Stepping stone to next MAJOR upgrade

SuperDave23414

So im looking for a graphics card or two to last me a max of one year, because my 8800GTS isnt hacking it very well any more IMO and i dont think it will be able to fair well against MW2 Section 8 and any new graphics intense games. So i was looking for yalls opinion on this i was thinkin 9800GTX+ sli'd or something similar in price. I found some for 179.00USD from EVGA SSC a piece, but i wasnt sure if it was compatable with my current setup in my specs OR if i should just wait longer for the
GT300 series to comeout and see if it would work with my rig and i wonna be able to play on high or very high in all my games at 1920x1200.. So any advice would help out alot

MM10X · **Memory**: 4GB ocz 1000Mhz 5-4-4-15

$179 for 9800GTX+'s? EACH? you can get a GTX 260 c216 for $145 at newegg.

DSK · 10-02-2009, 12:13 | posts: 16,635 | Location: Scotland | User is Online

Yeah those 9800GTX+s are a rip off.

Juicy8504 · **Memory**: 4GB Cruical 4-4-4-12

Get another 8800GTS if you can find one for a good price. I wouldn't pay more than 70 for one though.

You could wait it out for about a month and get a 5850 or 5870. Monster card for the price. You're going to be waiting IMO 6 months to get your hands on a GT300 for less than 400.

a 4850 is still a VERY strong contender. Cheap, and whoops the snot out of a 9800GTX

LedHed

If there is something wrong with your GTS 640 why not RMA it, you'll get a 9800GTX+ to replace it anyway (since there aren't GTS 640's available anymore). At least I think so, if BFG has the same policy has eVGA of equal or better for RMA.

Squall Leonhart · 10-02-2009, 14:37 | posts: 1,331 | Location: Australia | User is Offline

that or knowing bfg's track record the replacement will not work the first time,
the second time it has stuff falling off
and the third time he gets a lower performing card.

lol.

Phroster · **Memory**: 8GB @ 800Mhz 4-4-4-11

I'm waiting this out, until the second generation directx11 cards come out.

The Geforce 8 series that supported dx10 for the first time were not really good at it.

Best to wait anyway, prices of the old cards will drop when nvidia releases the new GTX300

H83 · **Overclock?... -** 10-02-2009, 15:54 | posts: 156 | User is Offline

Have you tried to overclock your CPU??? I could be wrong but maybe your CPU is bottlenecking your videocard, it happened the same with me. After i overclocked my CPU over 3Mhz, i gained more performance from my 8800GT just like that, maybe you could try it, since the CPU and videocard are similar to the one i´ve got.

As for a new videocard, i think the best options are the GTX260 or the Radeon 4870/90.

A M D BugBear · 10-02-2009, 17:04 | posts: 865 | User is Offline

Quote:

Originally Posted by SuperDave23414

So im looking for a graphics card or two to last me a max of one year, because my 8800GTS isnt hacking it very well any more IMO and i dont think it will be able to fair well against MW2 Section 8 and any new graphics intense games. So i was looking for yalls opinion on this i was thinkin 9800GTX+ sli'd or something similar in price. I found some for 179.00USD from EVGA SSC a piece, but i wasnt sure if it was compatable with my current setup in my specs OR if i should just wait longer for the
GT300 series to comeout and see if it would work with my rig and i wonna be able to play on high or very high in all my games at 1920x1200.. So any advice would help out alot

Dude if your looking for a Major overhaul on your system I would strongly advise you to wait on the new intel 6 w/HT or 6 core/12 threads. I Would wait on the review on the gt3XX cards. Then I would make your move on which gfx to get. Far as memory is concerned, Dominators have treated me well, the g.skill ram are great but it seems not to last long once they are overclocked from my experience, I dont know which IC's they use now probably not the same as before Which was micron I think it was.

I would wait man until the new gfx card and the new intel cpu is unleashed.

