9600GT SLI upgrade to 6950 2gb?

[dpk33]

My friend currently owns a 9600gt 512 mb sli setup, with an athlon ii x4 620 at stock. would a 6950 2gb give him a really noticeable performance increase at 1080p?

and what is the modern equivalent of a 9600gt sli setup?

 

[bryanW1995]

GTX 460-768 seems like a good comparison, though with its tons of overclocking headroom it would pull away from 2 x 9600gt most likely. Maybe a gtx 460 se?

He'll see tons of improvement in situations that are gpu-bound, but if he gets the 6950 then he really needs to slap a decent OC on the cpu.

 

[dpk33]

so to see a real performance gain, he needs to overclock his cpu?

sadly, neither of us have any experience with overclocking. any simple guides?

 

[happy medium]

Just tell him to grab a gtx460 for under 140$ and he will see much improved framerates.A gtx460 is much faster than 2 9600gt's in sli.
A $240 6950 2gb is overkill.

 

[dpk33]

Just tell him to grab a gtx460 for under 140$ and he will see much improved framerates.A gtx460 is much faster than 2 9600gt's in sli.
A $240 6950 2gb is overkill.

he's buying the 6950 off me for $200 and he plays pretty gpu intensive games like bad company 2 and shogun 2 and crysis.

 

[happy medium]

he's buying the 6950 off me for $200 and he plays pretty gpu intensive games like bad company 2 and shogun 2 and crysis.

Then like Bryan said, learn to overclock and it should perform ok.
Your a good friend selling him a 6950 for only 200$.
He will see a good performance gains even at stock cpu clocks at that resolution and those peticular games.

 

[dpk33]

i've been wanting to learn how to overclock for a long time..
i just don't know where to look. i dont understand the guides on google.

 

[happy medium]

Just go to the cpu/overclocking section and ask. I'm sure someone will walk you through it.
It's really not that hard. Just tell them what motherboard and cpu you have and you will be at 3.5 in no time. First thing, you might need a better cpu cooler. I would help you myself but I never overclocked a Athlon II.

Here is the basics.
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/phenom-overclock-athlon,2161.html

http://www.ocia.net/articles/k10overclock/page1.shtml

 

[dpk33]

so approximately how much of a performance gain would there be coming from a 9600gt sli setup to a single 6950 2gb setup?

 

[toyota]

at what res? just in general though that Athlon 2, even overclocked, will likely kill about 20-25% of what a 6950 can do in many cases.

there was some review I saw not too long ago that showed the Athlon X4 getting hammered because of lacking L3. happy or russian probably can find that link...

 

[Madcatatlas]

Gsus, the guy asks a straightforward question and all he gets is beating around the bush. You Are looking at around a doubling in framerates in gpu intense situations, generally speaking.