Gaming on an old 17" CRT

[manveruppd]

I'm speccing a rig for a friend, and have opted to get him one of these 7600GTs over here. However, he said he's keeping his old 17" CRT monitor for now, so he'll probably be playing at 1024x768 resolutions, and I'm wondering if even the 7600 might be overkill? His main game atm is Dawn of War: Dark Crusade, which can run ok on an old GeForce 3 Ti (though obviously there aren't any of those in PCI-E!), so I know he could get by on a much cheaper card. I picked the 7600 so that he'll be covered if he picks up some other game within the next year (he was making vague murmurs about Company of Heroes, and I think he'll definitely be interested in Warhammer: Age of Reckoning when that comes out). However, I suspect that, even with everything turned to max, the 7600 won't be stressed too much at 1024x768, and would therefore be a bit of a waste of money. Am I right? Should I set him up with a 7300 instead?

 

[xirokx]

get the 6600 turbo or the 7600 for now, dont spend too much, tell him to sit tight and then go for a dx10 card when dx10 games are released....otherwise he wont see that much of a difference so ultimately will be wasting money atm

thats my opinion anyway...

 

[Zefan]

The 7600 is a brilliant card and will allow him to run at a much higher resolution which will look SO much better. The difference between 1024x768 with no AA and 1600x1200 with even just 2xAA is astounding. It'll allow for him to enable AF anf AA on all his games which he currently has (the Ti would go BOOM if he did) and will last him a good while when he decides to play newer games.

The 7300 on the other hand will struggle quickly when it comes to new games.

 

[manveruppd]

There's no question of him playing at 1600x1280, as I said he's on an old 17" CRT.

The 7300 on the other hand will struggle quickly when it comes to new games.

...but should be ok for now, right? THG lists it in the same bracket as my current 6800nu which lets me run all the games he plays at max at 1280x1024. I thought by going one up and suggesting the 7600 I'd save him an upgrade a year down the line, but now that I think about it the prices on these things drop so fast once the new ones are out that it always makes financial sense to get the cheapest card that meets your current needs and upgrade as those needs change.

 

[snowdog]

There's no question of him playing at 1600x1280, as I said he's on an old 17" CRT.

Ehhh
I have a 7 (17') year old crt monitor wich im using mostly for fps games and any fast games, and im playing @ 1600x1200 @ 75 hz and 1280x1024 @ 85hz.
Also even at 1024x768 a 7600 isnt that good at all, i have a 6800gs wich is approx 15% slower as a 7600GT, yet i need a lot mroe power at that reso in tdu, can onyl handle upto 4x aa and 8x AF, while cars need a bit more aa to look better, or a higehr res offcoruse, but then the gfx card chickens out.

My recommendation is to get something even more powerfull as a 7600 series, its not enough for games like tdu or medieval total war 2 for example.
1900/1950 ati series would be a nice choise or the new 8600gts that is coming soon.