660ti in older generation PC

[NavJitsU4]

Here's my PC specs (built in late 08):

Intel C2Q Q6600 @ 3.4Ghz
EVGA 780i Mobo (PCI-E 2.0 Only)
8GB Memory
10000RPM Sata HDD
650Watt PSU

I had a 8800GT in this system that died this morning.

From what I've read, there isn't a huge difference between PCI-E 2.0 and PCI-E 3.0. Not sure if there is anything else that will limit this GPU to the point of the upgrade not being worth it.

Would it be worth it for me to put a 660Ti in this box?

 

[ShintaiDK]

Yes it would.

 

[KompuKare]

Here's my PC specs (built in late 08):

Intel C2Q Q6600 @ 3.4Ghz
8GB Memory
10000RPM Sata HDD
650Watt PSU

I had a 8800GT in this system that died this morning.

From what I've read, there isn't a huge difference between PCI-E 2.0 and PCI-E 3.0. Not sure if there is anything else that will limit this GPU to the point of the upgrade not being worth it.

Would it be worth it for me to put a 660Ti in this box?

Did the 8800GT by any chance die of the infamous Nvidia bumpgate? In other words, did it die prematurely because Nvidia engineers seem to have missed the basic electronic 101 lessons on thermals, solder choices etc?

My 8800GT did die for exactly those reasons and ever since I have been totally avoiding Nvidia for some reason...

 

[96Firebird]

Did the 8800GT by any chance die of the infamous Nvidia bumpgate? In other words, did it die prematurely because Nvidia engineers seem to have missed the basic electronic 101 lessons on thermals, solder choices etc?

My 8800GT did die for exactly those reasons and ever since I have been totally avoiding Nvidia for some reason...

Funny, my 8800GT has been going good since I bought it new waaaay back when. Right now it is in my HTPC, which is on 24/7.

OP, your CPU will be the bottleneck of your PC if you get a 660Ti in most games. Even overclocked, it will show it's age. You may not notice it though, and the 660Ti will be a decent upgrade. What games do you play, and at what resolution?

 

[NavJitsU4]

Funny, my 8800GT has been going good since I bought it new waaaay back when. Right now it is in my HTPC, which is on 24/7.

OP, your CPU will be the bottleneck of your PC if you get a 660Ti in most games. Even overclocked, it will show it's age. You may not notice it though, and the 660Ti will be a decent upgrade. What games do you play, and at what resolution?

I play at 1920x1080

I've been playing Crysis 2, it scaled down pretty well and looks great at 1920x1080 even on the 8800gt but I'm excited to see what it will look like with a new DX11 GPU.

Witcher2, but I shelved it because it ran kinda slow. Hoping that the 660ti will be able to churn it.

I want to play nexiuz, and skyrim and keep this system for another 2yrs if possible.

All other games I play looked and ran great on the 8800gt so not worried about those.

 

[VulgarDisplay]

I think the CPU may bottleneck the 660ti slightly, but it will still be a massive improvement over the 8800GT.

I'm hesitant to recommend the 660ti to anyone who wants it to last 2+ years because we could begin seeing more use of OpenCL and DirectCompute in games which the 660ti doesn't perform as well at as other current GPU's.

I would say that if you've used a 8800GT for this long you will be able to tolerate the 660ti for a long time though. I also think that the 660ti is a decent card, but this is the wrong time to buy one. Right now the AMD cards are a better buy for the performance you get. It's too bad your GPU fried because if you could wait the 660ti may see some adjustments to it's price to make it better compete with the 7870 and 7950 based on price.

 

[96Firebird]

I've heard Skyrim needs a decent CPU, have you tried it on your rig yet?

I upgraded from my E8400 rig (same generation as the Q6600, but is a dual-core) because BF3 really brought it to it's knees. Not sure how the Q6600 fares in today's standards, but I'm guessing you might see some slowdown if you want to stretch your current system for another 2 years. Did you try Witcher 2 on low settings/low resolution to see if your CPU was the culprit for running slow?

 

[toyota]

a Q6600 at 3.4 would still match some lower clocked i5 and i7 cpus in games so overall its fine for a gtx660ti.

 

[VulgarDisplay]

a Q6600 at 3.4 would still match many lower clocked i5 and i7 cpus in games so overall its fine for a gtx660ti.

By bottleneck slightly I meant that your framerates would increase with an increase in CPU clockspeed. It will still be a massive improvement over the 8800GT.