Which videocard for Socket 775?

[goelh70]

Hi.

I currently have a Intel D975XBX2 "Badaxe 2" Motherboard with a Core 2 Duo E6600 CPU and 4GB of PC6400 DDR2 SDRAM. It is currently attached to a Dell 3007WFP 30" LCD via a Geforce 7600GS video card running at 2560x1600 for day to day operations (browsing, e-mail etc). I would like to start gaming on this platform and was wondering which video card would be best.

The motherboard supports crossfire but I was wondering if getting a hd 5770 would be overkill given my current cpu horsepower. I have about $200 to spend so please advise me on whether to get the 5770 or not? Also, if I can throw in an additional $200-$250 would it be worth it to get a Yorkfield or Wolfdale CPU upgrade along with the video card?

I will of course be running Windows 7 x64 (Actually Windows Server 2008 R2 converted to a workstation) on the machine.

Thanks in advance

 

[alyarb]

a 5770 wouldn't be overkill; it's what would get. I would not upgrade the CPU though. you don't seem very serious about gaming and the 5770+E6600 will be fine for you (dont expect everything to run fast at 2560x1600 though, you may need to step it down).

 

[v8envy]

A low midrange card with a memory bandwidth limitation is not going to drive a 30" monitor and that CPU is enough for most games.

Unfortunately there is no good choice in the $200 and under price range, so a 5770, 4870, GTX260 and 4890 are your best bets (in order of increasing performance at your resolution). I don't think your board supports either crossfire or SLI -- if it did, a GTS250 1gb x 2 or 4850 1gb x 2 might also squeak in under your budget and WOULD drive the resolution you want most of the time.

All of those will not give you great frame rates on a 30" so just pick the cheapest one you find.

As far as your CPU: just overclock it. The E6600 should have zero trouble hitting 3 ghz or so, which is enough for all but a tiny number of games which require a heavily overclocked quad.

 

[goelh70]

what about with two 5770's?

 

[Kenmitch]

I'd think the 5770 would be fine. As far as gaming at your current resolution I'm not sure how good that would work out for you....Hell not sure how good it would even work out on the system in my sig

If you did scrape up the xtra $200-$250 to throw in for a cpu I think you'd be better off just selling your current MB, CPU and memory and doing a full system upgrade. If you live near a fry's they have some pretty good combo's from time to time withing the stated cpu budget. If not maybe you live near a Microcenter they have good prices on cpu's most of the time.

 

[goelh70]

thanks v8envy.

Which card would you get for $400-$450 (single or dual setup - according to intel the motherboard does support crossfire)?

 

[RussianSensation]

thanks v8envy.

Which card would you get for $400-$450 (single or dual setup - according to intel the motherboard does support crossfire)?

Best value i would say is 5770s in CF (make sure to get 1GB versions).

As far as the best videocard in the $400-450 price range, it's too hard to say since GTX470 and 480 are going to be launched in less than 2 weeks. Right now, performance wise, GTX295 is the best videocard, but 4870 X2 and 5870 follow closely.

 

[v8envy]

I agree with my fellow ex-soviet. 5770 CF is the only way $400 (well, $360 or so) will get you the performance you need at 25x16. Two of them will be faster than a 5870 in many cases. That comes at a price though -- multi-GPU solutions do have some drawbacks you might want to investigate before diving in.

You may also need to upgrade your PSU though. With a machine as old as yours you may not have enough PCIe 6 pin plugs for both 5770s.

 

[alyarb]

it'll be 16/8 PCIe 1.0 xfire and his CPU needs to be OCed. should be able to do well over 3 GHz on that board if you strap your RAM out of the way.

 

[Shmee]

what about a 5850? if you OC/upgrade the cpu that is

 

[v8envy]

5850 or 5870 may be a better way to go. Vulture hot deals, jump through some hoops and you should be able to score a 5850 for around $280 or a 5870 for around $370. Compared to a 8x pcie 1.0 crossfire (good catch!) the price premium for a single board of slightly lower performance may be justified.

 

[betasub]

OP: please check your Power Supply for 12V output and PCIe power connectors (6pin or 8pin).

 

[goelh70]

My power supply is a 850W Silverstone so it should be able to handle 2 video cards it has 4 x 12v rails.

 

[tweakboy]

I agree with you all smart gurus. ATI 5770 would be great for you and as they said @ 25xx resolution things are gonna be much slower then say HD 1920x1080 or 1920x1200 which is most gamers res. I don't think doing it crossfire would help any. That res is just way to high and should be a desktop resolution not a gaming res.
For gaming res all you need is 1920x1200 with 16x AF free and 0AA and set to high quality.

Now that I think about it, going from nVidia to ATI is gonna be a big mess and you need to format, howerver if you get a nVidia board you wont have to format and it will be fast. But ive heard enough stories of guys changing between ATI to nvidiao or vice versa and things run slower then their previous card.

