HELP Best Value Mid Range Card (if such a thing exists anymore!)

Greebo · 30 Jul 2007 at 11:35

Right, I have read and read and read and still can't make my mind up as to which card to upgrade my system to so time for advice.

Currently have an X800XT which has been fine for the games I have been running since I only run at 1280 x 1024 res.

However, I now have two games (splinter cell and colin mcrae dirt) which I am desperate to play but they require Shader 3.0 support so time to bite the bullet and upgrade.

Unfortunately money is tighter than it used to be when I bought the X800xt for £350 (was I mad?????) so as much as I wish I could have a 8800 GTX its beyond my reach plus would probable need a psu upgrade as well

.

So the best I can bring my selection down to is as follows:

X1900 XT 256Mb - £95
X1950 XTX 512Mb - £105
8800 GTS 320 Mb - £160
2900 xt 512Mb - £185

There would appear to be no real mid range card anymore. I have already discounted the 8600 and 2600 as although their performance would be a step up from my X800XT (barely any fps with the 2600, all I would be gaining would be the shader 3 support and IQ). The directx 10 support is irrelevant IMHO as neither of these cards will be able to run the new games at any kind of playable framerate.

So my choice comes down of what used to be the old top end and what is now the bottom of the new top end.

So do I get one of the x19xx cards which would give me my shader 3 support and a very large fps gain over my x800xt and then upgrade again next year or should I stretch myself to the 8800 or 2900 now?? As far as I can tell, the 2900 would give me better image quality but no more fps than the x1950xtx whereas the 8800 GTS would still give me even more fps for my money. Also confused with the 8800 GTS 320Mb, as in certain games it's results are dire due to some problem over the memory. Hopefully, only a driver issue with the weird quantity of memory but it might be a permanent glitch and with the new drivers improving the performance of the 2900 XT all the time and 512Mb on board, it might be worth the extra for the 2900 XT

The current price difference between the 2900 and 8800 would steer me more towards the 8800 atm if it wasn't for the memory issue.

But is it worth the extra £55 for the 8800 over the 1950 in the first place???

Are there any games coming out which require shader 4.0 support? I don't want to buy a shader 3 card and then have to upgrade again just to play a game.

God, i'm sure choosing pc components used to be easier in the old days!

So give me your best advice please

ergonomics · 30 Jul 2007 at 14:43

an x1950xtx 512 for £105?? thats excellent price. very good dx9 card, if a little power hungry. if you arent *too* concerned with dx10 get that really.

Greebo · 30 Jul 2007 at 15:04

I know, I can't beleive you can get them for that price as well. It has almost made me buy it twice now! A lot of card for the money and once was top of the range and that was not a long time ago either.

But I'm trying not to make any rash decisions.

I have now read about the new beta drivers for 2000 series cards and it has made a big difference to both the 2900 and 2600 cards supposedly.

It seems to make it worth the extra money for the 2900xt over the 8800 GTS now.

Perhaps I should also include the 2600XT 256Mb DDR4 card again since I can get them for £73.

Depends on how much it has improved things on fps but if they are getting somewhere up near the 1900/1950 performance then it would save a packet load of money and mean I could get a better card in a years time.

The waters just get muddier.....................

Greebo · 30 Jul 2007 at 16:47

ergonomics said:
an x1950xtx 512 for £105?? thats excellent price. very good dx9 card, if a little power hungry. if you arent *too* concerned with dx10 get that really.

You say "power hungry". How much is that? Will my Tagan 480W with 28A on the 12v rail handle the job?

For that matter, are there any other cards on my shortlist which I need to remove because my PSU won;t handle them? I don't really want to fork out for another PSU yet.

Big.Wayne · 30 Jul 2007 at 16:56

Greebo said:
as much as I wish I could have a 8800 GTX its beyond my reach

I recently bought a Powercolour X1950XT 512MB with the quiet cooler for about £136 and its doing the business. A 640MB 8800GTS would have been my choice but I wasn't happy paying over £200.

I've got quite a large 'backlog' of games to get through, all DirectX 9 and WinXP and even though I play at high res the X1950XT has enough muscle to keep everything smooth.

Will look again at whats for sale at around xmas time, by then I may have a Vista machine set-up and be looking to see if anything exciting is happening on the DirectX 10 scene.

fish99 · 30 Jul 2007 at 17:59

Greebo said:
X1900 XT 256Mb - £95
X1950 XTX 512Mb - £105
8800 GTS 320 Mb - £160
2900 xt 512Mb - £185

2900 XT 512 mb for £185 :eek:

Aren't they £230 :confused:

ergonomics · 30 Jul 2007 at 19:29

Greebo said:
You say "power hungry". How much is that? Will my Tagan 480W with 28A on the 12v rail handle the job?

For that matter, are there any other cards on my shortlist which I need to remove because my PSU won;t handle them? I don't really want to fork out for another PSU yet.

the psu you have is fine, what i mean by power hungry is just that it consumes a fair bit of power for a dx9 card, but like i said, your psu is more than enough to cope with it

ACESHIGH · 30 Jul 2007 at 20:46

Being concerned about budget i would say get the X1950 XTX 512Mb. That card will run pretty much everything fine, and not be a problem for your Tagan PSU.

