Graphics card help!

[DRuM]

I've decided not to bother with replacing the fan and heatsink on my 9800pro and will buy a replacement card. Currently have a fan blowing inside the case to keep it cool. Which of these cards will MATCH the 9800pro for graphics quality? I only have AGP, not PCI-E. Don't want to spend much. I have the same old Athlon XP2000+ cpu, so unless I change that bottlenecker, don't need too fancy a gpu. Here are pc world prices:

Would this cheapo card match my 9800pro 128mb?
PNY Geforce 6200 128MB AGP Graphics Card £29.99

Which is better out of these 2?
PNY GeForce 7600 GS 512MB AGP Graphics Card £64.99

PNY Geforce 7300GT 512MB AGP Graphics Card £54.99



OR, if I order online, overclockers.co.uk have some good prices, what would you recommend from them up to £60? I'm guessing a 512mb is better to go for than a 256mb.

[Captain]

7600.

It'd be better if you just built a new rig, but I'm guessing you're not into hardcore gaming?

[DRuM]

7600.

It'd be better if you just built a new rig, but I'm guessing you're not into hardcore gaming?

Nah, definitely not hardcore me. I haven't touched a game in months and I've got several games in limbo. Still haven't finished
TR Anniversary

I presume the 7600 is better than the 9800pro? Or does it just match it?

[Foo]

Just a word on airflow - Blowing a fan into the case only improves things if they're pretty terrible already. Best general setup is:

1 or 2 intake fans located at the lower front of the case near the hard drives.
1 or 2 exhaust fans located at the top rear of the case near the CPU fan.

Then when the side panels are on, the air flows from the front to the back of the case in a kind of S-shape.

That's why it's important to keep the rear of the case unobstructed with plenty of room for hot air to rise up and away from the case.

You might already know all this, I dunno...

I recommend scan and ebuyer over overclockers BTW. OC are fine until you try to return some faulty good, at which point they get very stroppy.

Go for a 6600 or 7600. They're the 'mid' range of each generation performance-wise where you'll find actual gaming performance. The 6800 and 7800 likewise being the high end of each generation then all the various models under those being a mishmash of budget confusion, generally with poor performance. So yeah.... Nvidias *600 cards for the wins...

[DRuM]

Thanks foo. Yeah, my airflow is pretty much as you mentioned. I have to blow a deskfan into it for now because otherwise the 9800pro heats up so fast it causes yellowy glitches all over the screen. It's fine now though. Just need to buy a card asap.
Ok, I have taken onboard that the nvidia *600 series are good.

Just a few others to mention. Would any of these ati's be as good or even better, or shall I be done with it and go with the 7600 GS?
I did actually get these from overclockers, but would buy from those other places you mentioned.

OcUK ATI Radeon X1650 Pro 512MB going for £38
Asus ATI Radeon HD 3650 Vcool Silent 512MB £70 ( looks like a very chunky card )
Sapphire ATI Radeon 2600 Pro 512MB £56

[Foo]

I'm not up on the ATI stuff so I'll leave someone else to comment.

All I know is the extra bulk on the 3650 is passive (read: no-fan) cooling fins/pipes. Ran one of those once, more trouble than it's worth IMO.

[Captain]

Still haven't finished
TR Anniversary

You're gonna miss out big on Underworld

Years ago I went through a Radeon 9200 and a 9550. Both were terrible in my opinion. The GeForce 6600GT on the other hand kept me satisfied until I grabbed an 8800GT. I'd say Nvidia still makes the better cards and the 6xxx and 7xxx definitely beat their ATi counterparts.

Asus ATI Radeon HD 3650 Vcool Silent 512MB £70 ( looks like a very chunky card )

That's a PCI-E card. It's a low-end ATi DX10 card, probably comparable to a GeForce 8600.

[DRuM]

Hey Foo and Capt.Mazda, after doing some reading up, and card comparison research on these cards, you're right, the 7600 GS seems to be the best AGP card to get according to popular opinion. Well, apparently the 7600 GT is even faster, but I don't care about that, the GS is meant to be pretty slick.


