Why do so many people have 6800GTs?

[aplefka]

On FS/T I've noticed that a lot of threads are for the sole purpose of selling this card, or the variants of it. I thought that the general consensus on here was that $400 or more was too much to pay for a video card, but it seems like most people have them.

What I'm wondering is why do they have them just to sell them, and not actually use them? Any 6800 owners out there wanna answer this for me?

 

[Mrvile]

Who knows? This is ATOT.

 

[Brutuskend]

Why do people trade in perfectly good cars every few years?

People are weird.

 

[Looney]

$400 is too much to pay for a videocard? Maybe to you and me they are, but there's a shortage out there because there is a demand for them.

As for why people are selling it? Maybe to make a profit, or because it's more power than they thought they needed, and want some money back, or buyer's remorse,

 

[Atomicus]

6800GTs can be found for under $360 easily. Its also very easy to softmod it to Ultra speeds so I guess its just the crave for best-bang-per-buck

 

[Schadenfroh]

they want to offload the AGP version and get the PCI-E version

 

[aplefka]

I'm still happy with my 9800 pro, and once I get it on the new rig I'll probably be satisfied for another year or so.

 

[CarlKillerMiller]

Originally posted by: aplefka
I'm still happy with my 9800 pro, and once I get it on the new rig I'll probably be satisfied for another year or so.

Same situation here.

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
they want to offload the AGP version and get the PCI-E version

That would be my guess as well.

I have an AGP 6800GT myself that I got for a reasonably decent price (well, as decent as could basically ever be found since the card was released), $337. I'd like to build a new machine, but if I did that I'd want to go PCI-Express...and I'd need to sell my current card...and probably lose well over $100 in the process because the few places that do have PCI-E 6800GT's in stock are massively price-gouging for them...

 

[xEDIT409]

Originally posted by: Chraticn

Originally posted by: aplefka
I'm still happy with my 9800 pro, and once I get it on the new rig I'll probably be satisfied for another year or so.

Same situation here.

ditto!

 

[aplefka]

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
they want to offload the AGP version and get the PCI-E version

That would be my guess as well.

I have an AGP 6800GT myself that I got for a reasonably decent price (well, as decent as could basically ever be found since the card was released), $337. I'd like to build a new machine, but if I did that I'd want to go PCI-Express...and I'd need to sell my current card...and probably lose well over $100 in the process because the few places that do have PCI-E 6800GT's in stock are massively price-gouging for them...

Why would you wanna go from AGP to PCI-E so soon? I mean it's not fully worked out so that the load is equally balanced and everything, and if you have the [6800 AGP] card why not use it? I guess that's what I don't understand, is it worth it to pay top dollar for the latest technology when it's not even 100% where it's going to be?

Edit: Made readability a little easier

 

[MustISO]

I just purchased a 6800GT for $355. Yes, it's a lot of money but seeing Half-Life 2 at 1280x1024 is just too cool. My old video card was a DX7 card so I really couldn't play any games at all.

 

[aplefka]

Originally posted by: MustISO
I just purchased a 6800GT for $355. Yes, it's a lot of money but seeing Half-Life 2 at 1280x1024 is just too cool. My old video card was a DX7 card so I really couldn't play any games at all.

Now that makes sense, and you probably owed it to yourself anyway. I just don't understand why people buy the cards then sell them without using them or using them that much. And I remember in a thread a while back people also brought up how much was too much for a video card, and it was about 350-400 where everyone seemed to agree that it was too much.

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: aplefka

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
they want to offload the AGP version and get the PCI-E version

That would be my guess as well.

I have an AGP 6800GT myself that I got for a reasonably decent price (well, as decent as could basically ever be found since the card was released), $337. I'd like to build a new machine, but if I did that I'd want to go PCI-Express...and I'd need to sell my current card...and probably lose well over $100 in the process because the few places that do have PCI-E 6800GT's in stock are massively price-gouging for them...

