PCX5900 vs. 6600GT

[boxfetish]

I have seen some pretty good deals on both of these cards. I am trying to decide between these two models for my Small Form Factor PC with PCI Express slot. The cards seem to be comparible in performance, with a light advantage going to the PCX5900.

The biggest concern I have is heat output and power consumption. Does anybody know if how much power each of these cards consumes and how much heat they give off?

It looks like I can get the PCX5900 for about $25 cheaper than the 6600GT so I am leaning that way unless the heat or power requirement for it are too high for a small form factor box.

Thanks for your help!

 

[dug777]

the 6600GT will eat the 5900 for lunch, then ****** it out and eat it again for dessert...

 

[Leper Messiah]

5900>>9800pro>6600GT.

Seriously, the 5900 sucks in DX9.

 

[imported_Kiwi]

I have the AGP version of that VGA, and it takes up two slots in the card cage. It probably gets pretty warm when running intensive graphical imagery, which I don't usually do. It does require its own separate 12 V power lead from the power supply, The PCX's are all adapted cards from the FX 5xxx series that nVidia released 2 1/2 years ago, to huge outcries, boos, catcalls, and raspberries. Most were seriously overpriced at the time, and seriously slow if compared to either the GF4's of the year before, or to the Radeon 9500 and upward from ATI.

I also have a GF4 Ti-4200, which is not quite as fast at stock speed, as my vanilla FX 5900. It doesn't need an extra power lead, but it does idle at a hotter level than any other VGA I have ever owned. It doesn't seem to get a lot hotter when stressed, though -- very odd.

If you can get a PCX 5900 for about $70-75, that would be pretty much its value. TTBOMK, the circuitry allowing an AGP GPU to run on PCI-e puts about a 10% penalty on the poor thing. A Geforce 6600GT should blow it so far into the weeds you'd never find it again. In the confines of an SFF shoebox, however, almost any VGA with decent gaming speed is going to be a potential problem!

 

[boxfetish]

I'm confused. Do you mean 5900<<9800Pro<<6600GT?

Also, the peak fill rate and peak memory bandwith seems to be slightly better on the pcx5900 than the 6600gt, but I did not consider or understand that there would be a difference in DirectX 9 performance.

I guess this is why I can find pcx5900 cards for around $70, eh?

 

[Leper Messiah]

Originally posted by: boxfetish
I'm confused. Do you mean 5900<<9800Pro<<6600GT?

Also, the peak fill rate and peak memory bandwith seems to be slightly better on the pcx5900 than the 6600gt, but I did not consider or understand that there would be a difference in DirectX 9 performance.

I guess this is why I can find pcx5900 cards for around $70, eh?

I got them backwards. But yeah, fill rate and bandwidth mean sh1t with these cards. 6600GT will blow it way so hard core.

 

[boxfetish]

Oh, and thanks for the help. I appreciate it!

I almost bought a refurbished pci-x pcx5900 (single slot) for $59 including shipping tonight.

Now, I will not waste my money and will just shell out $100- 120 for a 6600gt.

 

[fliguy84]

Originally posted by: boxfetish
Oh, and thanks for the help. I appreciate it!

I almost bought a refurbished pci-x pcx5900 (single slot) for $59 including shipping tonight.

Now, I will not waste my money and will just shell out $100- 120 for a 6600gt.

yup, that would be the right thing to do in your case

 

[dug777]

If you want a cooler running card with very similar performance (generally marginally lower, albeit quite a bit less in d3 and Q4) in most games, get a used 9800 pro, they're pretty cheap 2nd hand now...

My 6600GT is a toaster compared to my 9800 pro (idles in the 60's, loads in the high 80's with the stock hsf).

 

[boxfetish]

Hmmm. Getting more confused.

Upon further digging around it looks like i can get 6800xt 128MB cards for around the same price as 6600gt 128mb cards. Whic would be better?

It looks like the 6800xt has 8 pipelines vs. 12 for a plain old 6800. Does this make it virtually identical in performance to a 6600GT? I am not familiar with this XT designation, though.

Finally, how important is 128MB vs. 256MB for gaming? Would a 6800 (not XT) with 128mb be better or worse than a 6600gt with 256mb?

LOL. Thanks again for all the answers.

