Looking for advice - Is upgrading to GTX worth it?

[Rebel7254]

I have been looking at some benchmarks around the net, and it looks like the GTX is a good deal faster than the GTS. However, I haven't been able to find really any benchmarks that are close to my setup:

C2D e6400 (~3GHz o/c)
eVga GeForce 8800 GTS 640MB (660/1800 o/c)
2GB DDR2-800 RAM (Corsair XMS 5-5-5-15)
Gigabyte GA-965P-S3
Windows XP Pro / Vista Ultimate

I'm only interested in playing @ 1680x1050 resolution. The games I want to play are:

Unreal Tournament 3
Crysis
Assassin's Creed (supposed to come out early next year)

I've noticed that anti-aliasing hurts my performance too much. I hate jaggies, and even at 1680x1050 I need some AA in certain places. But if I turn AA on (even 2x), I can't make it to my goal of 60+ fps at all times (in bioshock and ut3 demos). I realize I probably can't MAX OUT all settings in these games unless I want to upgrade everything, but I want to play at a resonably high detail. So I'm wondering this:

Given my CPU and the resolution and the fact that I want to use AA, will selling my GTS and getting a GTX allow me to reach my goal of 60+ fps at all times (particularly in UT3)? The reason I ask is I'm thinking my CPU might limit the GTX to the point that I won't see much of a boost. I just don't know, because I haven't really seen comparison between the C2D e6400 and those two cards (GTS/GTX). I believe my e6400 @ ~3GHz is comparable to an e6550, since AT says 20% more clocks makes up for a 2MB L2 cache deficit. But I still haven't seen even bechmarks with the e6550/1650x1050 combination. I was hoping maybe some of you could shed some light on this for me.

I realize the 8800GT is coming out, and leaked benchies make it appear to be quite a monster card for the price. I just have a problem with the fact that it is only 512MB. Maybe 512MB would be more than I'll need if I don't go higher than 1680x1050. What do you think?

Anyway, I might be rambling a bit so I'll leave it at that. Thanks in advance for the help.

 

[Dkcode]

You will struggle to maintain a solid 60+ FPS in Bioshock at all times even with a GTX. I own one, and ok i play @ 1920 x 1200 but i average around mid 40's. This is without AA.

UT3 runs pretty much 60FPS all the time. Sometimes when it gets busy in an area it drops down to the 40's but this is inevitable. I do have a fairly strong CPU though - E6850.

 

[Mana]

Wait until the new ATI and nVIDIA cards have been released and see how they perform, there is a decent chance that the Radeon 3870 will outperform the GTX.

Bottom line, given the impending launch of the 8800 GT and Radeon 3850 and 3870, the GTX isn't worth it from a bang for your buck perspective.

 

[Rebel7254]

But look at this:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3128&p=4

There is a 22+ fps difference between the GTS and the GTX at 1600x1200. I know that they're using a much more powerful processor than me, but the GTX sure does seem to blow away the GTS there (I consider nearly 30% faster very significant).

I'm just not sure how much this applies to me since they're obviously not using my proc. Since CPU is held the same, it looks like the GTX is nearly 30% faster in that situation. But if my GTS is already CPU limited, then there's no point in upgrading to the GTX. That's what I'm trying to find out.

What are the expected price points for the Radeon 3850/3870?

 

[MarcVenice]

Depends on how much you can sell the 8800gts 640mb card for, and even then I'd wait till the 8800gt and ati's new cards come out, wether that be 2950xt's or 3800xt's or whatever the heck ATI is going to call them.

 

[Rebel7254]

I was thinking I could get $300 or so out of it on ebay. That seems realistic based on the completed listings I saw....

However, I'm afraid that will go down quite a bit if the 8800GT is all it's cracked up to be. I probably couldn't get but $225 or so then I'd say.

So if I can get $300 out of my GTS and buy a GTX (not brand new, but in good shape from somebody who has good feedback, whether on ebay or heatware whatever) for $450 or less, then that would be great.

If the GTX would give me 25-30% better performance, then I'd like to move on this before the new cards come out before the selling value of my GTS goes down. But, like I said, if I'm already CPU limited then there's no point. I'm pretty happy with my current framerates with no AA enabled, so I think a 25-30% faster card with AA on would at least get me the same framerates I'm getting no with no AA right now.

 

[onlyCOpunk]

I would say, not worth the upgrade.

 

[balane]

You get 660 on your GTS with stock cooling? You can run 3DMark06 with stability? I can't get over 625 on mine and my case temps are now sub 40C. (Vista 64 bit) Are you doing anything special to get it that high?

