Upgrade or Wait?

[romar00]

Hello everyone,

I am new to this forum. My question is that I am thinking about upgrading my video card. Right I have an AMD 64 3500 with 1 gig a ram with onboard ati video and running xp. I do not play games to much but do a lot of picture editing. I have been looking at the ati x1950 gt or should I wait till the R600 cards come out.
Thank you for your help.

 

[Rommel44]

Wait for R600 if you can - it was delayed and I think(my estimate) it will be released in april.

 

[happy medium]

Originally posted by: romar00
Hello everyone,

I am new to this forum. My question is that I am thinking about upgrading my video card. Right I have an AMD 64 3500 with 1 gig a ram with onboard ati video and running xp. I do not play games to much but do a lot of picture editing. I have been looking at the ati x1950 gt or should I wait till the R600 cards come out.
Thank you for your help.

If you don't game, just get a cheap card. If you do alot of picture editing get a AMD duel core cpu. Does your motherboard support them? You don't need a 8800 series or r600. Save your money for more ram and a duel core cpu. That will give you a great performance jump.

 

[KeithTalent]

Originally posted by: happy medium

Originally posted by: romar00
Hello everyone,

I am new to this forum. My question is that I am thinking about upgrading my video card. Right I have an AMD 64 3500 with 1 gig a ram with onboard ati video and running xp. I do not play games to much but do a lot of picture editing. I have been looking at the ati x1950 gt or should I wait till the R600 cards come out.
Thank you for your help.

If you don't game, just get a cheap card. If you do alot of picture editing get a AMD dual core cpu. Does your motherboard support them? You don't need a 8800 series or r600. Save your money for more ram and a duel core cpu. That will give you a great performance jump.

Listen to this apple-shaped man, he is wise.

 

[JPB]

Originally posted by: KeithTalent

Originally posted by: happy medium

Originally posted by: romar00
Hello everyone,

I am new to this forum. My question is that I am thinking about upgrading my video card. Right I have an AMD 64 3500 with 1 gig a ram with onboard ati video and running xp. I do not play games to much but do a lot of picture editing. I have been looking at the ati x1950 gt or should I wait till the R600 cards come out.
Thank you for your help.

If you don't game, just get a cheap card. If you do alot of picture editing get a AMD dual core cpu. Does your motherboard support them? You don't need a 8800 series or r600. Save your money for more ram and a duel core cpu. That will give you a great performance jump.

Listen to this apple-shaped man, he is wise.

I second the notion for listening to the Apple...I real almost all of his posts, he gives excellent advice.

 

[lopri]

Really if you don't play game all you need is a 7300/X1300 series and that's just in case you upgrade to Vista (Aero). Video cards has zero effect on photoshop editing. I had a friend who purchased 7800 GTX thinking it'll help his photoshop performance immensely. He paid $599+tax at the time..

What games do you play? That's the key to your video card purchase. If you want to play very demanding games, you might need to consider CPU upgrade as well as adding more memory. Believe it or not, I've been playing Company of Heroes in Vista 64-bit, and was shocked to find out that 4GB of RAM makes such a tangible difference.

 

[happy medium]

Originally posted by: x80064

Originally posted by: KeithTalent

Originally posted by: happy medium

Originally posted by: romar00
Hello everyone,

I am new to this forum. My question is that I am thinking about upgrading my video card. Right I have an AMD 64 3500 with 1 gig a ram with onboard ati video and running xp. I do not play games to much but do a lot of picture editing. I have been looking at the ati x1950 gt or should I wait till the R600 cards come out.
Thank you for your help.

If you don't game, just get a cheap card. If you do alot of picture editing get a AMD dual core cpu. Does your motherboard support them? You don't need a 8800 series or r600. Save your money for more ram and a duel core cpu. That will give you a great performance jump.

Listen to this apple-shaped man, he is wise.

I second the notion for listening to the Apple...I real almost all of his posts, he gives excellent advice.

Thanks, at least I know my times not wasted. :thumbsup:

 

[romar00]

Thanks everyone for the great advise. When I do play games I usually play RTS type games.
Thanks.

 

[lopri]

I wasted plenty of time playing StarCraft: Brood War, Age of Empres 3, and WarCraft 3. Today's RTS is more demanding but still a mid-range GPU will provide you with enough power. (I played WarCraft 3 with 9800 Pro @1600x1200) Do you overclock your CPU? Higher CPU clocks help alot when lots of units are duking it out.

 

[paydirt]

For graphics/video editing, you will also notice a jump in performance if you upgraded to 2 gig RAM.

The R600 will likely cost as much as its name...