X1950pro + 24" monitor = slide show???

pcAnywhere

pcAnywhere

pcAnywhere

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I've had budget approval for a £200 "new shiny" upgrade.

Current main PC spec is:

Athlon 64 3800x2; Saphire X1950 Pro 256MB; Corsair 400w PSU; 2gig ram and Win 7 HP + 19" TFT (non-widescreen) and 1 TB F3

I'm considering getting one of those 24" Benq LED monitors to give me more desktop space but I'm concerned that the rather old GPU wont be able to cope. I don't play many GPU intensive games (although I do dabble with TF2 occasionally) and I only occasionally rip CDs (which is about the only time my aged CPU works flat out!)

So - does anyone have a clue if an old X1950pro can run any game at 1920x1080 or will I really need to upgrade the GPU to a 5750 / 5770??
 
That will be terrible. Even my 3850 256mb was made worthless when I went from 1280x1024 to 1680x1050, nevermind 1920x1080. And that card was about twice as powerful as a x1950pro. You will probably be ok playing Half-Life 2 but not newer games.
 
Can you up the budget a bit? £230 or so would get you the screen and a second hand GTX260/4870 which would be great.
 
reflux said:
Can you up the budget a bit? £230 or so would get you the screen and a second hand GTX260/4870 which would be great.
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Pretty sure his Athlon 64 3800x2 will bottleneck the those two graphic cards. I think the 4850 1GB will be the best balance with the rest of the rig if he does go 1080p, but not upgrading the CPU:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-007-HS&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=938
It would be the best match, but if the price between 2nd hand 4850 1GB and 4870 1GB is not that great, then I guess it's better to go 4870.
 
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Is a second X1950 pro physically possible? And if so, would it be powerful enough (bearing in mind with that rig he's obviously not enjoying the latest games even on his 19" so a second card should give similar performance at the higher res)?

Or, can't you just game at a lower res - the monitor will upscale and not exactly look beautiful, but that's a free option until you can upgrade the rig.
 
Liampope said:
Is a second X1950 pro physically possible? And if so, would it be powerful enough (bearing in mind with that rig he's obviously not enjoying the latest games even on his 19" so a second card should give similar performance at the higher res)?

Or, can't you just game at a lower res - the monitor will upscale and not exactly look beautiful, but that's a free option until you can upgrade the rig.
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No because as old a card as the x1950pro is, the biggest problem is the 256mb vRAM. Adding another card will always result in a total vRAM of 256mb.
 
Thanks for the opinions guys; I'd rather not invest in a 4xxx series but may get a 5750 card with 1gb of ram. Just need to convince the purse strings holder that an extra £70 is needed lol

Next upgrade would be a new CPU, mobo, and ram
 
Your CPU might not be the best but at least it's a dual-core. I think the 5770 is a great price and well worth the extra over an £80 card, even with your CPU
 
Only buy it if you're gonna use it though. Sounds like you don't game much at all in which case 140 (ooh i've only just noticed i'm on a US keyboard layout - where's me pound sign:() er, quid, is a lot to spend on a PC graphics card. Worth it if you plan to get into gaming a little more, but if not just save the money and get a 55xx or 56xx.
 
For the desktop the X1950 is more than enough really, but for gaming at that resolution, you'll have to run most games on low unless they're old ones of course like Half Life 1 and such.

I had to use a temporary card (8400GS) a few weeks ago and it was snappy for Windows 7's aero and such but with only 256MB of VRAM, even playing games like Eve Online on lowest settings hardly got me over 30FPS.
 
Its quite surpising actually the old Athlon x2 3800+ is a fairly nippy chip for its age, my rig in sig runs 21.7s wprime and the athlon x2 stock is 44.3s so not that far behind if you factor in the extra clock speeds.

As far as GPU i'd try for something like an 8800 or a 9800 would be your cheapest option but still giving a good boost
 
frozennova said:
Its quite surpising actually the old Athlon x2 3800+ is a fairly nippy chip for its age, my rig in sig runs 21.7s wprime and the athlon x2 stock is 44.3s so not that far behind if you factor in the extra clock speeds.

As far as GPU i'd try for something like an 8800 or a 9800 would be your cheapest option but still giving a good boost
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Actually this is not a bad idea at all. Try to find a 2nd hand 8800GT/9800GT for may be around £30-£40 to use for now, and then save up toward updating the rest of the PC. Once the PC is updated, can then grab a 5770 1GB (should be cheaper by then as well) and sell the 8800GT/9800GT for around the same price that it was bought at.
512MB ram on the graphic card is more than enough for 19" monitor as well.
 
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When my 4870 broke i resorted to using my old 1900XTX 512MB.

I was running on a 24" Acer G24 @ 1920 x 1200. I managed to run cod 5 at around low - medium settings i think at playable framerate (but not great). I was using a Core2 Quad Q9550 @ stock and 4gb of ram at the time tho.

Best bet would be to get a better card of some sort.
 
I'm considering a Radeon HD 4850 512MB (new, for the bargain price of £69.98). From reading back issues of custom PC it should be able to cope with games I'm playing now @ 24" resolutions
 
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