66/6800 GT Which does which?

[southnjess]

Hi all,
My first post so go easy on me.

I need some advice from you clever guys/gals.

I'm looking to buy a new vid card, either the 6600 Gt or the 6800 Gt.

From what I have read (which is confusing) the 6600 Gt has the newest thingy for rendering HD video while the 6800 GT does not, I don't know if this is going to translate as being better in certain apps and games that I play even though it's slower than the 6800 GT.

The 6800 GT is faster but does not have this stuff so playing games will be good but other apps i'm not sure about.

The app I really want to get a speed increase on is Pinnacle Studio, I do alot of home editing from camcorder stuff. I also play games alot, Doom 3, Farcry, Chronicles of Riddick, ect and will be getting Half Life 2 within the next 2 weeks. At the moment I have pretty much been doing everything on a GF3 TI200 which was ok, the video editing is pretty slow and doom played ok but the new games are getting unplayable (chronicles at certain points).

So what do I go for if I want better video rendering speeds and dam good gaming graphics.

My system is not too bad, the important specs:
CPU = Barton 2800
Ram= 512 DDR 3200

Any advice greatly appreciated here.

 

[Sniper82]

If your not on a budgets about everyone will recommend the 6800GT over 6600GT no matter what. My next upgrade will be the 6600GT though.

 

[LTC8K6]

The 6800GT is overkill for your CPU, imo.

I would go with a 6600GT.

 

[cw42]

i think faster cpu + more ram gives better video editing rendering speeds, not a grafx card.... someone correct me if i'm wrong.

if you have 350-400 to spend on a videocard, go ahead and get the 6800GT. it'll last you longer. if you prefer to spend around 200-230, get the 6600GT.

 

[w00t]

your cpu is going to bottle neck the 6800gt, get more ram and a 6600gt will be fine for you. i recommend corsair value ram cas latency 2.5 (http://www.newegg.com/app/View...20-145-026&depa=1)

 

[imported_Computer MAn]

Originally posted by: cw42
i think faster cpu + more ram gives better video editing rendering speeds, not a grafx card.... someone correct me if i'm wrong.

if you have 350-400 to spend on a videocard, go ahead and get the 6800GT. it'll last you longer. if you prefer to spend around 200-230, get the 6600GT.

The cpu shouldn't be too much of a bottleneck for a 6800GT IMO.

 

[Home Built]

I asked a similar question in December but wanted to get the most out of my current system since my FX5200 was my biggest bottleneck. I run a Thoroughbred 2700/ 512 of PC3200 which is relatively close to your rigs specs. Everyone that replied told me the 6600GT would be the best for my rig and the 6800 would be overkill. My kids are extremely happy with the graphics and they mostly play Farcry, Chronicles of Riddick and Need for Speed Underground. I upgraded from the FX5200 and there is a night and day difference. I have Pinnacle Studio but don't do any video editing so I can't help you in that respect. But would believe that those type of programs would be memory intensive and more affected by the items that move the data through your system.

 

[dwcal]

Originally posted by: cw42
i think faster cpu + more ram gives better video editing rendering speeds, not a grafx card.... someone correct me if i'm wrong.

I think he's asking about this, NVIDIA Enables PureVideo on GeForce 6 GPUs. This feature is supposed to accelerate decoding of WMV9 HD videos. The article says it's disabled on the 6800GT and Ultra, but does work on the 6800/6600/6600GT/6200. A little confusing to me. Isn't the 6800 the same core as the 6800GT but with only 12 pipes?

 

[ggjb]

Originally posted by: dwcal

Originally posted by: cw42
Isn't the 6800 the same core as the 6800GT but with only 12 pipes?

Yep. Oh and go with the 6800GT, its going to last you a long time and if you game it will absolutely wipe the floor up with the 6600GT.

 

[warcrow]

Originally posted by: cw42
i think faster cpu + more ram gives better video editing rendering speeds, not a grafx card.... someone correct me if i'm wrong.

if you have 350-400 to spend on a videocard, go ahead and get the 6800GT. it'll last you longer. if you prefer to spend around 200-230, get the 6600GT.

This is correct. The card will render some of the effects that Studio needs to create, but other than that...not much else is needed.

When I was using Studio 8 back in the day, I have almost your exact same system.

2800XP
512MB RAM
9700 PRO

Thats the only differnece really, and it worked really well. So, I'm sure the 6600GT will work fine for you.

 

[southnjess]

Wow thanks for the replys guys, getting some really really good info for making a decision here.

I will add that my MB (epox 8rda=+3) has the option only for the AGP and I most probably won't be upgrading for another 2 years (if I can get away with it) So I obviously would like to get a graphics card that will last till then, which at that time I most probably have to switch over to PCI-E for a full upgraded system.

I do wonder about the difference in the ram on the 6600 and 6800, from what I can tell the 6600 only comes with 128mb while the 6800 comes in 128mb and 256mb, is this going to make a difference at all? Also what about the difference in pipes, 8 in the 6600 gt and 16 in the 6800 gt ?

By the sounds of it, if it's games I'm gonna play then get the 6800 gt, if it's video editing get the 6600 gt and spend the difference on the ram correct?