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Do I need an new card?

Dev2

Dev2

Dev2

Associate
Joined
5 Jul 2006
Posts
959
Location
Dublin
Hello,

My Rig:
AMD San Diego 3700+ @ 2.4 GHz
ASUS A8N SE SLi
2 GB PC3200
Enermax Liberty 620 Watt (at leas 22 amps on each 12v rail)
Sapphire Radeon X1900XTX w/ Zalman Copper Flower @650MHz Core, 1.5GHz Memory
Dell 17" Flatscreen @ 1280x1024

I get approximately an average of low 20's in Far Cry 2 and Crysis. I hope to be playing mostly shooters in the nature of Crysis possible some strategy games like Empire and World in Conflict.

If I bought lets say a high end card would it be a complete waste or would it get me to an acceptable 50 fps in my shooters or is it simply a case of leave the computer and save up for a new one. The truth is I can't afford a new computer just a new graphics card.
 
What kind of budget did you have in mind for the gfx card? Ideally you could upgrade your existing graphics card as the above poster suggests, but you should really consider upgrading to a bigger monitor that can offer better resolutions. Don't underestimate how much an impact the new monitor will have on your gaming.
 
You should just plan on a total upgrade. Your rig was good in it's day but now it's really, really dated.
 
Thanks for the replies. Unfortunately I can't afford a new computer, I'm a student and unlikely I will get any significant amount of money in the next year or two till I have finished my studies at university. Then when I'm working for a while get an awesome rig.

I do however have the intention of buying a new card fully knowing that some other part of my system will be a bottleneck. I just really want those extra fps for games I want to play like Crysis. However if buying a new card doesn't get me extra fps I don't want a new card. Basically what I'm asking is if I get a 4850 or equivalent will my fps go approximately to the desired amount or will it increase a negligible amount meaning my system is almost already bottlenecking the graphics.

@darwin, I appreciate the reply and that a new monitor will improve my gaming but isn't a higher resolution monitor the last thing I would want. I mean if anything it would take from both my fps and wallet?

Ma budget is €300
 
Dev2 said:
Ma budget is €300
Click to expand...

*Asus GeForce GTX 260 896MB GDDR3 PCI-Express Graphics Card - £119.99
*Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS4 Intel P35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard - £60.98
*Intel Pentium Dual-Core E5200 "LGA775 Core 2" 2.50GHz (800FSB) - £51.99
*OCZ Gold Edition 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 PC2-8500C5 Dual Channel - £41.99
*Akasa AK-965 CPU Cooler (For overclocking E5200 upto 3.6Ghz+) - £13.98

Total: £299.86 Inc Vat + Delivery = Job done and sell your old parts to make a few £'s back :) Edit: Parts were chosen on the assumption your not an old hand at overclocking etc, so the above should be fairly simple to get on with ;)
 
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I would go for this... ok its over budget but you can sell off your old bits to fund the differance & if your really lucky you might be able to unlock the CPU to a Quad :) (See Sig)

HIS ATI Radeon HD 4870 1024MB GDDR5 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - OEM (H487F1GP) £103.99
(£90.43) £103.99
(£90.43)
AMD Phenom II X2 Dual Core 550 3.10GHz Black Edition (Socket AM3) - Retail AMD Phenom II X2 Dual Core 550 3.10GHz Black Edition (Socket AM3) - Retail £79.99
(£69.56) £79.99
(£69.56)
Gigabyte GA-MA770-UD3 AMD 770 (Socket AM3/AM2+) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard Gigabyte GA-MA770-UD3 AMD 770 (Socket AM3/AM2+) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £60.98
(£53.03) £60.98
(£53.03)
Kingston HyperX 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 8500C5 1066MHz Dual Channel (KHX8500D2K2/4G) Kingston HyperX 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 8500C5 1066MHz Dual Channel (KHX8500D2K2/4G) £37.98
(£33.03) £37.98
(£33.03)
Sub Total : £246.05
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £10.00
VAT is being charged at 15% VAT : £38.41
Total : £294.46
 
Oh **** it then, might as well aim for a new computer or at least a partial upgrade. :) Should I create a new thread in a different section or can I continue here?

I was going to buy a €400 headphones. Maybe I could put the money to a new rig and lay off the weed for a while.
Parts I can use from my rig

Ma Case (Antec Sonata II)
Ma HDD (Seagate 250 GB SATA)
Ma Monitor, Mouse and Keyboard (Arbitrary)
Ma PSU (Enermax 620 Watt)
Ma Sound Card (Creative X-Fi)

Ma new budget: €600

Parts to be replaced
CPU
RAM
Mobo
GPU

Also please note that I work in €'s, work your normal magic in £'s and I'll do the converting. It would be just worth keeping in mind that Ma €600 budget in english money is approx £500.

The two systems above me add up to €450, where should I blow the extra cash?
 