(I would wait instead of upgrading. Yes, the value of your GTS will go down but so will the value of the 8800GTX when the new cards come out. I'm hanging on to buy and saving up for the new crop of cards.)

 

[Rebel7254]

I'm using stock cooling, but I do have to use Rivatuner to make the fan speed 100%. It makes a little bit of noise, but do you really care while you're gaming? I don't. When I'm in desktop I just turn it back down to 60% or whatever.

I haven't bothered with 3dmark. I haven't had any artifacts/crashing in games, so that's all I care about.

 

[alcoholbob]

I wouldn't get fixated too much on average FPS. You should also pay attention to minimum fps to get an idea of the total gaming experience. Compare the 640mb with the GTX to see if you really will see that much of a difference at the lower end.

For example, I HATE to see a minimum below 25fps. I don't care if the average is 35 or 105, if it goes below 25 in certain scenes that bothers me a lot more. But weigh your priorities; these are mine, yours might be different.

 

[nitromullet]

This is very tough to answer because I don't think any of the games you listed currently support AA.

Unreal Tournament 3 - no AA support in the demo
Crysis - no AA support in the MP beta from what I've heard, and no really reliable published benchmarks due to NDA
Assassin's Creed (supposed to come out early next year) - well, obviously...

 

[Rebel7254]

Actually, the new beta Forceware supposedly allows you to enable AA through the drivers without any tricks. I just read it at planetunreal.com.

There are also a couple of tricks to enabling AA in UT3:

1) Rename the UT3Demo.exe to Bioshock.exe and use your nvidia control panel to enable AA for the bioshock "profile".

2) Use some thing called nHancer (I didn't use this)

I used the bioshock.exe trick, and it really hurt the framerate. Even at 2x. I'll definitely give the new drivers a try tonight though....

 

[nitromullet]

Weird, I couldn't get AA working Bioshock under DX10... It worked by forcing DX9 in Vista, but the game would crash on exit. I ended up playing with no AA, disappointingly. I'll have to take a look at that with UT3.

nHancer is really cool. I never touch the NVIDIA control panel anymore. Plus, it lets you used the older transparency SSAA modes that are not visible in the NV control panel.

 

[danEboy83]

I would say invest your money in a quadcore, the newer games seem to actually use all 4 cores, and if you get the G0 stepping your looking at a 3.2+ overclock average.

 

[Rebel7254]

Originally posted by: danEboy83
I would say invest your money in a quadcore, the newer games seem to actually use all 4 cores, and if you get the G0 stepping your looking at a 3.2+ overclock average.

I guess I'm just wishing I can see what kind of performance my current proc yields with an 8800GTX @ 1680x1050. Or, if I could compare benchies between my current proc and a quad core with the 8800GTS @1680x1050 that would be super. The CPU scaling benchies I've seen all use 1024x768 resolution to eliminate the graphics card from the equation.

What I'm trying to find out is, perhaps from somewhone who has personal experience or has seen benchies I don't know about, is how much am I CPU limited right now playing @1680x1050.

And let's not forget that playing at roughly the same framerates I have now with at least 2x AA is pretty much the main goal. I just can't seem to find out what will accomplish that @1680x1050 in the games I play- more CPU power or more GPU power....

 

[nullpointerus]

Originally posted by: Rebel7254

Originally posted by: danEboy83
I would say invest your money in a quadcore, the newer games seem to actually use all 4 cores, and if you get the G0 stepping your looking at a 3.2+ overclock average.

I guess I'm just wishing I can see what kind of performance my current proc yields with an 8800GTX @ 1680x1050. Or, if I could compare benchies between my current proc and a quad core with the 8800GTS @1680x1050 that would be super. The CPU scaling benchies I've seen all use 1024x768 resolution to eliminate the graphics card from the equation.

What I'm trying to find out is, perhaps from somewhone who has personal experience or has seen benchies I don't know about, is how much am I CPU limited right now playing @1680x1050.

And let's not forget that playing at roughly the same framerates I have now with at least 2x AA is pretty much the main goal. I just can't seem to find out what will accomplish that @1680x1050 in the games I play- more CPU power or more GPU power....

I second quad-core if you upgrade your CPU. IIRC, high end will be octo-core in mid to late 2008. But you must get good cooling and the right motherboard if you want to overclock a quad-core CPU. The CPU and overclocking forum can help you with that.

 

[QuixoticOne]

Why don't you see if someone with a GTX will run a quick benchmark of
min/avg/max FPS for you in that resolution with one or more of those games/demos and some other benchmarks that may indicate relative performance.

Personally I'd wait until at least through November 2007 to get a GTX since
rumors exist that NVIDIA MAY launch other cards by then, and if they
do happen to launch the '9800' or whatever within a time-frame you're willing
to wait for, it'd almost certainly be a better performing choice for an upgrade.

