Shuttle SN95G5 V3 - Best bang per buck (pound actually!)

[combat.monkey]

SN95G5 V3 - Best bang per buck (pound actually)? Anyone have any thoughts on the best VFM set up using this chassis? I currently have a 939 3000+ in it, along with a 9800 Pro and 1 Gig of RAM. What upgrade/mod would make the best gains?

Any other advice in improving gaming speed for this little beaut will also be appreciated; think of me as your own little project!

Regards,

DD

[DanceswithUnix]

Weakest part in there looks like the graphics card, but as I never play games on a Shuttle I have no idea what a good replacement would be.

[streetster]

ive got a 6600gt in my rig which is pretty good for games, but I'm tempted to upgrade to a 6800gt (off ebay) or possibly a 7800gs depending on how much i earn over the summer... but it kinda makes sense to sell up and move to PCI-e rather than spend £120+ on an an AGP card...

You might be able to overclock your 3000+ a bit aswell, I had my 3700+ running at 2.5Ghz (before the summer heat kicked in) so you that could be a place to start - but the 9800pro is the weakest link in your system

[combat.monkey]

Trouble is, I don't think that the Missus will wear me buying another rig!! I need the best options for the current chassis. Is the 9800 pro that outdated? It runs BF2 (my game of choice) fine - I was thinking about OC'ing it for a bit more performance. Would a mild OC make any difference?

[DanceswithUnix]

If you are happy with the performance of your current graphics card, I would say wait until you can't play something and must update.

Some results based on Half Life 2... HERE

If you upgrade your CPU massively you get a few FPS improvement, apart from in the last graph where it is CPU limited but there you get so many frames per seconds who cares.

With GPU updates, there are some tricks modern cards can pull with the latest shader models that are not available to your card. In terms of performance, have a butcher's HERE for some Oblivion benchmarks. This is all PCI-e so your 9800 won't be on there, but it will be down just below the 6600GT in performance.

These things get updated about every 6 months. I find I have to replace my card every 18 months to 2 years. I currently have a 6600GT, and am watching the new budget 7300GT spank it soundly in benchmarks!

I think the next generation of graphics is due around September, and will be a biggie.

[nichomach]

I think the next generation of graphics is due around September, and will be a biggie.

QFT, but I think you'll be lucky at that point to find any that aren't PCI-E. If you look at the limited choice now in AGP cards, you're basically looking at the top whack being things like the 7800GS or X1600 PRO. I think the DX10 cards will be very scarce on the AGP front if they even exist at all.

[DanceswithUnix]

Native AGP may be scarce, but sales of AGP are still good so I expect someone will make cards with bridge chips.

[MSIC]

I currently have a 6600GT, and am watching the new budget 7300GT spank it soundly in benchmarks!

Got any links? I wouldnt have thought that it would do so, at least not as an average across different games...

[combat.monkey]

I bit the bullet and ordered the following from misco.co.uk:

AMD ATHLON 64 X2 4200+ (PIB) SKT 939 CPU
Sapphire Radeon X1600Pro 256MB DDR2 AGP

SN95G5 V2 - I dont know what the bios revision is, but it will probably need updating. Anyone else seen good results with similar rig?

[DJWillis]

SN95G5 V2 - I don’t know what the bios revision is, but it will probably need updating. Anyone else seen good results with similar rig?

On the V2 make sure you put the latest BIOS on before you pop the CPU in as CPU's pre rev. E (IIRC) cause all sorts of really nasty funnies with earlier BIOS's and some revisions of the V2.

One of my rigs is a SN95V2 with a few choice parts added over time from our very own For Sale forum .

2GB RAM
3700+
X800 XTPE (smashing AGP card IMHO)

The only thing I really want to upgrade is the CPU to an X2 4400 or 4600 depending on cost but to be honest I use this rig for software development and my tools are multi-threaded so can make use of the extra horsepower.

The parts you have selected seem to offer a decent return for the outlay and should keep you going with that rig for some time if you happy to sit in the middle of the stack in games.

SN95's can be a real nightmare to get setup and stable but I have to confess once I got mine sorted (Shuttles later BIOS revisions, versions after the new bootup logo, did wonders) and learned to live with some of its quirks I would be loath to change it as its general solidness when doing coding, driving 3 screens and playing the odd bit of Oblivion is great.

[MadduckUK]

Got any links? I wouldnt have thought that it would do so, at least not as an average across different games...

as long as the 7300GT is a GDDR3 card, it does. its very close to a 7600GS

[combat.monkey]

On the V2 make sure you put the latest BIOS on before you pop the CPU in as CPU's pre rev. E (IIRC) cause all sorts of really nasty funnies with earlier BIOS's and some revisions of the V2.

One of my rigs is a SN95V2 with a few choice parts added over time from our very own For Sale forum .

2GB RAM
3700+
X800 XTPE (smashing AGP card IMHO)

The only thing I really want to upgrade is the CPU to an X2 4400 or 4600 depending on cost but to be honest I use this rig for software development and my tools are multi-threaded so can make use of the extra horsepower.

The parts you have selected seem to offer a decent return for the outlay and should keep you going with that rig for some time if you happy to sit in the middle of the stack in games.

SN95's can be a real nightmare to get setup and stable but I have to confess once I got mine sorted (Shuttles later BIOS revisions, versions after the new bootup logo, did wonders) and learned to live with some of its quirks I would be loath to change it as its general solidness when doing coding, driving 3 screens and playing the odd bit of Oblivion is great.

Thanks for your responses guys, I am quite happy with my shuttle at the moment. I intend to avoid seeing anyone with a really fast setup, as I will probably want to spend the cash reserved for my wifes Xmas present!!!

Although I could drop one of the presents for one of those Dell 24 inchers.......

[mountainmachine]

as long as the 7300GT is a GDDR3 card, it does. its very close to a 7600GS

Interesting as they're about the same price, the 6600GT and the 7300Gt.

[Apex]

2GB RAM
3700+
X800 XTPE (smashing AGP card IMHO)

Pritty much the same set up