6800 Ultra - Worth upgrading?

Nazbit · 15 Apr 2006 at 10:30

Hi all,

I currently have a BFG 6800 Ultra OC, its an AGP card and I was looking at selling it and going SLi.

If I did decide to do so, I would need a new mobo aswell, so I could only buy the one gfx card for now, but it would enable me to add another a few months down the line.

I would probably be looking at something like:

Leadtek GeForce 7800 GTX Extreme Edition 256MB GDDR3 VIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-070-LT)

What do you think? Is it worth upgrading from my current card to something along the lines of this one? What sort of improvement will I see in game frame rates, benchmarks etc.

Cheers

Hawklord · 15 Apr 2006 at 10:41

I'm in a very similar position but with an XT850XT PE and have now decided to hold off until the next crop of CPU's and DX10 cards are out. Both our cards are still capable of running games at reasonable frame rates with most of the eye candy (at lower resolutions - my LCD is only 1280x1024 obviously).
I must admit though I have had my curser over the buy button on an PowerColor ATI Radeon X1800 XT 512MB GDDR3 and a pci-e mobo a few times though.
It basically comes down to whether you want to upgrade to something marginally better now or wait to build a whole new system in a few months time. I'm just a bit worried if I was to do it now my cpu (A64 3500+)would bottleneck the card anyway so would probably need to upgrade the cpu too.
Prices are becoming a bit more of a tease now so I still might make the change to the tune of about £300 now as oppose to £1000 later.

Vegeta · 15 Apr 2006 at 12:31

Yeah I've got a 6800ultra PCi-e also, and although they arent the best performing cards at the moment, they still run most games decent fps with most eye candy, so just wait if I were you.

easyrider · 15 Apr 2006 at 12:41

I would get a 7600 GT and a sli mobo this performs faster than a 6800ultra and gives you the upgrade path of another in SLI down the line.Offering fantastic performance over cost.

There is no point in waiting for DX 10 cards reason being by the time the games are released that use them the card you have been waiting for would be already out of date.

By the time games use DX 10 as the norm the gfx cards companies would already be second or third generation in defeating the object of waiting.

There would be no point getting a 7800 GTX as the 7900 GT offers faster performance for less outlay.

You should either get a single 7600 GT with the option to SLI or a single 7900 GT/GTX

A single 7900 GT would get you around 10-11k in 05 thats quite an improvement I think you will agree.

bbreezeuk · 15 Apr 2006 at 12:42

dont get a 7800gtx just get a 7900gt that ofers more performance than the gtx for the same price

gary996 · 15 Apr 2006 at 17:24

imo hold off till the next gen comes out that support DX10 etc

Nazbit · 15 Apr 2006 at 17:38

Yer im a bit stuck really, whats been said here is more or less whats going on in my mind.

Half of me is saying wait for DX10, the other half is saying go and get yourself some 7900 ownage.

Decisions!!

kbc · 15 Apr 2006 at 17:46

Nazbit said:
Yer im a bit stuck really, whats been said here is more or less whats going on in my mind.

Half of me is saying wait for DX10, the other half is saying go and get yourself some 7900 ownage.

Decisions!!

Wait, wait, wait, there's never a good time to upgrade.

If the games are not performing as you would like it, take the plunge and upgrade. DX10 in my opinion is still a little while away. I used to own a 6800LE AGP, and am now on a 7900GT PCI-E. The performance leap is huge. If I were you, I'd get the current Nvidia generation cards such as the 7900 series as opposed to the 7800GTX. I'd go for the 7900GT as opposed to the pretty expensive X1900XT-X and the 7900GTX... it's cheaper and can run any games at 1280 resolutions considering you have a 17" LCD?

killer_uk · 15 Apr 2006 at 17:48

I'm in the same situation. I'm going to upgrade july time - regardless of directx 10. In my opinion, you will need to wait till the 2nd generation of directx10 cards for the games to be playable with high res + high detail, and that will be quite some time away.

Nazbit · 15 Apr 2006 at 18:09

Ok, so I am undecided on whether its time to upgrade or not.

But IF I were to upgrade, what do you think it should be to?

A 6800Ultra AGP >> 7900GT PCi-E?

That seems the most cost effective route to me.

kbc · 15 Apr 2006 at 18:18

Nazbit said:
Ok, so I am undecided on whether its time to upgrade or not.

But IF I were to upgrade, what do you think it should be to?

A 6800Ultra AGP >> 7900GT PCi-E?

That seems the most cost effective route to me.

Yes... some of the PCI-E motherboards are pretty cheap, doubt you'd need anything too spectacular unless you'd want to do some heavy overclocking. The 7900GT would be a "BIG" performance leap from the GeForce 6800 Ultra.

That card you have their would fund a "great" proportion towards the 7900GT, especially as it's a BFG branded one, not forgetting it's AGP. You'd make a good sale. I've seen them go for nearly £150.

Nazbit · 17 Apr 2006 at 22:35

Thanks for the input everyone.

I think I'm going to leave it for a little while and spend my money on something else.

I figure my current card does more than enough in todays games, I will wait another few months before pushing the boat out on something top of the range I think, if I upgrade now I wont be able to afford the best, and I will always be a generation behind.

May aswell save up a while longer and be able to afford the current best card, whenever that might be.

chippy001 · 18 Apr 2006 at 16:40

Hi Guys,

Sorry for intruding but going through your comments almost caused me a heart attack and I am now starting to have second thoughts.

Yesterday, I ordered an AGP Gainward 7800 GS 512mb (20 pixel pipelines) AGP in order to replace my X800XT PE card. I must admit that the x800xt pe is an excellent card but oblivion in the outdoor environments was occasionally turning into a power point presentation so I figured that since I will be playing this game regularly for the next 6 or 7 months (if not more) and that a 7800GTish card on AGP has just come out, it would be a wise decision to sell the x800xt pe (as I just did btw) and buy the 7800. I run games at 1280X1024 and wanted a performance boost in oblivion and all the latest games at full settings.

