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Would I benefit from a Geforce3?

E

ein

Junior Member
Hi!

I have a PIII500 with approx 440Mb ram, today I have a TNT2 Ultra graphics card. Would I notice any speed-increase (in games like Wolfenstein) if I switched to a newer graphicscard like Geforce3 TI200 / Radeon 8500 or similar, or is the processor the main "speed-limit" on my machine?

Kind regards,
Pontus😕
 
Hello and welcome to the Forums ein.

If you bought a new card your CPU would definitely be a bottlenech but having said that you will still see a huge boost from that TNT-2 you have now. Go for it!
 
Unless you plan on upgrading your system any time soon I wouldn't worry about going with the top end Geforce 3. Look at something like the Geforce 3 Ti200. It's an excellent performer/overclocker and you won't be wasting money on something you wouldn't benefit from anyway.
 
I agree with strych9. Upgrading to a GF3 made a HUGE difference in my system...if not just for the speed then for the extra features such as Hardware T&L, vertex shader, bump mapping, etc. Your games WILL look and play better, even on that system. Your CPU will be the bottleneck but you will still get a nice boost in performance over the TNT. If you are planning on getting a new systemn in the future and don't plan on migrating the card over then you may be well enought with an upper-end GF2 card though.

That being said I have a Gainward GF3 Ti200 and while overclocking it on my Athlon XP 1800 system i got huge increases in 3DMark2001 up until around speeds of Core 220 / Memory 530. After that the CPU became the bottle neck and I got bigger gains by overclocking the CPU.
 
I have a Geforce3ti500, but then I have a P4 1.7. In all honesty you will receive better graphics but no greater fps. Dont be swept by the hype, at least not with your current system. Upgrade and then buy the card.
 
With prices where they are now, you could get a lower clocked Athlon XP and Mobo, plus a GF3 Ti200 for just about the same price as a GF3. Might have to spend a little bit more, but you'd be gaining a great deal more in the long run, imho.
 


<< With prices where they are now, you could get a lower clocked Athlon XP and Mobo, plus a GF3 Ti200 for just about the same price as a GF3. Might have to spend a little bit more, but you'd be gaining a great deal more in the long run, imho. >>



I agree!
 
I'd say get it and move it into your next system when you have that ready. Speaking from myself, when I had my PIII500, I upgraded from a TNT2u to a GeForce SDR. Although Direct3D only showed a very slight improvement, I got about a 20% increase with OpenGL across the board using those old v1.8x and v2.x Detonators. Since the GF3 is huge leap from the GeForce SDR, I would say your gains would be even more. Maybe no breath-taking, but you will see a performance boost.
 
I would think the the Geforce 3 would pull the system down as it would over power the existing system that he has now. I could be wrong but my best suggestion is go with a upgrade to a new system and video card if you want to see a performance boost



Jen
 
If you think you might upgrade your system soon, then you could get the video card you want now and just transfer the nice vid you get now. BUT, if you are going to keep you current setup a while, then ask yourself this:

<< Does my current video card allow me to play every game that I CURRENTLY own? >>

If the answer is yes, then do NOT upgrade. If the answer is no, then upgrade to a very inexpensive GeForce 3 or a deriviative of it.
 
I strongly suggest you not to get those expensive video cards. It would be an overkill for your system. Might want to upgrade your system first and stick to something like GF2 Ti 64MB video cards.
 
In all honesty you will receive better graphics but no greater fps
I disagree. You will notice a difference. I don't know about wolfenstein, but something like quake, yeah.
I do agree with the people that are saying to go with the less expensive video cad and a new mobo and processor. I would go that route.
 
Hell go with a Geforce 3 Ti500...

...at least whenever you upgrade you can just carry it over to the new system.

But, yeah, as of right now you're going to be limited by your CPU but all your games are still going to run much faster then your TNT2 can ever dream of!
 
upgrade your main system first! I mean a P3 500 isnt too bad but I dont think you'll notice todays graphics heavy games blazingly fast on your system when your at 500mhz. If I were you I would get a cheap kt266a board, a 1.2ghz Duron or any athlonxp, and a GF3 Ti200 or ati 8500LE. Maybe even a cheaper vid card. Gf2 isa still good and so is the Radeon.
 

you can not benefit from a gf3, only from a radeon8500 🙂


Ok..just kidding.

Seriously: your system specs are maybe really too slow...and you will soon push the limits even if you get a gf3ti200/radeon le or similiar.

Dont know what to tell you...but upgrading your sys might be a good idea...but of course it depends what you want to do with your pc.





 
Wow!. Thank you for all the answers, you're very kind. I didn't expect a single one 🙂. Checking them all made me decide to go for a geforce 3 ti200. I don't know when I'm going to upgrade the other parts of a system (maybe when I win some money or something, but then again, that requires me to participate in some kind of lottery 🙂).

Thank you all, again.

/Ein. (not from Germany, I'm from Sweden)🙂
 
Dude, i woulda got like a GF2 Pro or something, and a K7S5A which supports your ram, and a Athlon. That 500 ain't gonna hack it man 🙂
 
Why go for the GF3?

I say get yourself the ECS K7S5A board and a nice Athlon MP1600+ or 1700+ for about $200 shipped. Costs the same as the GF3 Ti200, if not less, and it'll give you a much greater boost than just the GF3. You can even use your olde PC133/100 SDRAM in the ECS board until you get enough money to go DDR.

This seems much more reasonable to me, because in this scenario you can go ahead and sell your current mobo, CPU and video card for, say $120 shipped and you can get yourself an awesome used GF2 Pro/Ultra.
 
Ouch, now I'm really confused.
What you are saying is that I will benefit more from a new mainboard + cpu + old tnt2 ultra, than just the ti200 upgrade?.

And all this AMD talk, I've never been quite confident with AMD, although I've never had one myself, I've heard alot about it and problems with various drivers / software. I'm not the kind of person who like to poke around with my computer all the time to make it work (I do that too often at work as it is now), I want to "set it and forget it", is this possible when running on an AMD platform (please don't flame me, just asking).
And this ECS K7S5A, does anyone know if this is available in sweden somewhere?, if I can't find it, what card should I go for then? ASUS? (what chipset?)
What's the difference between Athlon XP and Athlon MP?, which speed is most valuable (1400+, 1500+ or higher)?
(I've checked some sites for prices, and to upgrade it all is just too expensive for me since my budget is rather limited).

/Ein
 
Maybe you don't need such a dramatic increase in cards though. My 32 MB Geforce 2 Gts will last me for at least another generation of games.
 
I think your best bet would be to go with a geforce2 since you're on a tight budget. Like the others said it would be nice to upgrade to a new cpu and mobo but as you said you can't afford it. And an Athlon MP stands for multiprocessor as far as I know. Hope that helps.
Scoob
 
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