Xmas prezzy suggestions.

[jeckulz]

I previously posted here
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/sho...3#post17510783
Regarding a GPU to get in march.
Well, my wonderfull girlfriend saw the post and said
"Why dont I get you a graphics card for xmas"? - I love my lady.

Requirements-
Dual screen + HDMI
1920 capable
Dont wanna be able to hear the fan above all the others in my case.

Main usage -Steam games + some C&C.
Heavy photoshop use.
Light/medium Premiere use.
Im also learning sketchup (which made my system lock up the other day)

Not bothered whether ATI or nVidia, although if its any use, I do preffer red+black over green+black

BUDGET- FLAT LINE £150, dont suggest any more expensive please. It will only serve to annoy me.

[kurosagi01]

Your options would be right now i would say is:
ATI:
5750
5770
6750*Maybe under £150*
6770*Maybe under £150*
Nvidia:
GTX460

[Cheapy]

If I had to buy ow I would go with the 768mb GTX 460.

But you dont so wait and see what ATI 6000 series brings. Who knows you may even get a small price drop too

[jeckulz]

If I had to buy ow I would go with the 768mb GTX 460.

But you dont so wait and see what ATI 6000 series brings. Who knows you may even get a small price drop too

Whens the 6k series due?

[Cheapy]

http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=26847

At the bottom it says the rumored date is the 22nd of october

[Pob255]

Quick question does

Dual screen + HDMI

mean

two screens and one must be HDMI

or

Two screens + a third on HDMI

Reason is the if it's the first, then not a problem almost all cards can do that, if it's the 2nd then you've got problems.

The only cheap way to do 3 monitors off one card is going to eyefinity or surround view and then you need the correct monitors to run that as you cannot mix and match resolutions and may require additional things like Display Port monitor or adaptor for an Ati or 2 cards in sli for nvidia.

As far as photoshop and Premiere go I'm pretty sure the nvidia is a better bet here for the acceleration.
I'd also ask what is your full current system specs?

[jeckulz]

Quick question doesmean

two screens and one must be HDMI

or

Two screens + a third on HDMI

Reason is the if it's the first, then not a problem almost all cards can do that, if it's the 2nd then you've got problems.

The only cheap way to do 3 monitors off one card is going to eyefinity or surround view and then you need the correct monitors to run that as you cannot mix and match resolutions and may require additional things like Display Port monitor or adaptor for an Ati or 2 cards in sli for nvidia.

As far as photoshop and Premiere go I'm pretty sure the nvidia is a better bet here for the acceleration.
I'd also ask what is your full current system specs?

LOL first option mate.
Max of 2 monitors at one time.

Current specification
AMD athlon 7550 AM2 (940) @ 2511mhz (will be OCing, but current mobo is locked down)
Mobo- (POS) ECS Geforce6100PM-M2 (will be upgrading to an OC-able Asus unit ASAP)
RAM - PQI 2x1gb RAM @ 400mhz (5-5-16-21) (Will be getting a better 4gb pair with xmas money, yeah, I know XP will only see 3 of the 4gb)
OS - XP SP3 (Going win 7 when new board and RAM are in)

[Pob255]

Ok, with thoes proposed upgrades (esp memory) you'll get more out of it, esp photoshop (large images) and Premiere
ps I hope you've got plenty of hrad disk space as video editing really chews up disk space.

The original AM2 cpu's where not great overclockers, it was one of the main reasons they seriously suffered vs the core2 cpu's at stock settings the AM2 cpu's did ok on performance for price with the core2, however the far greater overclocking range of the core2 really put them ahead.

I mention that because you may not get that much out of overclocking (ps I hope you've got a decent cooler) however I'd still replace that board as ECS have rather a bad rep for qulaity and hardware failing.

If you're a student, teacher (have a valid .ac.uk or .sch.uk email address) then you can get win7 pro cheaply now, direct download from MS, however remember to get the 64bit version
If you add in a 768mb or 1gb card then you will end up with less than 3gb of 4gb memory. (esp a 1gb card)

it's looking like a gtx460 would be your best option or maybe a cheap 5850 if places start selling stock off cheaply when the ati 6xxx series comes out.

[scaryjim]

The original AM2 cpu's where not great overclockers

It's a little worse than that The Athlon 7550 is a Phenom-based CPU, and Phenom was much worse than Athlon 64 for overclocking headroom. Fortunately, it had per-clock performance advantages, so the lower clock speed isn't too much of a problem (I believe the 7550 will be about on a par with a 2.8GHz Athlon x2). It should be fine for moderate gaming settings, but I think you'll find it bottlenecking a decent midrange card. Based on that, I don't think it's worth considering anything above a 768MB GTX460.

I'd definitely check out whether any of the photoshop effects / processing you use can be GPU accelerated. Some can, some can't, and if the ones you use can't then that Athlon is going to leave you chugging along as slowly as you can imagine...

[jeckulz]

Dont worry about the AM2.
I fully anticipated this to be a bottle neck, hence the new board I have in my sites is AM2+, so am3 CPUs arent out of the question.

Decent cooler already on the CPU (Asus Silent Square- Runs stock clock at 27 celsius idle, 48 load)

[scaryjim]

Good stuffs

If you can get it to around 2.8GHz the CPU won't be too much of a bottleneck, and I think you're going the right way about your upgrade as the mobo, memory and graphics cards should give you better performance boosts than bothering with the CPU at this point. But yeah, if you can get an AM2+ mobo that will support up to the AMD hex cores, that will give you plenty of additional upgrade options in a year or so's time

[jeckulz]

Right, its as above now really...
5830 or GTX460(768)? (leaning slightly more towards 5830 territory for output connectivity reasons)

And why do XFX seem to get slated?

The cards Ive got in mind are by HIS, EVGA, MSI, Gigabyte and Saphire- Do people get many problems with these manufacturers?

[scaryjim]

XFX get slated because they've earned themselves a very poor reputation for both quality and customer service in the past. The said, I've bought XFX graphics cards in the past without encountering any significant problems, and they may have upped their game since becoming an ATIAMD partner.

You're choosing between a 5830 and a 768MB GTX460!? The 5830 is (as far as I can tell from a quick whizz round the usual etail suspects) a £160 card still, while the 768MB GTX460 can easily be picked up for < £140. If you're thinking about spending £160 you need to be looking at the 1GB GTX460, which is a rather better card (in reducing the memory amount, nvidia actually chopped away 1/4 of the back end of the card!) and would be my choice above a 5830...

[jeckulz]

Good stuffs

If you can get it to around 2.8GHz the CPU won't be too much of a bottleneck, and I think you're going the right way about your upgrade as the mobo, memory and graphics cards should give you better performance boosts than bothering with the CPU at this point. But yeah, if you can get an AM2+ mobo that will support up to the AMD hex cores, that will give you plenty of additional upgrade options in a year or so's time

Well I was hoping for 2.8/2.9, so I'll be pretty happy If it manages a day of prime @ 2.8.

For the replacement CPU, I was only considdering a quad, maybe even only a lowly tripple with higher GHz figures rather than all the cores in the world and only 2.3ghz each lol.

Thanks dude

[nibbler]

I got my 7750+ BE to 3.1GHz stable.

[Jasp]

As scary has mentioned you want the 1gb 460GTX, the extra memory will help you in photoshop etc and its got a higher memory bus. Little over ya budget at £163.87 on scan but worth the extra.