Thats what I am doing, I am waiting. By then the drivers for the 58XX cards will be matured by then hopefully, not only that, price drop as well so wait.

SuperDave23414 · 10-02-2009, 18:45 | posts: 76 | User is Offline

Wow thnx for all the replies, yea i was thinking the same about the CPU bottlenecking the performance of the card i have now, but i looked at the VGA charts for crysis and the 9800+'s in sli mode scored really high but im sure thats on a specific setup with them. I dont think BFG has an RMA policy....not sure tho. As for price on those cards EVGA was $179 and PNY was $99 but im not sure about PNY o.O? so Maybe upgrading the processor CPU would be a better route?? Maybe like a C2Q9300 or a 9550? do yall think that would open up some xtra horsepower outta this old machine???

SuperDave23414 · 10-02-2009, 18:46 | posts: 76 | User is Offline

also why are OEMs more $$ than the retail versions?

DSK · 10-02-2009, 18:51 | posts: 16,635 | Location: Scotland | User is Online

Quote:

Originally Posted by SuperDave23414

Wow thnx for all the replies, yea i was thinking the same about the CPU bottlenecking the performance of the card i have now, but i looked at the VGA charts for crysis and the 9800+'s in sli mode scored really high but im sure thats on a specific setup with them. I dont think BFG has an RMA policy....not sure tho. As for price on those cards EVGA was $179 and PNY was $99 but im not sure about PNY o.O? so Maybe upgrading the processor CPU would be a better route?? Maybe like a C2Q9300 or a 9550? do yall think that would open up some xtra horsepower outta this old machine???

Well a low end quad like a Q9300 would not be much of a boost

a Q9550 would be due its highish clock speed and big L2 cache

and BFG RMA is lifetime so just send it away

but a decent upgrade would be a single GTX260 i'm sure you would be very happy with that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by SuperDave23414

also why are OEMs more $$ than the retail versions?

Hmm it should be the other way round.

SuperDave23414 · 10-03-2009, 10:52 | posts: 76 | User is Offline

Quote:

Originally Posted by kylzer

Hmm it should be the other way round.

yea thats what i thought

so do think it would be better to upgrade the CPU first or the GPU??
OR should i just wait and do a complete tear down and go motherboard CPU and GPU and rock out an i7??
When do these intel 6's come out??

very sry this took a turn towards cpu's

dudecat64 · 10-03-2009, 10:57 | posts: 3,084 | Location: nystate | User is Offline

Just wait and see what comes out in the next few months. Do a christmas upgrade lol.... by then you should see prices come down on motherboards and gpu's.

SuperDave23414 · 10-03-2009, 11:13 | posts: 76 | User is Offline

so i just crunched some numbers for a C2Q9550 and 2 GTX260 c216 superclocked puts me roughly $60 over budget. OR i could get a GTX 285 and the CPU and only be $20 over budget?? Is there really that big a perfomance boost on Sli'd cards? i could wait a lil longer i suppose...

A M D BugBear · 10-03-2009, 11:39 | posts: 865 | User is Offline

Your system is fine man. I would hold off if I were you. You got an ancient card but it still runs ok depending on what games you are playing. I play mostly mmo's so that card will do fine. But yes I would wait.

SuperDave23414 · 10-03-2009, 13:15 | posts: 76 | User is Offline

Alright i guess it is a good idea to wait and see what comes out nxt and how this new stuff holds up to the hype. thnx tho guys gotta lot to think about now and alot to save up for

DSK · 10-03-2009, 13:19 | posts: 16,635 | Location: Scotland | User is Online

Quote:

Originally Posted by SuperDave23414

so i just crunched some numbers for a C2Q9550 and 2 GTX260 c216 superclocked puts me roughly $60 over budget. OR i could get a GTX 285 and the CPU and only be $20 over budget?? Is there really that big a perfomance boost on Sli'd cards? i could wait a lil longer i suppose...

