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Guys please help with Video Card Choice
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auditech
Newbie
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6. June 2006 @ 16:39 |
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Guys,
My wife recently gave birth to our first child and needless to say that both money and time are scarce right now. I cannot afford to go out and buy a new computer or an Xbox360. I would rather buy a little better graphics card for my computer if you guys think it will help run games that are a year or two old.
Current Specs:
AMD Athlon 3200+ (2.2GHZ)
Nvidia Geforce FX 5700LE (256MB, 8X)
512MB RAM
In your opinions what is the best card that I could buy and would it actually help me any?? Should I buy more ram as well, or would that not affect gaming much?? This configuration didn't handle FAR Cry or DOOM 3 very well. I would like to be able to play them a little better as well as FEAR. Would a newer card even help??
Thanks for your time.
This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 6. June 2006 @ 16:41
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Moderator
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6. June 2006 @ 22:15 |
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Congratulations of the new little one :)
You'll probably get quite a few opinions on a good card but you may want to give us a ballbark budget so we can give you better recommendations. I just recently picked up an eVGA GeForce 6800GS for about $200 and it runs games like FEAR, Doom 3 and Half Life 2 very well.
Adding another 512MB of memory will help game performance too.
My killer sig came courtesy of bb "El Jefe" mayo.
The Forum Rules You Agreed To! http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/2487
"And there we saw the giants, and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight" - Numbers 13:33 |
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JaguarGod
Senior Member
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6. June 2006 @ 22:43 |
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Congratulations on the newborn!!
Ram will help you game, but the video card is the most important. 1GB would compliment the video card choices I listed well, but you can hold off on that until after you see how the games perform with only the video card upgrade.
By 5700LE 8x, I am assuming you mean 5700LE AGP 8x.
The best AGP card would be the x850xt PE. Unfortunately that one is very expensive still.
Now, for the games you described, you may benefit more from an nVidia card, but the AGP ones are far more expensive than the comparable ATi card and would not justify the performance increase.
I think your best bet would be an x800xl or 6800GS (the 6800GS is rather hard to find though). However, here are some other choices that are good:
x800GTO($130):
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814102609
x850xt ($240):
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814102570
x850 pro ($185):
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814102017
Geforce 6800 ($140):
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814140067
The 6800 is crippled, but can maybe be unlocked with something like Riva Tuner and the x800GTO can be flashed to an x800xl.
If this guy is telling the truth, this is a great deal
x800xl ($160):
http://cgi.ebay.com/Diamond-Radeon-X800XL-AGP_W0QQitemZ8824544796...
If you want to go middle end, then a 6600GT, x1600pro, x700pro and 6800xt are possibilities, but I cannot find any at reasonable prices.
Here is an x1600pro from ebay ($140):
http://cgi.ebay.com/New-Sapphire-ATI-Radeon-X1600-Pro-256MB-AGP-X...
6800xt runs for about $140 and is a good deal weaker than an x800gto (Same for the x1600 pro), so I would not know about those. The one with the most bang for the buck listed here is the x800xl, if that guy on ebay is telling the truth because that will outperform a 6800GT in many games and play Doom3 at maybe 1280x1024 with high settings and eye candy. If not, the Sapphire Radeon x800GTO (the first link I listed) is the best choice in my opinion. The x850 pro should perform similar to the x800xl, but a tad slower.
Sorry for writing so much, but it's late and I am tired, plus lots of options are always good.
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Moderator
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6. June 2006 @ 22:52 |
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Thanks JaguarGod, I didn't even think about whether he needed AGP or PCI-E :P
My killer sig came courtesy of bb "El Jefe" mayo.
The Forum Rules You Agreed To! http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/2487
"And there we saw the giants, and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight" - Numbers 13:33
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keithyb
Member
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6. June 2006 @ 23:42 |
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Yeah man, I would atleast get 1 gig of ram in that bad boy. You will notice a huge increase in perfomance.
AMD 4200+ x 2 over clocked to 2.6
BFG Geforce 7800 GT OC 256mb PCI-E
2 GB pc 3200 Corsair Ram
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auditech
Newbie
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7. June 2006 @ 15:07 |
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Ok. I will commit to upgrading to a gig of ram and would like to spend $200 on a GPU, shipped if possible. So, if you guys had $200, what would be your card of choice for most fps games (mostly what I play on the computer.) Thanks again.
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brazen521
Newbie
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7. June 2006 @ 18:14 |
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I've got an x800gto2 (same thing as x800gto, just a limited edition) and I flashed it to an x800xt bios (upgrades it to 16 pixel pipelines) and it runs anything that I throw at it beautifully. You can buy one that's already been flashed to x800xt bios on a lot of sites or on ebay for under 200 bucks. This would be my #1 suggestion just because I've had such a great time with it. If you don't have a problem with slightly used, this guy has exactly the card I have. You should buy it quick if you want it. You won't be disappointed.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ATi-Sapphire-X800GTO-2-X850XT-Speed-X850-XT-P...
150 bucks plus 15 shipping, so 165 bucks bottom line. Pretty good.
Keep in mind of course that this is a PCI-E card. Hopefully that's not a problem.
Athlon 64 3800+ venice, ATI Sapphire 256mb Radeon X800GTO2 (unlocked to 16 pipelines), Audigy 2 ZS Gamer, 2gb Corsair XMS Platinum, Zalman9500 heatsink, 250gb WD SE16, Audigy 2 ZS Platinum, Abit A8N Mobo, Ultra Aluminus Case with a 500 watt Ultra X2 power supply.
This message has been edited since posting. Last time this message was edited on 7. June 2006 @ 18:26
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JaguarGod
Senior Member
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9. June 2006 @ 09:44 |
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