I have a feeling that even the 8800GTX isn't going to 100% give you the
performance you want since AA does use a lot of GPU power and when you're
already in reasonably high resolution and already are using a lot of higher quality
settings, you're going to be near or below 60FPS at some points in some of the
more demanding titles.

You're right that you'll get less money for your current card the longer you wait
to sell it, but it seems like an expensive upgrade to spend over $100 more and
go through the hassle of selling / switching to something that only "mostly"
solves your problem. What about future games? Even if the GTX did reasonably
well for those three, you may still find yourself wanting more quality / FPS in
others in a few months. Since you demand high performance for the latest
games it seems like you'd want something more than a GTX since it does have
limits not TOO much beyond your current setup.

At your overclock I'd say your C2D is a pretty good gaming CPU for that
resolution. As long as your GFX card is 512MBy or more I doubt CPU would be
a huge limit for you in FPS as compared to the GPU given the fact you want AA
on and relatively higher quality settings.

I'd suggest enjoying what you have and wait for the next generation of
Intel's Quad Core CPU to come out by Q1 2008, and wait for the 9800GTX or
9800GTS or 9800GT or whatever they'll call it sometime between now and
Q1 2008. Then you'll have no limits with those particular titles or similar.

 

[Rebel7254]

Originally posted by: QuixoticOne
Why don't you see if someone with a GTX will run a quick benchmark of
min/avg/max FPS for you in that resolution with one or more of those games/demos and some other benchmarks that may indicate relative performance.

That was kind of what I was hoping somebody would do here. Should I have made a thread that just specifically asked for somebody with a e6400 C2D and an 8800 GTX to play UT3 demo @ 1680x1050 with some AA turned on, and then report back to me what framerates they got? I guess I could do that, if you think it would be more effective than this thread.

Personally I'd wait until at least through November 2007 to get a GTX since
rumors exist that NVIDIA MAY launch other cards by then, and if they
do happen to launch the '9800' or whatever within a time-frame you're willing
to wait for, it'd almost certainly be a better performing choice for an upgrade.

I have a feeling that even the 8800GTX isn't going to 100% give you the
performance you want since AA does use a lot of GPU power and when you're
already in reasonably high resolution and already are using a lot of higher quality
settings, you're going to be near or below 60FPS at some points in some of the
more demanding titles.

You're right that you'll get less money for your current card the longer you wait
to sell it, but it seems like an expensive upgrade to spend over $100 more and
go through the hassle of selling / switching to something that only "mostly"
solves your problem. What about future games? Even if the GTX did reasonably
well for those three, you may still find yourself wanting more quality / FPS in
others in a few months. Since you demand high performance for the latest
games it seems like you'd want something more than a GTX since it does have
limits not TOO much beyond your current setup.

At your overclock I'd say your C2D is a pretty good gaming CPU for that
resolution. As long as your GFX card is 512MBy or more I doubt CPU would be
a huge limit for you in FPS as compared to the GPU given the fact you want AA
on and relatively higher quality settings.

I'd suggest enjoying what you have and wait for the next generation of
Intel's Quad Core CPU to come out by Q1 2008, and wait for the 9800GTX or
9800GTS or 9800GT or whatever they'll call it sometime between now and
Q1 2008. Then you'll have no limits with those particular titles or similar.

I think waiting through the end of next month is probably the best option. I've been thinking about it, and it dawned on me that there would probably be abundant sources of UT3 benchmarks when the full game comes out. I'll be able to make a better decision then, and I'll have the luxury of taking real performance figures of the new 8800's into account.

UT3 is primarily what I'm going to play, with some Crysis on the side. I love Prince of Persia platforming type games too, so that's why I'm excited for Assassin's Creed (plus the graphics/environment interaction looks awesome. Aside from that, I don't see any games on the horizon that I'm interested in. I want to play UT3 competitively with my clan......so between that and a full-time job and my wife, I won't have time for much else.

I probably won't start thinking about a serious upgrade for at least another year. I just put this thing together in January. I don't have the kind of money to build a new good gaming rig every year. I mean, I have the money if I was absolutely dead set on it......but there are other things I need to be spending that kind of money on. Not to mention my wife would get very angry if I did another major upgrade anytime soon. She already doesn't like the fact that I'm thinking about trading my GPU out for another one!

But anyway, maybe I'll make a thread for somebody with a system setup like mine to tell me what their performance is in UT3 with AA @1680x1050. Right now I'm going to install those new beta drivers and see what they're like.....

