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Hi All,
I currently have a Sapphire Radeon 9600XT 256Mb. I've had this for maybe 10 months, originally as a stop-gap. Its served its time very well.
I'm thinking of upgrading to a GeForce 6600GT, as you can buy these for 120 quid now.
My question is this: Is it worth it? Will the image and performance gains justify forking out for this card, or is it worth waiting.
My PC spec:
Intel P4 2.0Ghz northwood (OC'd to 2.5ghz)
1Gb PC2700 RAM
....
Thanks!
Mutley
2.0Ghz northwood is a pretty old chubby... How fast are u running ur memory? I don't remember a 2.0Ghz northwood that could handle 166MHz FSB.. If ur memory is running slower than 166MHz, I'd say just wait it out till the end of the year when AMD and Nvidia does a price cut on A64 and SLI mobos... and get an entirely new system. If ur an Intel fan, Intel Pentium 820 dual cores are pretty nice to your pocket, wait it out and stick into a new LGA mobo...
hmmmm....not sure how that helps me to know if changing my graphics card is a good idea...;-)
The motherboard I have is the msi 645 max2 lru. Supports a FSB of 400Mhz (CPU) and 533 for RAM (its quad pumped). Have the FSB/RAM multiplier set so the RAM continues to run at 333Mhz. Its standard Crucial PC2700, and doesn't take too kindly to be overclocked, but that could be the mboard as much as anything else.
The whole thing runs very nicely, its pretty well tuned, the HDD is fast (7200 RPM, 8Mb cache, kept defragged and scanned regularly).
The 9600XT OC's quite well - I can add 50Mhz to RAM and about 30 to GPU, which yields noticeable improvements in games like Half Life 2, which runs at 1024x768 with all graphic/audio levels on high, with 2xAA and AF pretty well.
Hence my question. The 9600XT is really a low end card now, but is it sufficiently low end that its worth forking out for a mid-range card like the 6600 GT?
I intend to build a new rig in about a year so it should last that long.
You could get one as another stop gap or grab a 9800 Pro or x800 series second hand off the forums to tide you over till you go to a PCIe system
ahh.. if u have the extra 100 quids to shell out.. 6600GT would be a good choice...
I would say that the 6600gt would be a good upgrade from a 9600xt
Interesting - I hadn't considered the 9800 pro, so lets just open another can of worms...
Looking around, it looks to me like the 9800Pro is somewhat cheaper than the 6600GT. Any opinions on which one to go for:
o Is the 6600GT sufficiently faster/better than the 9800pro to warrant the price difference?
o I'm looking for a card that will last another 8 months to a year, and then I want to build a new machine, however, I would like to sell my current one, so which card, would most likely keep its value over that time?
Thanks!
Well this week OCUk have a 9800pro with arctic cooler for 82quid Inc VAT, good buy if you ask me.
But if i was in your shoes id probably get a nide 6600GT, or do nothing and geta complete new system, as your CPU and memory are pretty old.
Personally, I'd go for a 9800 Pro - it's not that much slower than the 6600GT, and is a fair bit cheaper. Also, your CPU might be a bottleneck so might not benefit from the extra performance of a 6600GT anyway.
but is it really worth it? £80+ for 4 more pipes and 256mb bus? I don't think it is. A 6600GT is a fair bit faster, but were a dead loss here with the CPU and memory anyways.Quote:
Originally Posted by mike_w
Hmm, so you're saying that getting any kind of graphics card upgrade could be a waste of money, given that my CPU/RAM will not cope? I.e. now that the GPU is flying, processing load will shift back to the CPU...
Looking at e-bay, I should be able to get a few bob for my graphcs card, which would ease the cost of getting a 9800pro, perhaps enough to make it worth it.
its gotta be the 6800nu for me, their virtually the same price as the 6600gt's these days and can potentially be unlocked.....plus should you upgrade in the future will be more than capable of performing even better!
Whats a 6800nu?