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Looking for a good AGP card

T

Thoth093

Member
I'll be looking to pump up my graphical capabilities in a couple of months.

I have:

Athlon 64 3200+
1 gigabyte PC 3200 RAM
Radeon 9800 pro 128mb
Two 80 gigabyte hard drives
Onboard sound
Windows XP Pro

I'd like to just get an AGP card. Are there any being produced anymore? Or is the current crop as good as it gets?

Do you guys see any major price drops on the horizon for the 6800 series in AGP?

Thanks for your help,

Brian
 
Originally posted by: Powermoloch
x800xl 🙂
Click to expand...

I thought the 6800GT's where still much better buys for AGP as they are faster and are usually alot cheaper. PCIe is another story...

The 6800GT is still one of the best cards out there and can be had for not that much. Plus most can overclock to 6800 ultra speeds without breaking a sweat so that makes it a pretty easy choice when you are looking for AGP.

-spike
 
6800GT is the best its gonna get for a while, unless you want fastest out of the box, then go for an X850XT-PE AGP, or a 6800U if you're NVIDIA-biased 😉 . There most likely won't be an AGP version of G70 or R520 (which pisses me off to no end), so those 3 are really your best options 😉 .
 
Originally posted by: Thoth093
I'll be looking to pump up my graphical capabilities in a couple of months.

I have:

Athlon 64 3200+
1 gigabyte PC 3200 RAM
Radeon 9800 pro 128mb
Two 80 gigabyte hard drives
Onboard sound
Windows XP Pro

I'd like to just get an AGP card. Are there any being produced anymore? Or is the current crop as good as it gets?

Do you guys see any major price drops on the horizon for the 6800 series in AGP?

Thanks for your help,

Brian
Click to expand...

I feel your pain. I'm looking at upgrading my 9800Pro to something new here soon and I don't want to go PCI-e yet. I've been looking at the x850xt-pe but the problem is that I want a card with dual-DVI (since I have 2 2001FP's). The few ATI's that have it are expensive but the 6800GT's and 6800U's have it by default. I'm still deciding...
 
I second the 6800GT suggestion (unless you can find an X800XL in AGP for less). Most seem to overclock to Ultra speeds easily (mine does), and the price has dropped on them pretty nicely in recent weeks/months, I believe. Probably the best price/performance overall in the AGP "once was high end" market right now. 😛
 
I'd go with the X800XL, too. It's as fast as a 6800GT and not as pricey. Or, you could buy a refurbished (read new) X800XT for the same price or lower.🙂
 
current fastest AGP card : X850XT PE. I would either get 6800U AGP or X850XT AGP. I do know that ATI said that will support AGP with R520 and R530 but i think that wouldn't happen for a long while.
 
I'd get the 6800gt - it's still a good card, doesnt cost too much, and can be overclocked to ultra speeds. The x850xt pe is faster, but it's also more expensive. There may or may not be any new AGP cards released in the future, so if you want an upgrade, get one while you still can, because the supplies are running dry.
 
Originally posted by: Thoth093
I'll be looking to pump up my graphical capabilities in a couple of months.

I have:

Athlon 64 3200+
1 gigabyte PC 3200 RAM
Radeon 9800 pro 128mb
Two 80 gigabyte hard drives
Onboard sound
Windows XP Pro

I'd like to just get an AGP card. Are there any being produced anymore? Or is the current crop as good as it gets?

Do you guys see any major price drops on the horizon for the 6800 series in AGP?

Thanks for your help,

Brian
Click to expand...

Hey Brian - I have an AGP system too...I upgraded from a 9800 Pro to a PNY 6800GT. Best upgrade I ever made. See my review of the PNY 6800GT:

http://www.epinions.com/content_194243694212

Definitely worth the money!
Justin
 
Thanks to all for the suggestions. I figure that a 6800GT would probably serve. What's a good price for one, used or new? What about refurbished units? I know that newegg.com sells some of those.

Brian
 
Originally posted by: munky
I'd get the 6800gt - it's still a good card, doesnt cost too much, and can be overclocked to ultra speeds. The x850xt pe is faster, but it's also more expensive. There may or may not be any new AGP cards released in the future, so if you want an upgrade, get one while you still can, because the supplies are running dry.
Click to expand...


Sad, but true. You would hope that the prices for the x850xt-pe and 6800gt in AGP would be down to $100-150 two years from now, but if they really are the most powerful and the last of the AGP cards, and if new units are no longer being produced, they could become scarce and the prices could start to jump up or at least remain much higher than they should be. I couldn't believe how long the Radeon 9800 Pros maintained a price of $200.

What I'd like to know, is, will additional units be produced at all? Will the guy who built a then powerful top of the line AGP system a year-and-a-half ago be able to upgrade his 9800 Pro to a 6800 GT or x850xt-pe two years from now?

 
I was in the same boat as you, and I just took the cheap way and ordered the Leadtek 6800LE from Newegg. It's almost guaranteed to unlock to 12 pipes which is what the 6800NU has, and lots of people get lucky and can unlock the full 16 pixel pipes and 6 vertex pipes. That basically puts it at 6800GT levels, but it has slower memory (not GDDR3) so it's still not quite as fast.

The cheapest 6800GT I could find was in the ~$185 range after rebates or used, so I figured $130 for a slightly slower card was a good buy. They also have refurbs for $99 if you wanted to try your luck (I did not). Also factor in that our 9800pro cards are still worth roughly $100, but if you wait longer they will be worth less.

That being said, If I had a little more in the budget, I'd probably go for a good brand of 6800GT (BFG, eVGA, etc) and OC the heck out of it.

I am also one of the many who are upset about AGP not being around much longer... especially when the comparable cards in PCIe show almost ZERO improvement (all other things being equal). What a buncha crap.
 
Yeah, it makes little sense to me because there's such an installed user base that would benefit not so much from a processor upgrade but from a video upgrade. I'm perfectly happy with my overall speed and capabilities. 6800GT is is, probably then. I see I can get a refurb as low as $200 from Newegg. What are the pros and cons of such a purchase?

(Although I'm thinking of putting more RAM in -- would an extra 512mb make a difference, or would it create a bottleneck? I've got two slots used, one free).


 
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