won't be in 6 months.

[oralpain]

The 8800GT 256MB has a much lower memory clock than the 512MB version (700 vs. 900MHz). So even if you are not memory size limited, you are going to be memory bandwidth limited.

The 3850 is a better card than the 8800GT 256.

[TooNice]

That might be true now, but it won't be in 6 months.

I am inclined to disagree. At the very least, I find it a rather speculative statement. Games do not suddenly increase in memory requirement by leaps much every 6 months. I reckon that the odd games that might give the 256MB 8800GT grief at 1280x1024 will give grief to the 512MB version too, at least without toning down on the eye candy. And doing so will drop the memory requirements. I'd definitely have snatched a 256MB GT at ~&#163;120 when Scan announced it's deal if I was running at such resolution - but I am running at higher resolution, so 512MB it is. That said, by default I am more likely to recommend a 512MB version simply because I think most people here run at resolution above 1280x1024. And prices between the 512MB and 256MB are narrowing now.

@oralpain: I am not sure where you saw otherwise, but Anandtech for one would disagree. And from memory, I don't really recall any reviews stating otherwise. Unless you are commenting on something other than performance (but even in performance/cost I seem to remember that the 256MB GT comes out on top).

[Robbie G]

I am inclined to disagree. At the very least, I find it a rather speculative statement. Games do not suddenly increase in memory requirement by leaps much every 6 months. I reckon that the odd games that might give the 256MB 8800GT grief at 1280x1024 will give grief to the 512MB version too

But DX10 games have greater memory requirements, even at 1440 x 990 or 1280 x 1024, and there will more of those in 6 months. Sorry, I would have thought that was obvious but I should have spelled it out for those that didn't understand this. Anyone can (should be able to) see that future games will be more memory hungry, even at lower resolutions.

[kalniel]

That's what they said a year ago though - and 256mb has proven to be remarkably long lasting in effectiveness.

Why do DX10 games have greater memory requirements? I thought the idea behind a lot of these new features like geometry shaders/instancing etc. was a reduced memory footprint.