I suggest the GTX 260 896mb for you. Fry's like the guys said, you can find it with rebate to bring the price under 200 bones. Soo about 150 to 200 bones for a nice GTX 260 ,,,, 216 core .

Im scared to tell you to get a ATI card like I said, many horror stories. For example a guy with a 7600 gets a ATI 5870 and he says its slower then his 7600. This has happened a lot with different models. Some guy went from 3870 ATI to nVidia GTX 260 and says its slower then the 3870,,, Here is where people format and install drivers clean.

I dont have the knowledge about how kind ATI is when u change a ATI card for another ATI card, but I know with nVidia ,, upgrading you will get what you payed for and if you went from a 7800 or 9800 to gtx 260 you will notice the difference and how the 260 is faster.

If you had a ATI card, I would suggest what the gurus said 5770 . But you have nVidia soo go for the gtx 260 Fry's rebate or online, you can find 150 to 200 dollars

Also your CPU is not a bottleneck its your weak 7600 card. soo go for gang green 260, I dont want you to get a ATI and say wtf this is slower then before ya know...

gl

 

[goelh70]

thanks tweakboy

Your point is valid. Going from nvidia to nvidia makes more sense than going from nvidia to ati. Will definitely consider the 260.

 

[vj8usa]

Tweakboy: Please stop spreading FUD. You don't need to reformat just to switch video cards. Even if a regular uninstall isn't good enough, using a driver cleaner should clear up any issues. It's not worth it to buy a worse/more expensive card just so you don't have to switch between ATI and nvidia.

 

[v8envy]

You are just as likely (or unlikely) to run into problems going ATI->NV or NV->ATI as you are ATI->ATI or NV->NV for different product generations. In both cases you should de-install the driver, revert to the VGA driver, run driver cleaner, physically deinstall the old card, install new, run driver cleaner, install new driver. Or, you could simply de-install the old driver, swap cards, install new like I do and see if you feel lucky.

You're welcome to pay more to get less with a GTX260, but you shouldn't do it for fear of driver problems. The days of having to perform black magic to get windows drivers to work are well behind us.

For reference, I've moved one hard drive with XP installed through 3 upgrades with completely different hardware, including video brands and generations and chipsets (X200 => X850XT => X1800XT, 7600GT => 8800GT on AMD 3200+ with AMD chipset => core2 E2180 P35 chipset => i7 920 X58 chipset). Zero problems.

 

[happy medium]

This is one case where I would say, WAIT! In less then 2 weeks the gtx 470 will be released and a price war should happen.
At the very least you will see better prices and you might look into a gtx 470 or 480. they will have 1.3gb and 1.5gb of video memory and should perform better at your 2500x1600 resolution.

 

[RKS]

I also have an Intel D975XBX2 with a E2140 attached to a Dell 3007WFP 30" LCD. I had a 8800GT but currently purchased 2 5770s to run each of my 3007s. Since my other computer just died I am planning on using the cards in CF but to be honest; even a single 5770 hasn't been too bad. When I rebuild my other PC I'll probably get an another 8800GT or another single 5770.

 

[BFG10K]

Buy the fastest single GPU you can afford. Don’t worry about CF, and don’t worry about your CPU. Your CPU is fine for 99% of games out there, especially if you plan on gaming at 2560x1600.

 

[zerocool84]

Overclock your cpu. Free performance that will help a lot.

 

[faxon]

oc the shit out of your CPU and get a 5870. most games would still run fine on it and it would give you a significant boost in FPS still over a 5850 even in games that would be somewhat cpu limited depending on the scene

 

[Shmee]

oc the shit out of your CPU and get a 5870. most games would still run fine on it and it would give you a significant boost in FPS still over a 5850 even in games that would be somewhat cpu limited depending on the scene

and then OC that as well!

 

[Dadofamunky]

I agree with a lot of the posters here - OC the snot out of the E6600 (you should be able to get a 33% OC easy) and get the single best video card you can afford, regardless of type. Right now, the value and performance crowns are all with ATI. Now, V8Envy is absolutely correct - if you follow that exact sequence there is no reason why you can't switch card vendors. OTOH, rarely have I seen a more seamless upgrade then when I went from an 7800GT to a 9600GT in an old box of mine. The big issue is driving that monitor at native resolution. So OC the CPU some, and get a very strong card, MINIMUM GTX 260 216 or likely an ATI 5850, which for what it costs appears to be the best bang-for-buck card hands down. I'm toying with the idea of getting one myself but I might go for a second 4850 and crossfire it instead.

 

[goelh70]

thanks dadofamunky

So I will

1) Buy a 5850 or 5870 single card and
2) Overclock the 6600

Anything else?