9700, 9800, or 5900? Which to buy?

[Guspaz]

I'm attending a LAN party the 24th of May, and would like to have a new video card by then. However, recent releases have thrown my decision into dissarray!

The current machine:

AthlonXP 1900+
Abit KT7A
768MB PC133
VisionTek GeForce 3 (original)
SB Live! Value
Maxtor 120GB 7200RPM HDD

The choices (CDN $):

1) Buy a 9700 Pro before the party for 500$ (possibly less)
2) Buy a 9800 Pro before the party for 650$
3) Wait until later and buy a 5900 for 750-800$ (possibly more)

#1 is the cheapest, and still should offer good performance.
#2 is faster, but costs 150$ more, and it's speed benefit is to be reduced by the new cats that improve 9700 perf.
#3 is hellishly expensive, but will be the fastest card bar none in June. But then ATI will release another card shortly after it...

Where do I jump in and purchase? I have enough money for either three and little else to spend it on (Been saving for 8 months)

Can I safely buy a 9700 and not feel like I've been screwed? I'm leaning towards the 9700 right now.

 

[butch84]

I would go for the 9700pro. I dont think the small performance increase of the 9800pro is worth its price premium. I wouldnt wait un the fx5900ultra, just cause it prolly wont be avail for a few months. Take the money you will save, and get some ddr system memory and a mobo that supports it. That pc133 is gonna really hold you back with a new graphics card.

peace,
butch

 

[anomaly]

I hope to god those prices aren't american!

 

[CraigRT]

9700 Pro

WAY more reasonable price than the other 2.. the FX5900 Ultra doesn't win by that much in alot of the tests either. 9700 pro is more than good enough for current games...

 

[1ManArmY]

9700 PRO but use cat 3.2 driver's

 

[Guspaz]

"(CDN $):"

Allow me to translate into USD with today's exchange rate:

9700 Pro (retail ATI): 363$ US
9800 Pro (retail ATI): 472$ US
5900 Pro: Impossible to know, but probably at least 550$-600$ US

That is, of course, before the 15.025% sales tax in my province.

Prices after tax:

9700 Pro (retail ATI): 418$ US
9800 Pro (retail ATI): 543$ US
5900 Pro: Impossible to know, but probably at least 633$-690$ US

As I understand it, the fault is mostly ATI's. They use an exchange rate of 1.625 when the REAL exchange rate is 1.378. I mean, get this:

ATI charges 399$ for the 9800 Pro on their site on the US pricelist. They charge 649$ on the SAME site on the canadian pricelist. Now turn the CDN $ back into USD, and you get 471$ US!!! So, 71$ US more expensive becuase they have the exchange rate wrong. And ATI is in Canada to begin with...

 

[CraigRT]

Guspaz, if u are in Canada, I've found my 9700 Pro for about $450 Cdn which works out to be about $325 or so USD..

it was at vibecomputers.com

 

[Guspaz]

Sorry, I want official ATI boards only

I'm willing to pay the extra money for that aspect at least.

 

[Jedarius]

I would go for the 9700 too, it's a good card and it will last you for a while.
I think the 5900 won't be on retail shelfs for at least another month or two, even though it's slated for a june release...not to mention the price.

 

[Rogozhin]

You are cpu limited anyways even with the 9700, I'd go that route unless you have the money to burn, then get yourself a 5900 ultra.

rogo

 

[chizow]

Originally posted by: Rogozhin
You are cpu limited anyways even with the 9700, I'd go that route unless you have the money to burn, then get yourself a 5900 ultra.

rogo

Except in games where the GPU is the bottleneck or if you increase the resolution and turn up AA and AF. Even the "cpu-limited" Q3 engine shows signficant performance degradation at higher resolutions with AA and AF with the R3XX and NV30.....that is until the FX 5900U leveled performance at 1024/1280/1600 w/ AA and AF at 223 fps (from Anand's review). GPU and bandwidth limitations are still very real now that the emphasis on performance has shifted from straight FPS to higher resolutions with AA and AF enabled.

It seems Canadians are often stuck with ATi due to nVidia's high prices in Canada. The performance increase of the 5900U doesn't justify the increase in price tag in your situation, and I'm almost certain you wouldn't be able to purchase it in time for that May 24th LAN.

Chiz

 

[Guspaz]

Well, other nVidia cards aren't so badly priced. GeForce FX 5200 is 133$ canadian at the local store, Ti 4200 is 203$ cdn. Prices seem to be acceptable once they settle down...

 

[nRollo]

I would truly HATE to live in Canada, unless your wages compensate for this horrific overpricing. I just sold my buddy my ATI 9700Pro for $225 because Pricewatch showed me he could get a new one for $277 or so. How do you guys have any money left over for beer?!

I'd try to get a used 9700Pro, but I'd also get a SB Audigy 1 (SBLive has terrible cpu utilization) and some DDR RAM

 

[nRollo]

Craig:
"WAY more reasonable price than the other 2.. the FX5900 Ultra doesn't win by that much in alot of the tests either. 9700 pro is more than good enough for current games."