Greebo · 30 Jul 2007 at 22:47

fish99 said:
2900 XT 512 mb for £185 Aren't they £230

Sorry I never stated these prices were all on overclockers, some are and some aren't.

The 2900 xt is available for that price plus £8 postage but obviously I can't list where.

At £230.00 it would not be on my list and to be fair, even at £185, it's a push but I always like a bargain

TheRealDeal · 30 Jul 2007 at 23:31

HD2900xt is best card on that list so if you want the best go for that. In
your original post you state that the 2900 will give you better image quality
over the 1950 series but not frames. Thats far from the truth it will give
you a good boost in fps also. It beats the 8800gts for fps in most games
these days.

Tute · 30 Jul 2007 at 23:51

Whilst the X1950XTX is a nice price, i'm amazed at the 2900XT price! :eek:

If you can afford it, i'd go for that really, even if you don't like it you'd make £20 profit selling it on second hand.

I thought mine was cheap when I bought it, cost me £40 more than that!

simonnance · 31 Jul 2007 at 00:01

for good value, go for the X1950XTX, i aquired a 2nd hand X1900 XTX for £90, best deal i ever had! Strangely i have it beating mate's of mine with 8800GTSs in some games (X3 for example, full quality, 1280x1024), though my C2D is running faster than theirs which probably helps.

my point? ATI's top end X1xxx gen cards are still a force to be reconed with even with pretty intensive games (i run World In Conflict at HIGH with pretty good FSP for example), especially at lower res.

Now if the 8800GTS was sub £150, that might make life trickier, but as is you do NOT get a 60% performance boost for that extra £60, nowhere near. Oh, and from your sig you seem like a OCer, so you can get a LOT out of a decent X19xxx XT/XTX.

J.D · 31 Jul 2007 at 00:03

TheRealDeal said:
HD2900xt is best card on that list so if you want the best go for that. In
your original post you state that the 2900 will give you better image quality
over the 1950 series but not frames. Thats far from the truth it will give
you a good boost in fps also. It beats the 8800gts for fps in most games
these days.

Aye and a 640mb GTS is around 33-50% faster than a x19xx XT or XTX series card (I think). From some recent reviews I've read it's a little bit faster.

If money is a little tight just now then a X19xx XT/XTX series card will do you great. I really enjoyed my move from X800XT PE to this card with a dose of 7600GT OC for 3 weeks in-between the move

.

The only thing that's making me want an upgrade is that I run at 1680x1050 resolution and this is when a GTS/GTX/X2900 would do me fine.

C64 · 31 Jul 2007 at 01:17

Where is the facts relating to the 640mb version of the 8800gts
beating the 320mb version? im aware that at very high res it does but other
than that i think they are pretty much the same.

Tute · 31 Jul 2007 at 01:59

C64 said:
Where is the facts relating to the 640mb version of the 8800gts
beating the 320mb version? im aware that at very high res it does but other
than that i think they are pretty much the same.

They are, however I remember reading a certain review that found in certain games the 320MB version would struggle at 1600x1200 when AA, AF, HDR etc were all laid on thick.

Sure, it takes a lot to fill the framebuffer, however IF a current game can fill it at 1600x1200, then maybe (just maybe) owners will start to feel the pinch with games like Crysis?

Sure, it's just speculation, but possible maybe?

MikeHunt79 · 31 Jul 2007 at 02:08

What about the 8600? I would consider sub £100 cards to be mid range,

Tute · 31 Jul 2007 at 02:12

MikeHunt79 said:
What about the 8600? I would consider sub £100 cards to be mid range,

It's a bit of an odd range, the 8600s. If you are prepared to clock the nuts off it, the 8600GT is a very neat little card. Otherwise you're looking at the X1950XT for <£100, which is a lot faster.

man_from_uncle · 31 Jul 2007 at 08:23

Those are some very good prices on the ATI cards.

At the resolution you're gaming at a X1950XT will be fine, and a 256mb version to boot. I'd go for that in the short term, then as and when it starts to struggle at that resolution, you could upgrade again. As of this moment I don't know any games that won't play well at high/max settings at 1280x1025 on a X1950XT.

Margaret · 31 Jul 2007 at 10:06

Your PSU should be able to run any of them cards fine, even the 8800GTX.

I'm running my GTX on a PSU with 24a on the 12v rails. :eek:

Greebo · 31 Jul 2007 at 15:35

Jihad said:
Your PSU should be able to run any of them cards fine, even the 8800GTX.

I'm running my GTX on a PSU with 24a on the 12v rails.

I think I might be pushing my luck though. My system has 2 raptors, 2 big hard drives, fan controller, water cooler, wireless pci card, audigy card, 2 dvd writers................a GTX might just kill it all! :eek:

But on a serious note does a GTS require less power than a GTX?