ti4200 vs 9600 vs 9600 pro/5700 - assorted questions

[MrFish]

been out of the loop on kit for a while, but my gf2 ti is starting to strain on the latest mmorpg stuff. i'm looking at replacing it as cheaply as possible, hence the 4200 on my list, but i don't want to be replacing it again for a while, so if dx9 is gonna be a must have i'll move up a little.


it's going to eventually be going in a sff cube so heat and size are also going to be a factor, as is noise. passive cooling could be a clincher here.

also, are there any advantages to nvidia cards on nforce based mobos or do they all play nicely?

thanks

[Applecrusher]

I am sure ther is little or no difference on the CURRENT Nvidia line with Nforce boards...

BUT a 9600Pro will do you fine for a year or so..and is the best on your little list, i think.... and they dont make too much noise (i cant hear mine when i have every other fan off or turned down.....

[directhex]

http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/...charts-12.html

[Ravens Nest]

also, are there any advantages to nvidia cards on nforce based mobos or do they all play nicely?
Not with the nforce 1 & 2 motherboards there isnt, the Nforce 3 250 has optimisations for the GeForce FX videocard.
http://www.techreport.com/reviews/20...x/index.x?pg=1

What price range are you looking at for your new videocard??

[MurphmanL]

pfft, my geforce fx 5600 xt is as noisy as an old record player! I can hear it clearly above the other fans in my system, its a noisy little bugger! and a crappy performer as well!
I gotta get rid of the piece of junk asap, i paid £200 for it retail anyone interested in it for £170? LOL

[loki]

the ti 4200 card is good value for it's money

[mike_w]

the ti 4200 card is good value for it's money

Yeah, but DirectX9 performance is a bit lacking. For performance, an ATi 9x00 is better than than the nVidia counterparts in my opinion. It might be worth going up to a 9800 Pro since they are at such a low price (£140) at the moment, and are almost top of the range (only a bit off the 9800XT).

My Sapphire Radeon 9600 128mb has passive cooling (no fan, only heatsink) so that's silent.

[MurphmanL]

If you dont like AA and AF then nvidia is the way to go as they achieve normally in most review benchmarks a much higher score than radeons tend to... however if image quality tinkering is your cup of tea, then go for ATI... nvidia is personally my brand of choice

[MrFish]

i really don't like spending a lot on video cards. i've actually only ever bought one, and that was an i740 a looooong time ago. the rest of mine have been hand me downs from friends.

when even your dad has a better card than you tho, its time to do something right?

I have a budget of around £125, but I want to get a burner out of it too, I don't have one of those either. More I spend on card, the less I have for a burner, so, cheap + dvd writer. or more expensive + plain cd writer.

There is an outside chance of it going in an nforce3 board but probably not enough of one to worry about, so I guess that rules out the 5700 unless a bargain crops up somewhere.

I do however remember reading interesting things about the old 9500 pro - are those still worth getting?

[RoGuE|SaBeR]

52x MSI CD Writer £25 - Bargin

£100 to spend one a gfx card which will get you a 9600 Pro with plenty of change.

[blockers]

Mate....i would seriously say spend all the money on a r9800pro, unless you really cant hold off getting a CD-RW....

the r9800pro is a top card, and will kept up with everything running full details for a while yet. Where as i expect the r9600(pro) to get out-dated fairly soon. Also the r9800pro is at such a bargin price only about £130ish...for such a fantastic piece of kit.

So unless you cant hold off from getting a CD-RW i would say get your graphics sorted

Will

[MrFish]

i've never played with AA or AF period, and i'd imagine if this thing is going to last a while i'd be turning them off as games get more power hungry anyway, so i'm not sure if that is a consideration.

heat, noise and not fouling pci slot are primary concerns, with raw performance coming in 2nd to all those

[ed^chigliak]

Ebuyer
NEC 8x DVD DUAL R/RW IDE BURNER - OEM 056658 102 £53.54
Sapphire Radeon 9600 APG x8 128MB DDR DVI-I TV-Out Lite Retail 049372 £55.97
Total: £133.96 inc VAT

Sapphire Radeon 128MB 9600XT DDR DVI-i TV-Out Retail Box 055188 £89.99
Liteon 52x32x52x IDE DRIVE - OEM 052744 60 £17.13
Total: £131.15 inc VAT

You may want to spend more on retail drives if you don't have any software.

[MrFish]

ok, i think i'm down to 2.

straight 9600 or 5700u, having just read good reports on the msi one, and seen it for the same price (105inc) as the 9600xt.

huge diffference in cards i know, and given the lack of perfomance gains of a 9600 over the ti4200, i'm leaning towards the 5700ultra and a vanilla writer