 

[alcoholbob]

A 65nm 8800GTX...I wonder if they will actually make a different SKU (i.e., 384bit bus) or simply put a dual slot cooler on the G92 and jack up the clock speeds up the hizzle, like a 900 core / 2500 memory / 2000 shaders and slap on 1GB of DDR3.

 

[QuixoticOne]

Yes, makes sense to wait for a few real benchmarks post UT3 release if you're willing.

I found this, here's some indication:
http://utforums.epicgames.com/showthread.php?t=582126

That person's RAM bandwidth will likely be a little better than yours (being an Opteron vs C2D)
but your CPU should be faster given your OC and the C2D vs the Opteron dual core.
So I'd say you could expect better CPU and motherboard related performance overall than that OP's.

They didn't mention if they have AA enabled or not.

I was looking to see where the UT3 demo files actually were and if they had
(wishful thinking at this stage, I know) a LINUX version of the demo out.

My GTX just got moved to a LINUX box so it'd be a little difficult for me to
benchmark it with anything meaningful at the moment unless there is some
comparable demo out there that'll run in LINUX -- I know their older UT games
can run that way, but I haven't found the demo program links yet.

But anyway since that's a fresh threat on that site talking about
UT3 demo performance on GTX cards in the res. you want to run, I thought
you'd be interested. Maybe if you ask in that thread someone can check
the AA status vs. quality setting vs. benchmark for you.

I did notice someone say in that thread that some of the highest quality modes
aren't supported in the demo version though, so I don't know if that'd be
a fully realistic reflection of the final game's performance for you depending on
how much they optimize the final version as well as how much better the
quality could be set in the final version vs. the demo.

If I find a demo. I can run now or if I get my dual-boot set up to run it sometime
soon (maybe, maybe not) I'll check back and let you know the results.

Originally posted by: Rebel7254

Originally posted by: QuixoticOne
Why don't you see if someone with a GTX will run a quick benchmark of
min/avg/max FPS for you in that resolution with one or more of those games/demos and some other benchmarks that may indicate relative performance.

That was kind of what I was hoping somebody would do here. Should I have made a thread that just specifically asked for somebody with a e6400 C2D and an 8800 GTX to play UT3 demo @ 1680x1050 with some AA turned on, and then report back to me what framerates they got? I guess I could do that, if you think it would be more effective than this thread.


I think waiting through the end of next month is probably the best option. I've been thinking about it, and it dawned on me that there would probably be abundant sources of UT3 benchmarks when the full game comes out. I'll be able to make a better decision then, and I'll have the luxury of taking real performance figures of the new 8800's into account.

UT3 is primarily what I'm going to play, with some Crysis on the side. I love Prince of Persia platforming type games too, so that's why I'm excited for Assassin's Creed (plus the graphics/environment interaction looks awesome. Aside from that, I don't see any games on the horizon that I'm interested in. I want to play UT3 competitively with my clan......so between that and a full-time job and my wife, I won't have time for much else.

I probably won't start thinking about a serious upgrade for at least another year. I just put this thing together in January. I don't have the kind of money to build a new good gaming rig every year. I mean, I have the money if I was absolutely dead set on it......but there are other things I need to be spending that kind of money on. Not to mention my wife would get very angry if I did another major upgrade anytime soon. She already doesn't like the fact that I'm thinking about trading my GPU out for another one!

But anyway, maybe I'll make a thread for somebody with a system setup like mine to tell me what their performance is in UT3 with AA @1680x1050. Right now I'm going to install those new beta drivers and see what they're like.....

 

[nullpointerus]

NVM about the quad core. I assumed this was a discussion of whether to go from single core to dual core or quad core...quad core being the obvious choice IMO. Given the real nature of this thread, a GPU upgrade is much more likely to solve the OP's problem. One option is to configure games to upscale from a lower widescreen resolution (i.e. 1280x800) and then pump up the quality/AA settings. Things will look a little blurry, but they should not be very pixelated, and your framerate should be higher.

 

[Rebel7254]

Thanks for the link, Quixotic. I'll check it out later tonight when I get back.

Originally posted by: nullpointerus
NVM about the quad core. I assumed this was a discussion of whether to go from single core to dual core or quad core...quad core being the obvious choice IMO. Given the real nature of this thread, a GPU upgrade is much more likely to solve the OP's problem. One option is to configure games to upscale from a lower widescreen resolution (i.e. 1280x800) and then pump up the quality/AA settings. Things will look a little blurry, but they should not be very pixelated, and your framerate should be higher.

The problem with that is my stupid monitor won't do any other 16:10 resolution except 1680x1050. I'm willing for games to be a little less sharp in exchange for AA, but I refuse to play with distorted geometry...

 

[mtl]

8800 GT is performing great. and it's only $250