I agree with the "more than good enough" but the 5900 wins by a lot in a lot of tests.

 

[Budmantom]

I think you should upgrade your mb and ram 1st.

 

[nippyjun]

I would get the cheapest card now that will give you the performance you need. Then sell it and get the 5900 when that comes out in a few weeks.

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: Guspaz
Sorry, I want official ATI boards only

I'm willing to pay the extra money for that aspect at least.

why official only? makes no difference at all.. plus, the sapphire is even teh same design as the reference board.. you probably couldnt even tell.

 

[Guspaz]

Originally posted by: Rollo
I would truly HATE to live in Canada, unless your wages compensate for this horrific overpricing. I just sold my buddy my ATI 9700Pro for $225 because Pricewatch showed me he could get a new one for $277 or so. How do you guys have any money left over for beer?!

I'd try to get a used 9700Pro, but I'd also get a SB Audigy 1 (SBLive has terrible cpu utilization) and some DDR RAM

Well, AFAIK, yes, wages are in proportion to prices. But that doesn't compensate for the fact that companies like ATI inflate the exchange rate way beyond what it actually is, making their products much more expensive in Canada.

Audigy and DDR ram? Well, if I ever went nForce 2 it has audigy-level integrated sound (with similar CPU use to the audigy), as for DDR ram, that would require a new motherboard and RAM.

A new mobo and ram would set me back 262$ for an MSI nForce 2 board and 768MB DDR333, however, then a new CPU becomes a possible upgrade (My board doesn't even support AthlonXP even though I have one , and 12x is the max multiplier), which adds more to the price

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: Rollo
Craig:
"WAY more reasonable price than the other 2.. the FX5900 Ultra doesn't win by that much in alot of the tests either. 9700 pro is more than good enough for current games."

I agree with the "more than good enough" but the 5900 wins by a lot in a lot of tests.

The 9700 isnt even a direct competitor to the 5900 Ultra really... I guess that shoudln't matter... the fact of the matter is, the 9700 Pro is perfect for today's games, and it's not a complete ripoff..

 

[Guspaz]

Originally posted by: Budmantom
I think you should upgrade your mb and ram 1st.

Upgrade them FIRST?

OK, so I get a 5-10% performance increase going from PC133 to DDR333, another 5-10% increase from the new chipset... Let's be generous and say a 30% speed increase. Now, the Radeon 9700 will give me a much bigger speed boost than 30%!

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: Guspaz


A new mobo and ram would set me back 262$ for an MSI nForce 2 board and 768MB DDR333, however, then a new CPU becomes a possible upgrade (My board doesn't even support AthlonXP even though I have one , and 12x is the max multiplier), which adds more to the price

You can get the Soltek NForce2 and 512MB of spec-tek DDR333 from NCIX for just around $200 CAD..


linky

 

[Guspaz]

Originally posted by: CraigRT

Originally posted by: Guspaz
Sorry, I want official ATI boards only

I'm willing to pay the extra money for that aspect at least.

why official only? makes no difference at all.. plus, the sapphire is even teh same design as the reference board.. you probably couldnt even tell.

Call it superstition, or perhaps desire for better support. And the only non-ATI board sold at the local store I buy from is a Powercolor for 460$, and I've heard too many bad things about them.

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: Guspaz

Originally posted by: CraigRT

Originally posted by: Guspaz
Sorry, I want official ATI boards only

I'm willing to pay the extra money for that aspect at least.

why official only? makes no difference at all.. plus, the sapphire is even teh same design as the reference board.. you probably couldnt even tell.

Call it superstition, or perhaps desire for better support. And the only non-ATI board sold at the local store I buy from is a Powercolor for 460$, and I've heard too many bad things about them.

Alright fair enough.. just FYI I love my Sapphire 9700 Pro, it got great reviews... I couldn't justify spending the extra on a real ATI for more money... makes no difference.

 

[Guspaz]

Originally posted by: CraigRT

Originally posted by: Guspaz


A new mobo and ram would set me back 262$ for an MSI nForce 2 board and 768MB DDR333, however, then a new CPU becomes a possible upgrade (My board doesn't even support AthlonXP even though I have one , and 12x is the max multiplier), which adds more to the price

You can get the Soltek NForce2 and 512MB of spec-tek DDR333 from NCIX for just around $200 CAD..


linky

Or I could get the MSI nForce 2 and a stick of 512MB DDR333 from the local store for 210$ CAD without buying from the internet... which is hard without a credit card.

 

[Guspaz]

Originally posted by: CraigRT

Alright fair enough.. just FYI I love my Sapphire 9700 Pro, it got great reviews... I couldn't justify spending the extra on a real ATI for more money... makes no difference.

Well, 40$... meh. If Sapphire were sold at MicroBytes (http://www.microbytes.com), I might reconsider. But 40$ to get away from PowerColor seems worth it.