Low profile / PCI - Radeon 9000 v. GF FX5200

[duuuma]

FX5200 low pro VS. Radeon 9000 low pro

I know I'm severely limited by the PCI AND the low profile form, but I'd like to get an opinion as to which card is better/faster for gaming? I'm currently using the Radeon 7500le PCI Low pro with a DVI monitor.

If I switch to the FX5200, I'll be forced to use a DVI adapter to the VGA out on that card, so that sucks already. Though I think both will be a performance improvement over the 7500 chip, I want to know if there is one distinctly faster card. So how about overall performance of this GF Fx PCI card compared to the Radeon 9000 PCI card? Any opinions are welcome, thanks!

 

[pukemon]

Well, the 5200 you have there uses 64-bit memory (note only 4 chips) while the Radeon 9000 you have linked uses 128-bit memory. Presumably the 9000 is a cooler running chip (no fan). The PCI bus is going to be another bottleneck, the performance will probably be roughly the same either way come to think of it...

As far as gaming performance goes, that kind of depends on what kind of gaming you plan on doing. If its stuff like Warcraft III or older games like Counterstrike, you'll be fine. Newer stuff... that's gonna be a bit tougher.

 

[duuuma]

it seemed to me that the performance is probably quite comparably crappy between the two cards as well, especially since they're both PCI cards.

I only see 2 memory chips on both cards. How do you know whether either card uses 64-bit or 128-bit memory?

 

[Peter]

All LP Radeons use 64-bit memory too. The reason is the form factor itself - you just can't have RAM chips above the main chip on an LP card, only to the sides.

 

[duuuma]

that's what i thought...

so who do you think wins in terms of performance between these two cards?

 

[Peter]

Well for one, the PowerColor card isn't a "pro" ... wouldn't make sense anyhow, since clocking the core higher doesn't help when it's choked on memory anyway. And as a non-pro, it's fanless, which is good.

Then, I know that the PCI GF5200 is extremely (!) lowly clocked to fit the PCI slot power budget. It ain't a speed demon either.

From the positive experience with PowerColor cards and support, I'd pick the Radeon.

 

[duuuma]

yeah i know it's not a pro version of the card. I meant low pro as in 'low profile.' I guess I just wanted to see if people knew the exact specs on the 2 cards and which one is a clear winner in terms of speed.

 

[Blastman]

If you look at the benchmark charts at the bottom of this page ? digilife?, they have both the 9200 64bit and 5200 64bit cards benched (bottom of the chart ?LOL). The 9200 looks to be quite a bit faster overall than the 5200.

EDIT: 9200 = 9000 with AGP8x