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*Intel Core i7 920 D0 Stepping (SLBEJ) 2.66Ghz (Nehalem) (Socket LGA1366) - £205.99
*Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD3R Intel X58 (Socket 1366) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard - £143.99
*HIS ATI Radeon HD 4870 1024MB GDDR5 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - OEM (H487F1GP) - £103.99
*Patriot Viper 6GB (3x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800 (1600MHz) Low Latency Tri-Channel (PVT36G1600LLK) - £75.99

Total : £541.47 Inc Delivery

Ok slightly more than your new budget, well worth it imo :) I'm not upto speed on the latest and greatest AMD builds since I haven't built anything AMD based for nearly a year now. However I do know some AMD systems are currently better bang for buck value, although nothing touches the Intel I7's far as im aware? Rest of your current system should cope with that fine, is that 250GB a 7200.10 model?
 
I would advise against i7 as the purpose of the upgrade is gaming and between the i7 & Phenom II for gaming there is little in them, if you also do heavy encoding then the i7 might be worth considering but your not going to get it for £500 / €600... with a decent graphics card

I feel that the AMD System that I spec'ed above is the best thing to go for... the S775 Systems have limited upgrade potential whereas the AM3 should be good for newly released AMD CPUs for sometime yet.

As for adding to the AMD PC, you could consider a Tri of Quad Core AM3 CPU or going for a DDR3 & AM3 setup to keep things more future proof. A single platter 500GB 7200.12 seagate HDD should speed things up if your Current drive is 7200.10 or below also....
 
Sean_UK said:
*Intel Core i7 920 D0 Stepping (SLBEJ) 2.66Ghz (Nehalem) (Socket LGA1366) - £205.99
*Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD3R Intel X58 (Socket 1366) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard - £143.99
*HIS ATI Radeon HD 4870 1024MB GDDR5 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - OEM (H487F1GP) - £103.99
*Patriot Viper 6GB (3x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800 (1600MHz) Low Latency Tri-Channel (PVT36G1600LLK) - £75.99

Total : £541.47 Inc Delivery

Ok slightly more than your new budget, well worth it imo :) I'm not upto speed on the latest and greatest AMD builds since I haven't built anything AMD based for nearly a year now. However I do know some AMD systems are currently better bang for buck value, although nothing touches the Intel I7's far as im aware? Rest of your current system should cope with that fine, is that 250GB a 7200.10 model?
Click to expand...

Well ma new budget is €600 which is about £500 I'll probably get 4GB of RAM instead of 6GB. CPU/Mobo seems a bit pricey, games are generally GPU limited rather than CPU limited should I not scale back a bit on the CPU and get the 4890 or nVidia equivalent?
 
Dev2 said:
Well ma new budget is €600 which is about £500 I'll probably get 4GB of RAM instead of 6GB. CPU/Mobo seems a bit pricey?
Click to expand...

I7 is pricey no question, Intel alternatives would be 775 Q9650/Q9550 CPU's for serious gaming rig with a decent P45 motherboard, so if you're going down that route I'd advise looking at AMD and plough the savings into a better gfx card, as suggested by gamesaregood^
 
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I would rather save my pennys for a I7 or a AMD AM3 mobo ram cpu over 775 just because there is no longer an upgrade path for 775 socket :( (shame mines a 775 ow well once i upgrade to a I7 i have a media pc woo)
 
Intel has commited to another 2+ years support for LGA775 actually...

I would reccomend a core 2 based system along with a 4850 or 4870 personally as the best cost effective gaming solution right now - forget Phenom II or i7 ones a false economy and the other overkill for your needs.
 
Rroff said:
Intel has commited to another 2+ years support for LGA775 actually...

I would reccomend a core 2 based system along with a 4850 or 4870 personally as the best cost effective gaming solution right now - forget Phenom II or i7 ones a false economy and the other overkill for your needs.
Click to expand...

The Phenom seemed reasonable to me at the quoted price above of £80? The quoted dual core above is £50, surely £30 constitutes a worthy stretch?
 
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I've been reading these forums for a while now and thought it was about time i joined in on the fun :D

My personal choice would be something along these lines:

AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition 3.2GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £149.99

XFX ATI Radeon HD 4890 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £142.99

Gigabyte GA-MA790XT-UD4P (Socket AM3) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard £105.00

OCZ Reaper 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C6 1333MHz Dual Channel (OCZ3RPR13334GKK) £54.99

Titan TTC-NK85TZ Fenrir CPU Cooler (Socket 754/939/940/AM2/LGA775/LGA1366) £33.34

Sub Total : £422.88
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £10.00
VAT is being charged at 15% VAT : £64.93
Total : £497.81


This should be a well running system at stock, plus due to the cpu being a black edition should easily be able to ramp up the multiplier for a quick and easy overclock.
 
Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 LGA775 'Yorkfield' 2.83GHz 12MB-cache (1333FSB) Processor - Retail + World In Conflict PC Game £171.99

XFX ATI Radeon HD 4890 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £142.99

Gigabyte GA-X48-DS5 Intel X48 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £99.99

OCZ Blade Series 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 PC2-9200C5 Low Voltage Dual Channel (OCZ2B1150LV4GK) £56.99

Sub Total : £410.41
FREE SHIPPING (DPD Next Day)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : FREE
VAT is being charged at 15.00% VAT : £61.56
Total : £471.97
Click to expand...

Thats roughly what I would go for personally.
 
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