X1900 XT upgrade to 9800 GTX: Has anyone done it?

[Zak33]

Lo dudes.

My X1900 XT (512mb) is due for an upgrade.

There are some sexxeh 9800 GTX's on Scan for £117. Has anyone done this upgrade? Or a close one (X1950 maybe to a 9800GTX?) I wanna know how big a leap it will be on DX9 and OpenGL games? (I'm not doing the Vista shuffle yet, if ever)

I know everyone someone is gonna shout "4850 you nubber" but the 9800 GTX really might be the choice of all at this price.

It's for my QX6700 with 4gig (XP 32bit, so 3.2gig readable) and no overclock. It's going in a Sugo case some size issue should be ok I hope.

[SiM]

I haven't done that upgrade, but the 9800gtx is very nice at that price... Look on today only, its only £112 there... if only I had an SLI board, I would have bought another!

4850 is only slightly better, but it needs after market cooling so it is more expensive if you include that...

[Zak33]

I disagree with the 4850 being better.... particularly as I trust the HEXUS reviews deeply, and the 9800 GTX does creep above the 4850 most of the time.
http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=14146&page=5

[Bugbait]

Assuming your CPU or other hardware isn't the bottleneck the performance increase is significant. I moved from a 1900XT to the 8800GTX (similar performance to the 9800GTX) and it was well worth it.

[Mithrandir]

I think you'll see a nice improvement in games. I saw some improvements with my 2900gt over the x1900 (cf edition).

[Zak33]

ok chaps

thanks muchly

[SiM]

I disagree with the 4850 being better.... particularly as I trust the HEXUS reviews deeply, and the 9800 GTX does creep above the 4850 most of the time.
http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=14146&page=5

Well they are about the same afaik, I prefer the Nvidia because of my ownership bias
but the general concensus is that the 4850 is slightly ahead on average if you compare more games.

[AdamAnubis]

but the general concensus is that the 4850 is slightly ahead on average if you compare more games.

Which is great if you sit the your eyes glooed to fps counter

Personally, 9800GTX becuase i have a 8800GTX and they rock I'm sure the HD4850 is good, but at £120 for a 9800gtx is extremely tempting.

[Mithrandir]

£120 for a 9800gtx is extremely tempting.

£112 on today only

[AdamAnubis]

£112 on today only

Talk about being anal If only i had the money I would try and say that the £120 was for postage, but then i remembered that there's the free postage for orders over £20

[Zak33]

£112 is a bargain

[LuckyNV]

I went from X1900XTX to 8800GT, difference was immense, but I guess it would depend on what games and settings you use.

[Pob255]

Well if you consider that quake wars is OpenGL based, the 9800gtx has the edge over the 4850

at £112 you'll not get a 4850 currently for that much esp with aftermarket cooling.

Must admit I'm seriously considering this one to replace my 7900gs

[beanbandit]

I went from a 1900XT 512 to a 8800GTS 640 and there was a massive difference in quality and FPS. Biggest surprise was the drop in noise, i thought the XT was quiet, i now know it wasn't

[Mithrandir]

I went from a 1900XT 512 to a 8800GTS 640 and there was a massive difference in quality and FPS. Biggest surprise was the drop in noise, i thought the XT was quiet, i now know it wasn't

lol. The x1900 can be pretty noisy on higher fan speeds, but it's nothing compared to the 2900gt. It sounds like a jet engine, literally.

[kalniel]

I disagree with the 4850 being better.... particularly as I trust the HEXUS reviews deeply, and the 9800 GTX does creep above the 4850 most of the time.
http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=14146&page=5

If the Hexus reviews closely match your anticipated usage of the card (game selection etc.) then I'd also go with the 9800GTX in your case. We are still in the situation where different games perform better on either AMD or nVidia hardware, and you can see this in the difference between Hexus reviews and those of other sites (currently - they are validating a new set of benchmarks that might address this problem).

As far as the difference.. what games are you playing and at what resolution? I know that for the games I play the difference between my x1950xt (256mb) and a 9800GTX is actually quite minor - it would enable me to turn shadow details up to max (limited by my 256mb at the moment - you shouldn't be) and add more AA (I can already run AF, but AA sometimes slows some games down. You might not be able to add much AF on the X1900 due to slower memory). So for me it'd be shadow quality and slight image quality enhancements.. that's not really enough of a difference for me at the moment. When the next load of games come out that will have a gameplay difference (perhaps Fallout 3) then I'll re-evaluate. Prices of cards will only come down, or you'll get more for the money (9800GTX+ looks nice, as does the 55nm refresh of the 260, not to mention when AMD start allowing 3rd party OC and custom coolers for the 4870 and 4850).