V-Card upgrade help

[gamerteck]

Hi,

I've perused this forum and many others and Anandtech's forums seem the most helpful; so here goes.

I want to upgrade my current video card. My SLI setup is just not cutting it anymore.
Here are my system Specs:
MSI K8N Neo4 Platinum SLI
Athlon 64 x2 4200+ (939)
HITACHI 80GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s - x2
GeIL 1GB Duel Channel PC3200 - x2
7800GTX SLI x2

I mostly play Company of Heroes, Red Orchestra & WoW.
Playing at 1920×1080 is preferable but I have to tune the settings way down and even then I'm prone to shutter.

I'd like to spend about $150 but i'm willing to spend a few extra bucks for the HIS 4870 1G. I'm also not sure if I would benefit more from a mobo/cpu upgrade. What do you guys/gals think? Any advice would be so helpful and much appreciated.

Thanks ~ G

 

[way2fast91]

Should see some improvement in the games you stated you play, however it might be time for you to consider upgrading cpu, ram, and mobo to achieve a real boost in fps, texture detail, etc. Especially if you want to be able to run the next gen games decently. The card you have picked out is a nice upgrade, but the rest of your system is going to bottleneck additional performance gains. You could upgrade to something similar to what I have for under $200.

Food for thought.

 

[sgrinavi]

Well...

I had a similar rig and slapped an 8800GTX in it for a massive improvement, however I was CPU limited at that point. SO, ya, your 4870 1GB will help but you are not even going to come close to working it.

If you want to keep that system I would go with a $75 4830 and probably still not max that out.

 

[AstroManLuca]

Something like a 4850 (you can get 'em for as little as $99 after rebate, around $120-$130 before) would be a worthwhile upgrade without going overboard. Only problem is if you get one of those, you'll be conflicted again when you inevitably upgrade your mobo/CPU and are wondering if you shouldn't also upgrade the vid card. If you want to get a decent upgrade without spending too much (i.e., saving up for the future), the 4850 512MB is a good choice for a low price. Otherwise, just stick with what you have until you can afford to upgrade everything. Or just get the 4870 1GB or 4890 for $170-$200.

 

[cbn]

Originally posted by: gamerteck
Hi,

I've perused this forum and many others and Anandtech's forums seem the most helpful; so here goes.

I want to upgrade my current video card. My SLI setup is just not cutting it anymore.
Here are my system Specs:
MSI K8N Neo4 Platinum SLI
Athlon 64 x2 4200+ (939)
HITACHI 80GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s - x2
GeIL 1GB Duel Channel PC3200 - x2
7800GTX SLI x2

I mostly play Company of Heroes, Red Orchestra & WoW.
Playing at 1920×1080 is preferable but I have to tune the settings way down and even then I'm prone to shutter.

I'd like to spend about $150 but i'm willing to spend a few extra bucks for the HIS 4870 1G. I'm also not sure if I would benefit more from a mobo/cpu upgrade. What do you guys/gals think? Any advice would be so helpful and much appreciated.

Thanks ~ G

Is the mobo that runs true x16,x16 PCI-E1.0 in SLI mode? Or is this the typical 939 mobo that used x8/x8 for SLI?

At the moment one PCI-E 1.x slot can handle the current generation of single GPU Video cards. But once you get into stuff like 4850x2 it appears to be too much bandwidth for a x16 1st generation PCI-E lane.

So you can upgrade Video cards now but it maybe be you'll need a mobo swap to PCI-E 2.0 for the next generation of Video cards?

 

[gamerteck]

Just Leaning - My mobo does have x2 PCI-E1.0 slots x16/x16.

Thanks for the advice everyone.
I think the consensus here is that I should probably upgrade my mobo/CPU/ram
I've spec'd out a cheap upgrade for $240, which includes the mobo/cpu/ram/vid
Here is what I chose; comments are more than welcome (I bit some of your specs way2fast91 ):
BIOSTAR TFORCE TA790GX
Athlon 64 X2 7750 Kuma 2.7GHz
x2 Crucial 1GB DDR2 667
HIS Radeon HD 4830 512MB


Thanks again everyone for your advice

 

[AstroManLuca]

The Kuma isn't the worst choice for the money but it's not that great either. Luckily with that motherboard you can upgrade the CPU to a Phenom II X3 or X4 sometime in the future. So you may as well save your money for the time being. Of course you could look into deals on the original Phenoms. Performance isn't great but for the money they are very good.

Also there's no reason at all not to get at least 2 GB of RAM, if not 4 GB. 1 GB is just silly and will bog down the rest of your system.

 

[gamerteck]

I forgot to add x2 for the ram

 

[way2fast91]

I was very tempted to go with that BIOSTAR mobo, but I saw some reviews that scared me off, nothing too major, but I am fairly old school and ASUS is has earned my trust.

The 7750 is the best bang for buck, you can oc it to 3.0 Ghz with a multi bump, I have an aftermarket cooler (CM TX2) and could probably go to 3.3 or even 3.5 without issue (just don't have the need currently) Plus as someone stated above, I planned to get the PII Deneb 3.0 Quad when it comes down in the future closer to $150 (hopefully, currently around $215)

Not sure what your budget is, but I would recommend this over your current memory choice:
CORSAIR 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16820145184
It's only $55 out of pocket and $30 AR.

Not sure about HIS vs. Sapphire, but the 4830 is a terrific gpu choice for the money!

Outta all the upgrades I did in the last 3-6 months, the ASUS 22" lcd monitor was the best.

 

[way2fast91]

NM, my mistake. I was going to post a hot deal link for memory, but realized they were for SO-DIMM's.

 

[homercles337]

Originally posted by: sgrinavi
Well...

I had a similar rig and slapped an 8800GTX in it for a massive improvement, however I was CPU limited at that point. SO, ya, your 4870 1GB will help but you are not even going to come close to working it.

If you want to keep that system I would go with a $75 4830 and probably still not max that out.

Exactly. I have an almost identical setup and my problems are CPU limitations. Im happy to say that im building a new X58 rig in the next few weeks though.