Gonna pick up a new vid card- is my cpu a bottleneck?

[nichrf36]

Im gonna pick up a x1900xt -http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814102004
was looking into a 7900gt or x1800xt 512 but for an extra 60$ I might as well go with the xt.

My concern is my processor is an athlon 64 3200 (overclocked to 2.25 ghz)

For gaming I will run everything at 1680x1050 (my lcd native resolution)

Just concernced if my cpu is going to be a bottleneck on this.

Thanks for your input.

 

[Noema]

I don't think it will be a problem, specially since you overclocked it.

You can try it yourself before buying the card: play the games you feel the CPU might be a bottleneck in at 640x480 with all the GPU intensive (AA/AF, shadows, texture resolution, HDR, etc)settings as low as possible to eliminate the GPU bottleneck factor.

If you get high fps under those conditions, that means the CPU is enough to run the game and the only potential bottleneck will be the GPU.

 

[deadseasquirrel]

At that resolution, your 3200+ will perform the same as if you had an FX-57 or an x2 4400+ in there.

If you ever find that you do become CPU bottlenecked, simply crank up higher AA or AF (or if you find yourself using a CRT instead, crank up the resolution) and you're surely to become GPU-bound once again.

 

[Captante]

A stock 3200+ is about the point of diminishing returns for CPU speed in most games, so you should be just fine.

 

[acegazda]

i noticed you almost went with the x1800xt, to me that seems like the better deal considering there is only about a 15% performance increase between the x1800xt and the x1900xt and the x1800xt can be had for $260 for the 512mb version and $240 for the 256mb version.
256 mb version
there used to be a rebate on this thing

 

[nichrf36]

Originally posted by: acegazda
i noticed you almost went with the x1800xt, to me that seems like the better deal considering there is only about a 15% performance increase between the x1800xt and the x1900xt and the x1800xt can be had for $260 for the 512mb version and $240 for the 256mb version.
256 mb version
there used to be a rebate on this thing

yea like I said I was gonna go with an 1800xt 512 but decided to just spend the extra $$$ and pick up the 1900xt. Been looking at benchmarks and at my resolution (1680x1050) lot of the games with the 1900 get an extra 10fps or so(with high settings of course) which makes it worth the extra $$$ to me

 

[nichrf36]

Originally posted by: Captante
A stock 3200+ is about the point of diminishing returns for CPU speed in most games, so you should be just fine.

LOL looks like we have almost identical specs- your running a 3200+ as well. Im wondering how the fan noise is on the 1900xt. Im using an artic cooling fan/heatsink on my current x800xl- I cant stand case noise.

 

[acegazda]

ok thats pretty good, your lucky, I dont have that xtra $$$

 

[Ichigo]

10 extra fps is something like 25% increase at high resolutions in games like Oblivion. It's very worth it.