Mazda, that Asus ATI Radeon HD 3650 Vcool Silent 512MB is actually AGP.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showprodu ... DMI%20(AGP)

You're right though, I've also seen it described as low end. What I don't get is, how it can be low end with 512mb memory, and core speed running at 725MHz. Wouldn't that make it like 325Mhz faster than the 7600 GS which has a core speed of 400Mhz?

[Captain]

Oh, my bad :E

[DRuM]

Oh, my bad :E

I've just ordered the PNY GeForce 7600 GS 512mb. Cheapest I found it is actually pcworld, they have a web exclusive of £10 discount, so the price will be £54.99 instead of that £64.99 I mentioned. I'm paying for it and picking it up tomorrow at the store which is only 10 minutes drive away. Let's hope PNY is reliable. Here is my new baby

[Captain]

I've never used PNY hardware, but I haven't heard anything negative about them. Seems they're as reliable as the other big brands (BFG, eVGA, XFX, etc.)

[Survivor]

I had a 7600 GS before I built the new rig. It's a solid card. Won't get you the newest games at high but you wouldn't expect that of such a processor anyway.

[DRuM]

Well I read a comparison of the 7600 GS v 9800pro, and the 7600 is quite a bit better apparently. Considering I always did ok with the 9800pro, ( even ran doom3 and quake 4 on some high settings with not too much framerate drop ) I'm sure the 7600 will be great, and anyway, it's pretty cheap to buy.

[SOAPboy]

I've never used PNY hardware, but I haven't heard anything negative about them. Seems they're as reliable as the other big brands (BFG, eVGA, XFX, etc.)

EVGA>=BFG>XFX>PNY

In that order. IMO.

I prefer EVGA over BFG because of price, and company customer support. BFG gave me alot of hassle with dead shit, EVGA shipped out new stuff and threw in tshirts and crap simply because they wanted me to be happy. BFG, i had to haggle to get a card RMAed.

PNY isnt bad. Reliable cards. Just, for the money id rather go EVGA or XFX

[DRuM]

Hey guys, one more question if I may.

I'm just about to go to the shop and I've also ordered
a PNY 1GB stick of PC3200 DDR for £25.

I've currently got 768mb of ram, which consists of 512mb corsair PC3200, and a non branded 256MB stick of PC2700. Will I get better speed by removing the PC2700 and just using just the 1GB and 512MB of PC3200, or, shall I still keep the 256mb in and make it 1.7GB of ram? Because I know that the PC2700 brings down the overall speed of the faster memory, right?

[AmIdYfReAk]

Keep em all DDR-400... Ditch that 256.

Through, dont you have a system that can do Dual channel?

[DRuM]

Keep em all DDR-400... Ditch that 256.

Through, dont you have a system that can do Dual channel?

No idea amidy

Prolly not, my system is oooooold. My mobo is the asus A7V8X

http://www.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=3& ... odelmenu=2

Thanks for the advice, I'll remove the 256mb PC2700. I'm gonna remove my ati software now and install the nvidia.

[Survivor]

Holy shit drum, then you've just about got my old system. Same mobo and end card now. Only my proc was a 2200+

[DRuM]

Holy shit drum, then you've just about got my old system. Same mobo and end card now. Only my proc was a 2200+

Heh, ONE day I might decide to do a proper full on expensive upgrade of cpu, mobo ( so I can have PCI Express ), etc. But since I don't game much, it's kinda pointless. I remember quite a while back, tormentius gave me a great spec to buy at the time when AMD 64 was the newest technology. Unfortunately, I never did get around to putting it together.

My new card is slotted in now, will give it a whirl with some games later. It's interesting how early 3DMark programs like 3DMark2001SE (found it somewhere on my pc collecting dust) that used to lag run so smoothly now. I checked out their latest, 3DMark Vantage, but my system is not even capable of running that.

Btw, it seems the nvidia 9800 GX2 is the latest, greatest and most expensive graphics card on the market. Have you or anyone else seen it in action? It's meant to be incredible. And I imagine awe inspiring doubled up with another one.

[Captain]

2x9800 GX2 = quad SLI