Why would you wanna go from AGP to PCI-E so soon? I mean it's not fully worked out so that the load is equally balanced and everything, and if you have the card why not use it? I guess that's what I don't understand, is it worth it to pay top dollar for the latest technology when it's not even 100% where it's going to be?

Note that I'm not specifically talking about SLI. $900 for a pair of high-end video cards is out of reach for me, and even if it weren't, I'm not quite that crazy.

Basically, the idea is to be able to easily upgrade the video card in a year or whenever it starts feeling slow, and it appears that the manufacturers (well really, ATI and Nvidia) are trying to move over to PCI-E quickly, although that could certainly be debated. They're certainly not doing well with yields and/or supply now, anyways. Plus, I've been wanting to upgrade to an Athlon 64 system for a while now, so I figure if I'm building a new system, why not make it hopefully easier to upgrade later on?

However, I also realize that "future-proofing" is often not possible or practical. Not to mention that I would be paying more money for basically the exact same thing I have now. So I'm basically torn three ways, between 1) upgrading to an nForce4 A64 system with PCI-E, 2) upgrading to an nForce3 A64 system with AGP and keeping my current video card, and 3) sticking with the system I have now and saving money.

I don't know yet which I'm going to do, although #2 is becoming more attractive than #1, and #3 is possibly even becoming more practical than both of those because of all the money I've been spending on car repairs and such lately...

 

[aplefka]

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: aplefka

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
they want to offload the AGP version and get the PCI-E version

That would be my guess as well.

I have an AGP 6800GT myself that I got for a reasonably decent price (well, as decent as could basically ever be found since the card was released), $337. I'd like to build a new machine, but if I did that I'd want to go PCI-Express...and I'd need to sell my current card...and probably lose well over $100 in the process because the few places that do have PCI-E 6800GT's in stock are massively price-gouging for them...

Why would you wanna go from AGP to PCI-E so soon? I mean it's not fully worked out so that the load is equally balanced and everything, and if you have the card why not use it? I guess that's what I don't understand, is it worth it to pay top dollar for the latest technology when it's not even 100% where it's going to be?

Note that I'm not specifically talking about SLI. $900 for a pair of high-end video cards is out of reach for me, and even if it weren't, I'm not quite that crazy.

Basically, the idea is to be able to easily upgrade the video card in a year or whenever it starts feeling slow, and it appears that the manufacturers (well really, ATI and Nvidia) are trying to move over to PCI-E quickly, although that could certainly be debated. They're certainly not doing well with yields and/or supply now, anyways. Plus, I've been wanting to upgrade to an Athlon 64 system for a while now, so I figure if I'm building a new system, why not make it hopefully easier to upgrade later on?

However, I also realize that "future-proofing" is often not possible or practical. Not to mention that I would be paying more money for basically the exact same thing I have now. So I'm basically torn three ways, between 1) upgrading to an nForce4 A64 system with PCI-E, 2) upgrading to an nForce3 A64 system with AGP and keeping my current video card, and 3) sticking with the system I have now and saving money.

I don't know yet which I'm going to do, although #2 is becoming more attractive than #1, and #3 is possibly even becoming more practical than both of those because of all the money I've been spending on car repairs and such lately...

The thing that pisses me off is that I bought a P4 before reading about the AMD roadmap vs the Intel roadmap for 64-bit. I think the way you're going about it is smart, because you're starting to transfer now so that for the next couple years with the new technology coming in you're set to only have to upgrade one part instead of three or four.

But if that's what the other people are doing too, then why did they buy the card in the first place? I mean it's only been out for how long now? It seems like they could've known about PCI-E and how things were shaping up before making such a pricey purchase.

 

[pennylane]

I got a 6800NU for $250. It's the upper limit of what I'd spend for a video card (I'd rather keep it at $200, but it seemed like a better deal at the time than a 9800Pro for $200). It runs HL2 at 1280x1024. Framerates are fine in HL2, but only acceptable in CS:S (occasionally goes down to the 30-40 range). Still... I'd rather keep the looks and deal with minor frame rate drop.

