Hi folks,
I currently have a Athlon XP 2200+, 786MB of RAM, and a GeForce4 Ti 4600 graphics card. My system performs pretty well in games at resolutions 1024*768 and 1280*1024. The only real exception is Half-Life 2, which is a bit slow even at 1024*768, but I don't really care much about that, since it's just a single-player game.
Anyway, last week I bought a nice new Dell 2005FPW (widescreen ) monitor, which has a native resolution of 1680*1050. The two games I am most interested in currently (World of Warcraft and Counter-Strike: Source) look really beautiful on my new monitor at the native resolution, however the framerates are a bit weak.
World of Warcraft: my framerates in this game at 1680*1050 are around 20-30 in outdoor zones. That may sound extremely bad, but since it's an MMORPG, framerates aren't that critical. Still, something above 30 FPS would be nice (and at 1024*768 I always get 30+).
Counter-Strike: Source: in most levels in this game, my framerate at 1680*1050 (and the lowest details, with which the game still looks great) is between 35-90 (usually averaging around 50-60). The only real problem exists in de_aztec, which has lots of fancy graphics effects - I get 20 FPS in some areas on that map.
Now, finally here's my question: will a newer graphics card significantly improve my framerates at 1680*1050, or will I need a new processor to back up the graphics card too? I presume a GeForce6 or a X800 won't be any better than a Radeon 9800 with my Athlon XP 2200 - what graphics card would be optimal for my resolution, given my fairly old CPU?
Thanks in advance!
I currently have a Athlon XP 2200+, 786MB of RAM, and a GeForce4 Ti 4600 graphics card. My system performs pretty well in games at resolutions 1024*768 and 1280*1024. The only real exception is Half-Life 2, which is a bit slow even at 1024*768, but I don't really care much about that, since it's just a single-player game.
Anyway, last week I bought a nice new Dell 2005FPW (widescreen ) monitor, which has a native resolution of 1680*1050. The two games I am most interested in currently (World of Warcraft and Counter-Strike: Source) look really beautiful on my new monitor at the native resolution, however the framerates are a bit weak.
World of Warcraft: my framerates in this game at 1680*1050 are around 20-30 in outdoor zones. That may sound extremely bad, but since it's an MMORPG, framerates aren't that critical. Still, something above 30 FPS would be nice (and at 1024*768 I always get 30+).
Counter-Strike: Source: in most levels in this game, my framerate at 1680*1050 (and the lowest details, with which the game still looks great) is between 35-90 (usually averaging around 50-60). The only real problem exists in de_aztec, which has lots of fancy graphics effects - I get 20 FPS in some areas on that map.
Now, finally here's my question: will a newer graphics card significantly improve my framerates at 1680*1050, or will I need a new processor to back up the graphics card too? I presume a GeForce6 or a X800 won't be any better than a Radeon 9800 with my Athlon XP 2200 - what graphics card would be optimal for my resolution, given my fairly old CPU?
Thanks in advance!