7800GS vs 7600GT, which would you suggest on the AGP battle front for me?

[dug777]

The 7800GS is $60AUD more, $400 as opposed to $340) I would overclock it, and from what i've read it overclocks like a beast (unsuprising given its core and the stock rates it comes at)...

I'll be selling my 6600GT to partly finance the buy, since AGP 6600GT prices are still pretty good here right now...

I know people will try & tell me it would be cheaper to replace my Tbred & mobo, and get a PCI-E card. If you can make it happen with Australian pricing, i'd love to give that a go

This site should give you best Australian prices http://www.staticice.com.au/

 

[Stumps]

what speed is your T-bred?

I would say go for a 7600GT agp, as using the faster 7800GS would be wasted with a AXP, however even a 7600GT is still reasonably bottlenecked by an AXP.

I upgraded from a AXP 3200+ to a A64 3000+ and had a huge jump in framerates from my old 6800GT, so even a 6800GT was bottlenecked by an AXP.

 

[dug777]

It's 2.1Ghz/1gbRAM, but i don't want to get the 7600GT and then be mighty pissed off with it when i get a Conroe/dual VSTA mobo in Jan

Surely i can just enjoy greater levels of AA/AF now if i get the faster card, since that's not reliant on the CPU?

EDIT: i certainly won't lose much money which ever card i get, looking at the VERY solid high end AGP 2ndhand market here.

 

[Stumps]

what motherboard do you intend to use for your C2D upgrade....an AGP based one might be hard to find.

maybe just hold off till jan and then purchase a C2D/PCI-E mobo and decent PCI-E Gf 7 series cards, 7900GT's can be had for under $500 on ebay

 

[dug777]

The Asrock dual VSTA one that has a PCI-E slot as well as an AGP slot, and both DDR and DDR2 support

Waiting is sounding like a better & better idea tho...

 

[Stumps]

Originally posted by: dug777
The Asrock dual VSTA one that has a PCI-E slot as well as an AGP slot, and both DDR and DDR2 support

Waiting is sounding like a better & better idea tho...

I would wait, prices do tend to go down a bit a christmas.

what PSU do you intend to use?

 

[dug777]

Originally posted by: Stumps

Originally posted by: dug777
The Asrock dual VSTA one that has a PCI-E slot as well as an AGP slot, and both DDR and DDR2 support

Waiting is sounding like a better & better idea tho...

I would wait, prices do tend to go down a bit a christmas.

what PSU do you intend to use?

I was intending to carry over my Antec TruePower 380w (iirc it's 24A on the 12v), would that be sufficient? It's handling a significantly overvolted tbred (1.81vcore), a heavily oc'd 6600GT (585/1145 from 500/900 stock), SOunblaster Live! 24-bit 7.1 card, HDTV tuner, two HDDs & 2 optical devices fine right now.

 

[Stumps]

I'm currently using the same PSU(it's only 18a on the 12v) and I can tell you, it won't hold up to a C2D/highend PCI-E GF card, i'm currently in the process of building a SKT754 SLI rig and even as a minimum for one of my 7900GT's I'll need around 450W.

But from what I have seen high end 550W PSU's aren't expensive (at least in NSW) I've seen them for around the $150 for Antecs.

I'm sure if you shop wisely on Ebay(yes it can be done, I rarely buy retail anymore and I save heaps of $$$$)you can build a really good rig and do it reasonably cheap too.

 

[avi85]

wait till you build your conroe system and upgrade to pcie

 

[dug777]

Originally posted by: Stumps
I'm currently using the same PSU(it's only 18a on the 12v) and I can tell you, it won't hold up to a C2D/highend PCI-E GF card, i'm currently in the process of building a SKT754 SLI rig and even as a minimum for one of my 7900GT's I'll need around 450W.

But from what I have seen high end 550W PSU's aren't expensive (at least in NSW) I've seen them for around the $150 for Antecs.

I'm sure if you shop wisely on Ebay(yes it can be done, I rarely buy retail anymore and I save heaps of $$$$)you can build a really good rig and do it reasonably cheap too.

I double checked & it's definitely 24A, well, that's what the sticker on the PSU and the box say, it's the last Truepower generation before the TP2...i was hoping it would be enough for a lower end card and a stock 6400

 

[Netopia]

Originally posted by: dug777

I was intending to carry over my Antec TruePower 380w (iirc it's 24A on the 12v), would that be sufficient? It's handling a significantly overvolted tbred (1.81vcore), a heavily oc'd 6600GT (585/1145 from 500/900 stock), SOunblaster Live! 24-bit 7.1 card, HDTV tuner, two HDDs & 2 optical devices fine right now.

