Recommend an upgrade?

[Haiku32]

Current specs:

Western Digital 500GB HDD
8800GTS 640mb
Abit ip-35 dark raider
2GB corsair DDR2

I'm looking for an upgrade of around.. £200. Here's what I came up with:

Samsung 1TB F1 drive - £70
512mb HD 4870 - £130

I'm really just looking for more storage, and a boost in the graphics department. How much of an increase in performance will I see moving from the 8800GTS to the HD4870, at around 1400*900?

Also, how much could I sell my old graphics card for? I would probably upgrade the memory if I could get enough from that.

Thanks hex

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

You can get the HD4870 1gb for around £137:

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/1GB-X...VI-I-HDTV-HDCP

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/s...html?SAP-48701

I would look at the completed auctions section of Ebay to get an idea of the value of the 8800GTS 640mb.

[jim]

Someone just sold one very easily in the classifieds for £30

[Haiku32]

Think I'd be looking for a bit more than 30 quid for it. After all, I did pay around £130 for it last year. Hoping to get at least £60 - £70 for it. Enough for some decent memory and a little left over to add to the funds .

Does this upgrade look alright then, with the 1gb card instead that cat suggested?

[scaryjim]

Is the GTS struggling at 1440 x 900? If so, what with? If not, why bother upgrading it at all?

Personally I'd get another 2GB of RAM before upgrading my Graphics card - particularly if you're running Vista. You may find that this gives you all the performance boost you need for ~ £25...

[shaithis]

It's a nice upgrade and the 4870 will slaughter the 8800gts.

As for the "value" of the 8800, I cannot see you getting what you want for it. You have to realise that the price you pay for something 6 or 12 months earlier has absolutely no bearing on what it's worth today. For a little over £70 you can buy a 4770 card brand new......which is faster then a 9800GT (a re-badged 8800GT 512MB) which is noticeably faster then your 8800GTS 640MB.

That's the way of computer components I'm afraid.

[jim]

Think I'd be looking for a bit more than 30 quid for it. After all, I did pay around £130 for it last year. Hoping to get at least £60 - £70 for it. Enough for some decent memory and a little left over to add to the funds .

Does this upgrade look alright then, with the 1gb card instead that cat suggested?

Hence why I pointed out how easily it was sold - you should be able to get a little more. £60 is a bit wide of the mark though in my opinion.

[Haiku32]

Well, if I can sell the card and get enough for another 2gb of memory then I can live with that. I'm definitely getting more storage as I'm quickly running out of space.

My 8800GTS is still doing all right for most of the games I play, but I'm finding it hard to run new games on high settings. A few games (team fortress 2 with everything on full) stutter a lot and sometimes crash on 1440*900, and when I use my tv I have to turn the settings down to medium (1650*1080 I think) for it to be playable.

Think I'll just get more memory and storage as of now. Starting to think it isn't worth upgrading the graphics card when it's still doing all right with most games.

[Crevan]

For 1440x900 an HD4870 would probably be overkill, and it would handle almost anything at 1680x1050. You can probably save a bit by going for 4850.

[Haiku32]

It's a nice upgrade and the 4870 will slaughter the 8800gts.

As for the "value" of the 8800, I cannot see you getting what you want for it. You have to realise that the price you pay for something 6 or 12 months earlier has absolutely no bearing on what it's worth today. For a little over £70 you can buy a 4770 card brand new......which is faster then a 9800GT (a re-badged 8800GT 512MB) which is noticeably faster then your 8800GTS 640MB.

That's the way of computer components I'm afraid.

http://forums.hexus.net/wanted/16381...gts-640mb.html

That's the exact same card that I have .