Hi guys, well I think it's time to upgrade my graphics card but what do I go for? My system at the moment is a AMD XP3000+ Asus A78nx Deluxe V2 motherboard, Corsair Matched Pair Low lattency Ram 512mg. 128mg 9700 Pro Ultimate, Got 1 160gig SATA MAxtor 8meg cache, and a 80gig Weston digital. Thinking also about getting a 72gig Raptor to speed loading up, I was thinkiing about setting up a raid but I read somewhere that loading a game like Far Cry was only a second quicker in raid than running off 1 raptor. Plus I'm also trying to keep my budget down. Now the big question. What Graphics card do i get? Is it worth me getting a X800XT or just a X800 Pro. I've heard with these cards it's the CPU that bottle necks the system. I mean my CPU is no slouch. I love games like Medal of Honor and Battlefield 1942, I know that they are releasing battlefield 2 and that looks like a power hungry game. I want a good card to run battfield 2 and things like Far Cry. Not really too sure about NVidia, I just like my 9700 pro too much and I've got used to ATI stuff to change over to NVidia At a later date I will be upgrading to a Amd 64 system but just not yet Also is there much of a advantage of PCI-Express over AGP? I mean if so then the whole upgrade will have to wait until I've got enougth money. I've got enougth money to get a X800XT but do I really need the XT? Like I said I'm also getting 1 raptor...decisions, decesions...
just get the pro versio and OC (doesnt need it but if u want it) and use the extra money 2 buy more ram, this is my opinion and thus does not count, unless u actually listen 2 me. if u do o well, nah really there is no point gettin the XT as there overpriced for the performance gains
Both your advice sounds good, but now I've just gone and read this month's custom PC magazine. And they are ranting over the XFX GeForce 6800GT. It says it's got at least 10 FPS more than X800 Pro. And it's about the same price....What shall I do? I mean 10FPS isn't that much. I like the look of the HIS one with the ICE cooler it's so much quieter but then it's about £30-40 more.. The only thing is with the memory I'm running dual channel at the moment and I only have 1 slot free, Can I stick a 512mg in there And will it still run in dual channel mode?
the moddable X800 Pro's are likely to disappear soon, there's reliable sources suggesting that the X800 XT has been released on AGP, clocked at 500/1000 with 16 pixel pipelines.
Put (very) simply the new Nvidia cards are good at Doom3 but the ATI cards are meant to be better at half life 2. Search around for more accurate info Some people have been able to do this. Put the 512 stick in the single slot and the 2 x 256 sticks in the double slots. Don't worry too much about dual channel, it does give a bit more bandwidth than single channel, but not a lot. You could always sell your 2 x 256MB sticks to help fund the purchase of 2 x 512 sticks.