What sort of AXP do you have? I'm running a XP-M 2200 (1.6GHz) @ 2255MHz at 1.625 volts. It will boot to 2415 @1.675 volts but will eventually crash out of games. This is on a shuttle 250 Watt powersupply that's also handling a Gig of PC3200 memory and a GeForce 5900Ultra AGP card.

Why so high on the CPU voltage though... have you tried significantly lower just to see if it will work?

Joe

 

[Wreckage]

http://www.futuremark.com/forum/showthread.php?t=164

7600 GT 256MB (560/1400) (4.48/22.4) (PCIe)
- 12 pixel shader units ? 12 TMUs ? 8 ROPs - 5 vertex shader units
It?s a bit faster than a 6800 Ultra and therefore is it natural to compare it to a 7800 GS. The X1800 GTO has a similar performance. Good overclocker.

7800 GS 256MB (375/1200) (3.0/38.4) (AGP)
- 16 pixel shader units ? 16 TMUs ? 8 ROPs - 6 vertex shader units
This video card is a bit faster than a 6800 Ultra and the performance is equal an X800 XT PE. Games using HDR with FP blending (like FarCry) can increase the performance gap to 50 % when compared to a 6800 Ultra. The 7800 GS introduces new technologies to people who still have AGP main boards like: spatial-temporal deinterlacing for HD formats. The card can?t be softmodded.

 

[dug777]

Originally posted by: Netopia

Originally posted by: dug777

I was intending to carry over my Antec TruePower 380w (iirc it's 24A on the 12v), would that be sufficient? It's handling a significantly overvolted tbred (1.81vcore), a heavily oc'd 6600GT (585/1145 from 500/900 stock), SOunblaster Live! 24-bit 7.1 card, HDTV tuner, two HDDs & 2 optical devices fine right now.

What sort of AXP do you have? I'm running a XP-M 2200 (1.6GHz) @ 2255MHz at 1.625 volts. It will boot to 2415 @1.675 volts but will eventually crash out of games. This is on a shuttle 250 Watt powersupply that's also handling a Gig of PC3200 memory and a GeForce 5900Ultra AGP card.

Why so high on the CPU voltage though... have you tried significantly lower just to see if it will work?

Joe

Tbred-b (B0 stepping?). It's a 2000+ stock (1.6777ghz), running at 2.1Ghz atm. I can get up to 2.3 out of it, but it's not 100% stable (and i haven't bothered tweaking it to get it stable). It's 1.6v stock, i suspect the 1.81 (1.75 in the BIOS) is so high because i was trying to get 2.3 stable about 6months ago and i never changed it back, i'm sure i was stable at 2.1 with about 1.75vcore back in the day)...

EDIT: well i put it back to 2.2Ghz, we'll see how this goes EDIT2: seems rock solid at 2.2

 

[dug777]

Originally posted by: Wreckage
http://www.futuremark.com/forum/showthread.php?t=164

7600 GT 256MB (560/1400) (4.48/22.4) (PCIe)
- 12 pixel shader units ? 12 TMUs ? 8 ROPs - 5 vertex shader units
It?s a bit faster than a 6800 Ultra and therefore is it natural to compare it to a 7800 GS. The X1800 GTO has a similar performance. Good overclocker.

7800 GS 256MB (375/1200) (3.0/38.4) (AGP)
- 16 pixel shader units ? 16 TMUs ? 8 ROPs - 6 vertex shader units
This video card is a bit faster than a 6800 Ultra and the performance is equal an X800 XT PE. Games using HDR with FP blending (like FarCry) can increase the performance gap to 50 % when compared to a 6800 Ultra. The 7800 GS introduces new technologies to people who still have AGP main boards like: spatial-temporal deinterlacing for HD formats. The card can?t be softmodded.

But the 7800GS has very low stock speeds, and from what i've read it overclocks extremely well (stock i see 375/1200 here, and i've read about quite a few people getting 500/1500 or so)...

 

[WT]

Antec TP 380 is indeed 24 amps on the +12, as the later reviosion was updated but not advertised as such. The earlier revs only had 18a which is why we are seeing the disparity. I purchased one of the later ones after reading several reviewers pointing this out. Its powering a lowly 9800 Pro now, only because its my hand me down rig for my wife, so no need to add more juice. Still, for your purposes, its adequate.

 

[BassBomb]

just so you know, your 6600GT is stilll slightly bottlenecked by your current cpu

i had a 2500+ (1.8ghz) with my 6600GT for a few months before i went to A64

 

[Netopia]

So what is the definition of the CPU bottlenecking?

Does it mean lower resolution, or only with AA or AF?
or
Does it mean even at lower resolution, AA/AF won't be able to run well?

WHERE does the bottlenecking come into play?

