Should I get this AGP card?

[bodhammer]

System
Socket 478 P4 EE 3.4 (Gallatin) at 3.5Ghz
2GB Ram
Antec Earthwatts 500W

Currently have a Visiontek X800 Pro card.


Saw this for $70 after rebate: http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814121260

Would this hold me another year? The only thing I can't play right now is Bioshock because I need SM3.0. I just don't want to spend $1k to upgrade to PCIe.

P.

 

[Foxery]

Keep in mind that AGP 3000 series cards are not officially supported by ATI. This and the 3850 are as high as you can get for an older system, but you're limited to the vendor's driver CD (i.e. might not be able to download new ones) and won't get any help if you have trouble...

I believe the 2000 series does have official AGP support, but if you're after Bioshock, those won't serve you well. I can't find any 2900s on AGP, and the 2600s will be awfully slow.

 

[bodhammer]

I did find this on the ATI site:

http://support.ati.com/ics/sup...ledge&questionID=31625

 

[tcsenter]

Originally posted by: Foxery
Keep in mind that AGP 3000 series cards are not officially supported by ATI. This and the 3850 are as high as you can get for an older system, but you're limited to the vendor's driver CD (i.e. might not be able to download new ones) and won't get any help if you have trouble...

Huh? The AGP hotfix Catalyst packages provided by ATI Partners are the same ones released by ATI as seen in the link above. ATI doesn't support any partner boards, no matter the interface, that's what the partner does.

 

[Foxery]

Then the short answer is yes; or if you can spare a few more dollars, try to get a 3850 for the added gaming power.

 

[minmaster]

just save your money for a new system. the card won't be fully utilized in an aging AGP system and some 478 socket cpu.

 

[Qbah]

A HD3650 ain't a monster, that's for sure. It's probably as fast as your X800 card, with a bit more features. Though DX10 won't be used anyway, since the card is slow in the first place. If you wish to upgrade, then get some $$ for a HD3850 AGP. Otherwise don't bother at all, I'd say. Keep gathering cash for a total system upgrade.

 

[bodhammer]

OK - Now thinking about the 3850 card.

These two are $5 apart after rebates:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814102730
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814131090

Which is better and has better support Sapphire or Power Color? The Power Color looks to have a bigger fan.

I have an Antec P160 with plenty of space, two 120mm fans front and back and a Zalman 92mm cooler on my CPU.

 

[Dravic]

Originally posted by: bodhammer
System
Socket 478 P4 EE 3.4 (Gallatin) at 3.5Ghz
2GB Ram
Antec Earthwatts 500W

Currently have a Visiontek X800 Pro card.


Saw this for $70 after rebate: http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814121260

Would this hold me another year? The only thing I can't play right now is Bioshock because I need SM3.0. I just don't want to spend $1k to upgrade to PCIe.

P.

I actually have a 3800+ x2 @2.6ghxz, 2GM ram on XP that i just moved to my son. I'm looking at throwing the 3850 in there as the PC's last upgrade. Should handle all the jumpstart world, and zoo tycoon games to come out for the next few years, and probably work out well at 1440x900 (monitor is 1680x1050) for Diablo 3 so the wife an i can coop play.

$115 after rebate is a nice upgrade from the 6800 non ultra in it now.

 

[faxon]

if you are still using a netburst cpu i would really just save your money up and get a whole new system. onxe the nehalem chips launch, the mid range penryn chips are going to hit rock bottom and you could build a kick ass system with a cheap quad core, 4gb of ram, and a pcie board and gpu for about $500 before rebates and bundle deals start kicking in. im thinking a q6600, p35 mobo, 2 2GB sticks of ddr 800, and a radeon 4850, all for about 500. hell they arent far from that price point now, and it will be years before you need to upgrade since games have more processing power and cores than they know how to use, and even once all games have at least 4 threads, there is still an upgrade path from the Q6600 since it is a kentsfield chip