Maybe a Single GTX275 so that would sit right in the middle cash wise

Also if you want to wait for new nvidia gpus prepare to get ripped by the prices for anything high endish.

SuperDave23414 · 10-04-2009, 10:51 | posts: 76 | User is Offline

well if i wait till Jan. which is when all this stuff is supposed to come out my budget by then would double, so high end stuffs shouldnt be a biggy unless its gonna be close to a grand then the gf might get jealous =\

A M D BugBear · 10-04-2009, 11:24 | posts: 865 | User is Offline

SuperDave got one question for you which I didn't ask earlier, What resolution you play your games on???? If you are playing @ 1280X1024 then you are ok. if 1920X1200 with latest games then you will have problems.

SuperDave23414 · 10-04-2009, 12:07 | posts: 76 | User is Offline

Well i have a 37" LCD HDTV 1080p so 1920x1200 thats why im having issues with my current set but i might have to drop back down to my other 1680x1050 monitor when ever we move to the new house but it depends bc i might be getting a 52" plasma soon another issue i for see is power will all this next gen stuff use more or less power since it'll have a diff arc.?

A M D BugBear · 10-05-2009, 10:08 | posts: 865 | User is Offline

does your 1920X1200 screen do 1:1 pixel mapping?

If indeed the ati 5870 drops down very soon I might pick one up but like I said mise well wait cause of the new intel 6w/ht core cpu and the so called fermi gpu from nvidia, at least wait untill november to see how fermi is doing, I hope it will come out before the holiday season, I doubt it though, nvidia has to come out something fast otherwise ati is going to win this year.

SuperDave23414 · 10-05-2009, 19:48 | posts: 76 | User is Offline

1:1 pixel mapping? i dunno its an HDTV from vizio 1080p so i dunno..
how ever i think i might mooch my dads DP55KG and core i7 860 off him its been sitting there for over a month in the boxes dunno what he's gonna do with them besides tease me...... when r these GTX3xxx and is the fermi the same thing???

A M D BugBear · 10-06-2009, 04:49 | posts: 865 | User is Offline

Fermi and gt3XX afaik both the same thing.

yeah 1:1 video scaling, meaning it will scale to its true resolution but on a high resolution screen, the actual picture or video is going to be lower cause you are doing 1:1, you can stretch it but you may lose overall video quality, I had a viewsonic once that didnt last long and had excellent stretch video quality. Screen's response time is so much better then this gateway fpd screen I have but I went with this screen cause of the overall value and not only that, the amount of connections. This screen has not given up on my yet.

Dont mind about the 6gb total system ram that I updated on my profile, I had to install the other ram I had cause I run alot of stuff in the background, mainly mmos,etc. and boy does it help alot, holy ****.

Whats strange is that I can have 13 running mmos in the background in windows7 and the cpu usage aint all that high but the overall physical ram is a different story. If this was on winxp, the cpu usage would be off the scale.

quad core is really helping on what I am doing, would be better if I had 8 gigs of ram but I had another 2gb of system ram, same cpu overclock,etc, works great, 4+ prime 95 running in the background for ram testing and runs great.

Thundernoggin · 10-08-2009, 11:34 | posts: 1 | User is Offline

I've been asking myself this same question and I've got similar hardware except I'm running an overclocked 8800GTX in a IN9-32X Max. ATI looks like the best choice right now although I'm hesitant to put that in a Nforce mobo because last time it caused a few hiccups but nothing major. My e6600 was at 3.2ghz. Just replaced that with an e8500 which is currently stress testing at 4.2ghz on water with a nice little boost to the ram frequency. I'm just trying to make it one more year without a complete build because that can get expensive.

If Nvidia drops new hardware it could be expensive and there is always the possibility that the old stock will sell out before you get to the deal. It's tough shopping knowing whatever you buy will quickly be outdated. Right now I'm torn between the 5850 or an overclocked GTX 275.