Suggestions for video card for nF590: 4770 or GTS250?

[xephalon]

Hey guys,

I'm a mid-range gamer with the following current specs:

Athlon 64 X2 4600 2.4GHz
XFX nForce 590 SLI mobo
6GB Corsair DDR2-800
PNY 7900GS 256MB x 2 on SLI

I'm hoping to spend ~100-150 to upgrade my video to play Dragon Age and MW2 without a new mobo (which unfortunately is only PCIe 1.0). I'm considering a Radeon 4770 512MB or GTS250 1GB - What are people's thoughts? I can spend the extra $20-30 for a 4870, but is the bottleneck at PCIe 1.0 worth it? Is there a better "sweet spot" deal that's even cheaper?

 

[dflynchimp]

what bottleneck? Even the 4870X2 only sees a 2% penalty from being paired with PCIe 1.0

2.0 doubles the bandwidth of 1.0, but that doesn't mean that it was a necessary improvement at the time of release. There aren't many cards out there short of the Radeon 5970 that will be majorly impacted by the difference between 2.0 and 1.0

I'd go with what takes less out of the wallet. The rest of your system is getting on a bit and eventually you'll have to save up for a major overhaul. Until that does happen, play your cards cheap and economical.

 

[Lonyo]

You could well still be bottlenecked, but by your CPU. PCIe 1.0 won't be the issue.
I had an X2 4200+ w/7800GT and upgraded to HD4580. Bioshock performance was dramatically better, but Fallout 3 still wasn't very good.
You will need a new CPU to take advantage of something even like an HD4870, so I'd advise going for whichever is cheaper out of the HD4770 and TGS250.

 

[happy medium]

Buy a used ,8800gt (70$), if that isn't enough buy another one.

 

[Marty502]

My CPU holds me back quite a bit with Dragon Age, even at 1680x1050 4xAA, only ~5% slower than at 1024x768 with no AA, and that's with a puny 4670. My CPU is currently clocked just a bit faster than yours.

Try and overclock that CPU a bit, along with a 4870, 4850, 8800GT or whatever you want. They're all solid choices.

 

[xephalon]

I actually am overclocked to about 2.8GHz, but can't get much faster without loss of stability.

 

[xephalon]

Sorry, follow-up question: how big a difference is 512MB vs 1GB? What are your thoughts on these two?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814102853

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814125266

Thanks in advance!

 

[cusideabelincoln]

The HD4770 is the better deal. 1GB isn't going to make a difference.

 

[tviceman]

nevermind.

 

[exar333]

Geforce FX 5200 FTW. Saw one at BB a few weeks back for $79.99. It was a steal.

(I hope you know I am kidding)

 

[crisium]

4770 is probably about as fast as you'd want to get on an Athlon X2 below 3GHz. For $99, you'd see a great performance increase.

 

[nemesismk2]

My vote is for a 4770 as previous people have said, it is cheap and almost as fast as the 4850. The 4770 runs very cool, doesn't require a powerful psu and it is quiet as well.