There's of course a market for high-end video cards. One argument is... you can find many other parts for so cheap, so splurging on the video card isn't so bad if you keep the entire system's price in mind. I got an A64 3200 mobo combo from Fry's for $200. You can still build a sub $1000 computer with a $350 video card.

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: aplefka

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: aplefka

Originally posted by: SynthDude2001

Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
they want to offload the AGP version and get the PCI-E version

That would be my guess as well.

I have an AGP 6800GT myself that I got for a reasonably decent price (well, as decent as could basically ever be found since the card was released), $337. I'd like to build a new machine, but if I did that I'd want to go PCI-Express...and I'd need to sell my current card...and probably lose well over $100 in the process because the few places that do have PCI-E 6800GT's in stock are massively price-gouging for them...

Why would you wanna go from AGP to PCI-E so soon? I mean it's not fully worked out so that the load is equally balanced and everything, and if you have the card why not use it? I guess that's what I don't understand, is it worth it to pay top dollar for the latest technology when it's not even 100% where it's going to be?

Note that I'm not specifically talking about SLI. $900 for a pair of high-end video cards is out of reach for me, and even if it weren't, I'm not quite that crazy.

Basically, the idea is to be able to easily upgrade the video card in a year or whenever it starts feeling slow, and it appears that the manufacturers (well really, ATI and Nvidia) are trying to move over to PCI-E quickly, although that could certainly be debated. They're certainly not doing well with yields and/or supply now, anyways. Plus, I've been wanting to upgrade to an Athlon 64 system for a while now, so I figure if I'm building a new system, why not make it hopefully easier to upgrade later on?

However, I also realize that "future-proofing" is often not possible or practical. Not to mention that I would be paying more money for basically the exact same thing I have now. So I'm basically torn three ways, between 1) upgrading to an nForce4 A64 system with PCI-E, 2) upgrading to an nForce3 A64 system with AGP and keeping my current video card, and 3) sticking with the system I have now and saving money.

I don't know yet which I'm going to do, although #2 is becoming more attractive than #1, and #3 is possibly even becoming more practical than both of those because of all the money I've been spending on car repairs and such lately...

The thing that pisses me off is that I bought a P4 before reading about the AMD roadmap vs the Intel roadmap for 64-bit. I think the way you're going about it is smart, because you're starting to transfer now so that for the next couple years with the new technology coming in you're set to only have to upgrade one part instead of three or four.

But if that's what the other people are doing too, then why did they buy the card in the first place? I mean it's only been out for how long now? It seems like they could've known about PCI-E and how things were shaping up before making such a pricey purchase.

Well, one way to look at it is that the people who can (or are willing to) pay $400 for a video card are probably the ones who upgrade really often anyway, so perhaps upgrading a motherboard and CPU and maybe even that video card again the next year isn't such a big deal.

I don't think I exactly fall into that category though. I've basically had the same computer that I built in August 2003 before I started college, the only things I've upgraded having been the video card and a DVD burner. Originally I paid $200 back then for my 9700 Pro, which I still thought was a lot of money to spend on a video card, but it was also a good deal at the time. Kind of the same thing happened last summer; there was a deal on the 6800GT for $337, and I was selling a few other computer parts to my brother (including that 9700 Pro), so I could at least sort of justify it that way.

Edit: And PCI-E still seemed way off in the future at that point, so that didn't even enter my mind at the time. I'll still probably upgrade to an A64 system within the next few months, I'm just trying to decide about how to do it. Not to mention that once again, I have friends lined up to buy many of my current components, so the cost won't be as bad as it could be.

It's kind of funny actually, I'm at the top of the "upgrade chain", then my brother comes next, then some other friends, all the way down to one of the people in our LAN party group who's still on a 1GHz P3, and just inherited a Radeon 8500 after its previous owner upgraded to a 6800nu.