Will I notice any improvements in fps and in image quality in oblivion and in the latest games? This card is supposed to run as fast as a pci-e 7800GT with the added bonus of the 512mb of memory. I've heard that this card can even outrun the 7800GTX at stock, if overclocked.

I am fully aware that I wont be noticing a quantum leap in performance and image quality but I am hoping to get at least an extra 8-10fps in my games and slightly prettier graphics due to SM3.0, HDR and better shadow handling of the geforce 7 as opposed to the X800 technology. What do you think?

FYI the following are my specs:

A64 3400+ clawhammer skt754
1gb (2x512mb) corsair ram
160Gb 7200rpm IBM HD
Creative X-FI Xtreme Music
ATi X800XT PE

I anxiously await your feedback! Thanks

HangTime · 18 Apr 2006 at 17:27

I wouldn't bother upgrading from an AGP 6800u tbh, since that requires a new motherboard to boot.

Better option would probably be to wait until AM2 or whatever is coming out, e.g. AMD moving to DDR2 platform or whatever.

The 6800u isn't a bad card and it offers ~7600GT performance which is still 'ok' in today's market.

Nazbit · 18 Apr 2006 at 18:07

Yer my thoughts exactly hangtime,

Im going to hang on and see what the next generation gear brings I Think.

ACESHIGH · 19 Apr 2006 at 11:47

chippy001 said:
Hi Guys,

Sorry for intruding but going through your comments almost caused me a heart attack and I am now starting to have second thoughts.

Yesterday, I ordered an AGP Gainward 7800 GS 512mb (20 pixel pipelines) AGP in order to replace my X800XT PE card. I must admit that the x800xt pe is an excellent card but oblivion in the outdoor environments was occasionally turning into a power point presentation so I figured that since I will be playing this game regularly for the next 6 or 7 months (if not more) and that a 7800GTish card on AGP has just come out, it would be a wise decision to sell the x800xt pe (as I just did btw) and buy the 7800. I run games at 1280X1024 and wanted a performance boost in oblivion and all the latest games at full settings.

Will I notice any improvements in fps and in image quality in oblivion and in the latest games? This card is supposed to run as fast as a pci-e 7800GT with the added bonus of the 512mb of memory. I've heard that this card can even outrun the 7800GTX at stock, if overclocked.

I am fully aware that I wont be noticing a quantum leap in performance and image quality but I am hoping to get at least an extra 8-10fps in my games and slightly prettier graphics due to SM3.0, HDR and better shadow handling of the geforce 7 as opposed to the X800 technology. What do you think?

FYI the following are my specs:

A64 3400+ clawhammer skt754
1gb (2x512mb) corsair ram
160Gb 7200rpm IBM HD
Creative X-FI Xtreme Music
ATi X800XT PE

I anxiously await your feedback! Thanks

IMO it wasnt a smart move.
Would have been better to have gotten a PCIE s754 mobo & a PCIE card for a similar price.

Oblivion runs better on ATI cards though

Gainward BLISS GeForce 7800 GT SILENT 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (AGP) £276.07 Including VAT

versus

Sapphire ATI Radeon X1800 XT 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-121-SP) £199.69 Including VAT
This card is faster (or get the X1800XT 512MB card if you play at high res)
&
Asus K8N4-E Deluxe nForce4 4X (Socket 754) PCI-Express Motherboard (MB-113-AS) £58.69 Including VAT

chippy001 · 19 Apr 2006 at 17:15

ACESHIGH said:
IMO it wasnt a smart move.
Would have been better to have gotten a PCIE s754 mobo & a PCIE card for a similar price.

Oblivion runs better on ATI cards though

Gainward BLISS GeForce 7800 GT SILENT 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (AGP) £276.07 Including VAT

versus

Sapphire ATI Radeon X1800 XT 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-121-SP) £199.69 Including VAT
This card is faster (or get the X1800XT 512MB card if you play at high res)
&
Asus K8N4-E Deluxe nForce4 4X (Socket 754) PCI-Express Motherboard (MB-113-AS) £58.69 Including VAT

I must shamefully admit that I wasn’t aware of the fact that PCI express S754 motherboards even existed so when considering an upgrade to pci-e I always factored into the formula the cost of a new s939 cpu so I always ended up concluding that’s its not quite feasible upgrading to PCI-E for me at present.

Apart from making me realise how dumb I was when making this order, could you tell why you think most people do not consider taking the route you suggested if it costs just the same and decide to stay with an AGP system instead? Is it just me or it sounds too easy to be true? What I am sure of is that as far as I am concerned it’s now too late to cancel the order as the card has been shipped already.

I’ll be in front of my PC, standing on a chair with a rope around my neck, awaiting your reply.

Thanks

dale1uk · 19 Apr 2006 at 18:16

Some people can't be bothered with the hassle of changing the motherboard aswell as the graphics card, and some people, like yourself, just don't know.

You could always send the agp card back and order a pci-e set-up instead. You have 14 days to change your mind

chippy001 · 19 Apr 2006 at 18:45

dale1uk said:
You could always send the agp card back and order a pci-e set-up instead. You have 14 days to change your mind

Technically, you're right but I live in Malta and the cost of shipping the card back to the UK plus the additional shipping costs for the new delivery (MOBO+GPU would cost me 40 GBP to have them delivered to Malta) would not make the order feasible anymore.

dale1uk · 19 Apr 2006 at 19:39

Ahh never noticed where you lived. Don't be too disapointed though as the card your getting will still be very good and you'll see an improvment in games over the x800.