 

[boxfetish]

Originally posted by: fliguy84

Originally posted by: boxfetish
Oh, and thanks for the help. I appreciate it!

I almost bought a refurbished pci-x pcx5900 (single slot) for $59 including shipping tonight.

Now, I will not waste my money and will just shell out $100- 120 for a 6600gt.

yup, that would be the right thing to do in your case

That's not what I wanted to hear. I moved away from a 9800 pro already because they kept overheating in my SFF case. I guess maybe 6600gt's are not going to work for me at all if they give off a lot more heat. Also, another reason i moved away from the 9800 pro, it that the only game I really play right now is WoW, and I have had a lot of problems with the 9800 pro and WoW.

 

[dug777]

Originally posted by: boxfetish
Hmmm. Getting more confused.

Upon further digging around it looks like i can get 6800xt 128MB cards for around the same price as 6600gt 128mb cards. Whic would be better?

It looks like the 6800xt has 8 pipelines vs. 12 for a plain old 6800. Does this make it virtually identical in performance to a 6600GT? I am not familiar with this XT designation, though.

Finally, how important is 128MB vs. 256MB for gaming? Would a 6800 (not XT) with 128mb be better or worse than a 6600gt with 256mb?

LOL. Thanks again for all the answers.

I would think they would be very similar...the 6800XT with 256mb of 256bit DDR3 is apparently a bit to a reasonable bit faster than a 128mb 6600GT jsut to confuse you some more, and that can be had for about as much (i've seen it for less) than a 256mb 6600GT...

I'm confused now too

It often depends on the particular brand's ram and core speeds as to what is faster...

i would get a 6800XT 256mb/256bit myself and go for some unlocking/overclocking

 

[Gstanfor]

Originally posted by: dug777
If you want a cooler running card with very similar performance (generally marginally lower, albeit quite a bit less in d3 and Q4) in most games, get a used 9800 pro, they're pretty cheap 2nd hand now...

My 6600GT is a toaster compared to my 9800 pro (idles in the 60's, loads in the high 80's with the stock hsf).

The 6600 series may be "Toaster like" but at least they don't toast their heatsink fans out of existance which is more than can be said for the 9800 series. (Not having a go at you Dug, I consider this an imprtant pont).

 

[dug777]

Originally posted by: boxfetish

Originally posted by: fliguy84

Originally posted by: boxfetish
Oh, and thanks for the help. I appreciate it!

I almost bought a refurbished pci-x pcx5900 (single slot) for $59 including shipping tonight.

Now, I will not waste my money and will just shell out $100- 120 for a 6600gt.

yup, that would be the right thing to do in your case

That's not what I wanted to hear. I moved away from a 9800 pro already because they kept overheating in my SFF case. I guess maybe 6600gt's are not going to work for me at all if they give off a lot more heat. Also, another reason i moved away from the 9800 pro, it that the only game I really play right now is WoW, and I have had a lot of problems with the 9800 pro and WoW.

well, my 9800 pro was far cooler than my 6600GT to touch (it had no temp probe) with the stock hsf on both. 6600GT's run very hawt...but 9800 pros aren't exactly cool running either...

 

[dug777]

Originally posted by: Gstanfor

Originally posted by: dug777
If you want a cooler running card with very similar performance (generally marginally lower, albeit quite a bit less in d3 and Q4) in most games, get a used 9800 pro, they're pretty cheap 2nd hand now...

My 6600GT is a toaster compared to my 9800 pro (idles in the 60's, loads in the high 80's with the stock hsf).

The 6600 series may be "Toaster like" but at least they don't toast their heatsink fans out of existance which is more than can be said for the 9800 series. (Not having a go at you Dug, I consider this an imprtant pont).

:thumbsup: I had a nightmare run with 9800 pro's overheating and artifacting (went through five of them), i think it was the fan's dying on me, ambient here in Aus with no AC is pretty high...

I

 

[imported_Kiwi]

Generally speaking, only the higher performance (expensive) VGA's run fast enough to do much with 256 MB's of RAM. The 6600 is a 128 Bit GPU, and handles 128 MB's nicely. I'm fairly sure that it probably doesn't see any across the range gaming benefit from more RAM than that, although photoshop and some other non-gaming, slower speed rate activities might benefit from it. Mostly, the extra RAM is used by the manufactureres to help sell product.

