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AGP Upgrade

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rohizz

Member
I'm a senior in high school, and I'll be building a new computer next summer. But for right now I have a p4 2.4 Northwood, with a 4x AGP slot, and 1 gig of ram. I dont want to upgrade to PCI-E yet. I want a cheap (<$150) card that will easy beat out my 9800PRO without being bottlenecked by CPU and RAM.

I'm looking at the 7600GS. How much of an upgrade, if any, is that from the 9800PRO? I am running on a 4x AGP slot.

the 7600GS is 150-ish on newegg.

What about X1300 256mb for 70? or a 7300GS 256mb for 80?
 
7600GS sounds like more of a side-grade. in shader heavy games it'll come out ahead, maybe, but it has 1/2 the memory bandwidth of the 9800 Pro.

the GT would be a decent upgrade. it has a little more memory bandwidth than the 9800 pro and almost double the shading and fill rate power

the x1300 would be a down grade. so would the 7300GS and GT.

X850 pro might be a good upgrade. $160 at the egg
 
these can all be available in AGP 4x/8x? and how much do most of these cost?

whats the difference between X800GTO and the X850Pro?

both are 256mb, 256-bit, 12 pipeline cards.

i plan on flashing to 16. So would getting the X850Pro make that much a ($30) difference

Will these be good for the next year or so, for light Medium res graphics? Like Madden, CS1.6/Source, F.E.A.R., WoW? When i build my next computer, i plan on getting a much better highend card.
 
They are all AGP 4x/8x cards.

The difference between the GTO and Pro is core clockspeeds, the Pro has a faster core but also only has a chance to unlock if it's a VIVO version.

The GTO might unlock and, depending on the core (R430 or R480), can overclock to Pro speeds (R480). If you are wanting to unlock, the Sapphire X800GTO 256mb seems to have a good success rate (I have one unlocked) and the X850Pro can possibly unlock if you get a VIVO version.

Edit: I run this one with an A64 @ 2.6Ghz and the card really shines. Was previously running an XP2600 with it and it was still good. The only thing I have to turn down in most games is textures at a res of 11 x 8. Games still look and play GREAT.

Edit again: You might want to see if you can pick up an X800XL, they were on offer stateside a few weeks back. 16 pipes out of the box.
 
If you are not looking to overclock heavily or unlock the 7600gt is a great card. Its as fast as a stock 7800gs for alot less.
 
I think unlocked 850 Pro will give you full 16 pipes and XT (850XT) I have 850 Pro (vivo) and I am afraid of unlock it might damages.
 
hmmm maybe a 6800GS or X800GTO as a minimum (anything slower isn't really worth the upgrade from a 9800pro)...but even the two cards I listed would be fairly CPU bound by your 2.4ghz P4...maybe it might be time to bite the bullet and upgrade the whole system....or just use your 9800pro until you can afford a faster system...because you can't really improve that system a whole lot.
 
Originally posted by: Stumps
hmmm maybe a 6800GS or X800GTO as a minimum (anything slower isn't really worth the upgrade from a 9800pro)...but even the two cards I listed would be fairly CPU bound by your 2.4ghz P4...maybe it might be time to bite the bullet and upgrade the whole system....or just use your 9800pro until you can afford a faster system...because you can't really improve that system a whole lot.
Click to expand...

Maybe that's why I had my experience awhile back: I tried out an X850Pro from a 9800Pro [8x AGP, P4 3.0E, 1Gb PC3200 Value RAM] and really thought it only an "incremental" upgrade - really not worth it (but they were running $250 back then). I ended up returning it to the store and working on a PCI-e upgrade.

My advice in your shoes: make sure you can return what you get for what you paid (or at least close to it) - you may not like the results.

PM
 
Originally posted by: Stumps
hmmm maybe a 6800GS or X800GTO as a minimum (anything slower isn't really worth the upgrade from a 9800pro)...but even the two cards I listed would be fairly CPU bound by your 2.4ghz P4...maybe it might be time to bite the bullet and upgrade the whole system....or just use your 9800pro until you can afford a faster system...because you can't really improve that system a whole lot.
Click to expand...


ditto
 
Originally posted by: rohizz
I'm a senior in high school, and I'll be building a new computer next summer. But for right now I have a p4 2.4 Northwood, with a 4x AGP slot, and 1 gig of ram. I dont want to upgrade to PCI-E yet. I want a cheap (<$150) card that will easy beat out my 9800PRO without being bottlenecked by CPU and RAM.

I'm looking at the 7600GS. How much of an upgrade, if any, is that from the 9800PRO? I am running on a 4x AGP slot.

the 7600GS is 150-ish on newegg.

What about X1300 256mb for 70? or a 7300GS 256mb for 80?
Click to expand...

You have one option, grab a 6800gt or similar speed Ati card. Any thing else is a waste of money with your cpu. Now if you overclock your cpu up in the 2.8 or 3.0 range then a 7600gt will do you fine.
 
massive bottlenecks? I should be able to get my CPU up to 2.8........how does a 7600gt compare to a X1800XT AIW?
 
Originally posted by: rohizz
massive bottlenecks? I should be able to get my CPU up to 2.8........how does a 7600gt compare to a X1800XT AIW?
Click to expand...


I think you mean x800xt AIW. It's a little slower than a 7600gt and has no sm3 shader technology for future games,but is a good card.

If they were similar in price, I'd take the newer technology,but thats me.
 
okay yeah, thats what I meant. Sorry... what makes the 7600GT faster than the X800XT? the X800XT has 16 pipes and 256-bit. the 7600GT has 12 and is 128-bit. Is it the clock speeds?

after OC'ing my computer to 2.8, would a 7600GT last me a good while (at least a year) at 1024x768/1280x1024 ?
 
Originally posted by: rohizz
okay yeah, thats what I meant. Sorry... what makes the 7600GT faster than the X800XT? the X800XT has 16 pipes and 256-bit. the 7600GT has 12 and is 128-bit. Is it the clock speeds?

after OC'ing my computer to 2.8, would a 7600GT last me a good while (at least a year) at 1024x768/1280x1024 ?
Click to expand...

Well I have a 7800gs which is as fast as a 7600gt stock,but if I overclock my card near 7600gt speeds my card pulls away.So yes it's clock speed and clock for clock efficiency.
My card has 16 pipes and 256 bit memory. Now the x850xtpe which is as fast as my card which is equal to the 7600gt is faster then the plain x800xt. The x800xt is as fast as a 6800gt/ultra. One more thing I see when testing a x800 card in 3d mark 06, it scores way lower than newer cards with sm3 shaders enabled. I see this as more future proof.
But the x800 cards are fine when testing in 3d mark 05. Draw you own conclusion.


edit: AT those resolutions 1024x768 you should be good for 9 to 12 months,but remember "technology changes fast".
 
Get whichever one is cheapest out of these: 7600gt, x800xt/x850xt, x800xl. All of those cards are more than 2x as fast as a 9800p, and your cpu will likely bottleneck them to some extent. Features like SM3 and HDR arent important in this class of cards either unless you plan on running a low resoluton like 1024x768. Those features work best when used on high end cards.
 
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