Joe

 

[dug777]

Originally posted by: BassBomb
just so you know, your 6600GT is stilll slightly bottlenecked by your current cpu

i had a 2500+ (1.8ghz) with my 6600GT for a few months before i went to A64

I would hope my 2.2Ghz tbred-b would be somewhat faster than a 1.8Ghz barton, although i've no doubt it still limits my 6600GT in quite a few games

@netopia: i can't see why adding AA/AF would add to the CPU load in any conceivable way, so i was assuming i could ladle on the AA/AF at say 1280 and be very happy with the extra power of a 7800GS...i've got a 21" CRT as my primary so i'm extremely flexible as far as resolution is concerned...

 

[Netopia]

I'm in the same boat. I got a DOA 7600GT from NewEgg, but am hoping to run it in my Shuttle Box. Right now I've got an oc'ed 5900Ultra running CS:S at 1280x1024 with most but not all of the eye candy turned on. I'm hoping that the jump to the 7600GT will allow me to at least stay at the same resolution, but with all the eye candy and also be able to take advantage of HDR maps.

BTW... CS:S got DRAMATICALLY better for me about a month or so ago. It has always been running in DX8 mode and though the 5900U is a DX9 card, DX9 was greyed out as an option. I read that DX9 was horribly slow with the HL2 engine, but I forced it into DX9 mode once anyway... and it was HORRIBLY slow, though prettier. About a month or so back, I was playing and noticed that things just seemed MUCH more detailed and prettier. I checked, and suddenly it was in DX9 mode and running perfectly fine! I had changed NOTHING. Checked with a couple of friends with 5x00 series cards and theirs had all changed too! What makes it really weird is that HL2 itself still remains in DX8 and greyed out so you can't change it! I've looked around the web for an explanation of what's changed of if Valve did some special Voodoo to CS:S, but have found nothing.

Weird, eh?

Joe

 

[dug777]

Originally posted by: Netopia
I'm in the same boat. I got a DOA 7600GT from NewEgg, but am hoping to run it in my Shuttle Box. Right now I've got an oc'ed 5900Ultra running CS:S at 1280x1024 with most but not all of the eye candy turned on. I'm hoping that the jump to the 7600GT will allow me to at least stay at the same resolution, but with all the eye candy and also be able to take advantage of HDR maps.

BTW... CS:S got DRAMATICALLY better for me about a month or so ago. It has always been running in DX8 mode and though the 5900U is a DX9 card, DX9 was greyed out as an option. I read that DX9 was horribly slow with the HL2 engine, but I forced it into DX9 mode once anyway... and it was HORRIBLY slow, though prettier. About a month or so back, I was playing and noticed that things just seemed MUCH more detailed and prettier. I checked, and suddenly it was in DX9 mode and running perfectly fine! I had changed NOTHING. Checked with a couple of friends with 5x00 series cards and theirs had all changed too! What makes it really weird is that HL2 itself still remains in DX8 and greyed out so you can't change it! I've looked around the web for an explanation of what's changed of if Valve did some special Voodoo to CS:S, but have found nothing.

Weird, eh?

Joe

You're not the first person i've heard mention that either about the 5x00 series recently...

It's always been very good for me, initially with my 9800Pro, and then with my 6600GT, usually run CS:S with everything maxed, 2xAA/8xAF at 1280 these days, so a 2nd hand 6600GT would likely make you very happy in CS:S (well, i guess mine is reasonably heavily oc'd, no guarantee they'll all do that).

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: Stumps
I'm currently using the same PSU(it's only 18a on the 12v) and I can tell you, it won't hold up to a C2D/highend PCI-E GF card, i'm currently in the process of building a SKT754 SLI rig and even as a minimum for one of my 7900GT's I'll need around 450W.

Nonsense. If you have a quality unit and enough amperes on the proper voltages, then it should run fine. If it doesn't, there's something else going on causing the issues. I'm running an overclocked Opteron 144, 2GB RAM, HDD, optical and a factory overclocked 7900GT... on a 270W Enermax SFX PSU with 16A on +12v. It's been running fine since early this year and I fully expect it to continue running great.

Now, if your PSU is indeed only 18A and you actually have two cards in there, I can see where you would need more juice.

 

[Netopia]

The replacement has arrived and works just fine on a 250Watt Shuttle PS. VERY QUIET compared to the 5900U too!

The GPU temps seem to stay at about 51 idle, but only go up to about 55 when stressed. This is in a VERY small case (Shuttle Shoebox sized) so those temps aren't too bad.

As for performance... my guess is that I'm CPU bottlenecked. The Athlon XP-M is stable at 2255 with the mem @ 205. With the 5900U, I ran 1024*768 with most things maxed, but AA/AF turned off and no HDR. With the 7600GT, I've got 1152*864 and have 2x AA and AF. Nothing (at least in CS:S) looks much different.

I'm happy though. It is VASTLY quieter and has reduced my case temp by about 3 degrees C and my CPU temp by 1 degree C. The 5900U was a great SPACE HEATER!

Joe