You will see 256 MB's on really slow cards, like 5200's, 6200's and 9250's, and on many of those, being 64 Bit GPU's, will only be able to get at 64 MB's for game purposes!

A "true" vanilla 6800 should be better than a 6600 GT, whatever RAM the two have. The "XT" may be the PCI-e equivalent of the 6800 "GS", which manages to offer 6800 GT performance at vanilla 6800 prices.

I imagine you will just get a bit more confused before it's all clear. You can visit this site

http://www.gpureview.com

When you get there, you can compare cards, but if there is no benchmarck to look at, you will find that raw numbers don't help comparing unlike card families. You CAN compare a PCX 5900 with other PCX's, and you can compare various Geforce 6xxx's, but comparing FX's to Radeons doesn't work well, nor does comparing FX's to GF 6xxx's (you already tried that).

For WoW, the vanilla 6600 might keep up, and that one runs pretty cool compared to some of the cards being referenced. Also, anyone running an SFF box should be using Arctic Cooler setups for mid-level and better graphics. Those exhaust out the adjacent card slot and don't raise the temps in the box so much as a result. You can visit the AVS forums to collect more data about keeping VGA's cool in HTPC boxes, which have many of the same heating problems that shoeboxes have, plus they worry a lot about noise.


:thumbsup:

 

[A554SS1N]

lol.....

First, PCX 5900 will be beaten easily by 6600GT
Second, it's a larger card; 6600GT is alot smaller.

Third, those who are saying 6600GT is a toaster have the AGP versions with the hot bridge chip. As the OP is after PCI-E, that shouldn't be a problem.... I recommend the Leadtek 6600GT PCI-E. Just look at anandtech's review for temperatures/noise etc...

Fourth - these people are really confusing you now - a 6800XT at reference speeds is alot slower than a 6600GT (and not as one person put it, like a 6800GS??!!). The only 6800XT that's any good are ones with factory overclocked cores, and alot faster memory than reference. (For example, there's a Galaxy in a Guru3D review).

 

[nemesismk2]

Avoid the PCX5900 like the plague because if you get one you will wish you had purchased the 6600 GT!

 

[Vinnybcfc]

Dont get the pcx5900 you will cry if you do

6600GT should equal a 6800le / 6800xt and a 6800 or 6800nu will beat them both

 

[SpeedZealot369]

get a 6800nu for its 256bit interface, it's same price as 6600gt and much better.

 

[JPB]

Originally posted by: boxfetish
Hmmm. Getting more confused.

Upon further digging around it looks like i can get 6800xt 128MB cards for around the same price as 6600gt 128mb cards. Whic would be better?

It looks like the 6800xt has 8 pipelines vs. 12 for a plain old 6800. Does this make it virtually identical in performance to a 6600GT? I am not familiar with this XT designation, though.

Finally, how important is 128MB vs. 256MB for gaming? Would a 6800 (not XT) with 128mb be better or worse than a 6600gt with 256mb?

LOL. Thanks again for all the answers.

http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php?card1=187&card2=359

 

[aznrice54]

Yep, I'd go with a 6600GT.

I hate how NV went crazy with the names for the 6800 series - GT, Ultra, LE, XT, GS, and vanilla (nu). Makes it pretty confusing. ATI was guilty of this too with their X800 series (vanilla, Pro, GT, GTO, XL, XT, blah blah blah). Makes it pretty damn confusing.

Well, at least things are fine now for both sides with their latest product lines, except maybe NV's GTX 512 having basically the same name as the inferior 256.

 

[MrJim]

Get the 6600GT, more future proof (sm3, but of course in low res), better video decoding support

I have a 9800 Pro right now and it works for me im not a demanding gamer and run new games in 800x600 or 1024x768. But it would be pretty nice to get a passive cooled 6600GT if i had the cash.

 

[dwcal]

Originally posted by: dug777
i would get a 6800XT 256mb/256bit myself and go for some unlocking/overclocking

Sounds like a plan. Stock speed, the 6800XT might be slower than the 6800 because of the 8 pipes, but some XTs have DDR3 instead of DDR. Beyond that it's just the luck of the draw how the unlocking/overclocking goes.

 

[SolMiester]

Dont know why you guys think the 6600GT run hot, maybe its your cases?. The fan on my Gainward isnt even on full time when gaming. Maybe a brand issue?