Is This Upgrade Worth It?

Pablo72 · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:05

Going from...

AMD 64 4000+
XFX 7800 GTX 256mb

To....

AMD X2 4600
BFG 8800 GTS

Is this upgrade worth the £450.00 price tag? I game at 1280 x 1058 res, I think!

Thanks guys

mishima · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:09

Scrap the AMD chip, It's a waste of money getting an X2. Core 2 duo's are pretty cheap now and offer much better performance! Perhaps you should get a smaller card like a 256MB X1950 Pro or something for that res!

Pablo72 · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:13

But, as there is no point getting an X2, is that not also the case with a non DX10 card?

mishima · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:20

The DX10 cards out at the moment are definately suited for much higher resolutions. If you want a DX10 card thats going to be worth while for the res you play in you may have to wait until they become more mainstream and ATI releases their DX10 rival.

Otherwise a X1950 Pro would be ideal it is DX9 but it offers superb performance that will last. I'm getting one next week. 256MB one can be got for around the £120 mark!

Pablo72 · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:25

Sorry to keep asking a question with a question...

I don't really want to upgrade my motherboard/CPU/RAM right now, so if I went with a X2 4600 how much of a performance bump would I see going from a 7800 GTX 256 to a X1950 Pro?

MRBARKER · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:29

Pablo72 said:
Going from...

AMD 64 4000+
XFX 7800 GTX 256mb

To....

AMD X2 4600
BFG 8800 GTS

Is this upgrade worth the £450.00 price tag? I game at 1280 x 1058 res, I think!

Thanks guys

AM64 X2 4600 will still work well and if you game at 1280 x 1024 no problems , you can always clock the 8800GTS , you can always upgrade you cpu , memory , motherboard later in the year , its still early for DX10

You can still build a great 939 system to last you

syke · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:32

Or spend more on the 8800GTX, keep the 4400 and save towards a C2D set up later?

mishima · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:32

Pablo72 said:
Sorry to keep asking a question with a question...

I don't really want to upgrade my motherboard/CPU/RAM right now, so if I went with a X2 4600 how much of a performance bump would I see going from a 7800 GTX 256 to a X1950 Pro?

Dont worry about it, thats what we're here to discuss. Whats the reason for the upgrade? Cause I'm not certain there would be much of a performance increase.

kmistry · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:33

Thats, true but a 939 system currently fetches a good price on many sites due to its scarceity, so if you really did want to upgrade you could sell your 939 stuff for a decent price and then buy core2duo and a nice dx10 GFX card

It may still be early days for dx10, but Vista launch is only a few days away and dx10 is the future

Kiz

MRBARKER · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:40

If i was you i would upgrade to DX10 and wait a couple months to upgrade cpu , motherboard , memory , you could still upgrade to Vista also and run with 939 ok

I will be upgrading to core2duo soon thats the way togo , but i still think 939 socket has life yet

Pablo72 · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:41

mishima said:
Dont worry about it, thats what we're here to discuss. Whats the reason for the upgrade? Cause I'm not certain there would be much of a performance increase.

To be brutally honest, I have no real practical reason other than the fact I fancy doing a little upgrading on my system. My current set-up can handle most stuff I throw at it... although with the advent of Oblivion and Company of Heroes, the system has only recently begun stuttering.

So, with a little Chrimbo money, I was going to do a small upgrade to keep me going for another year... and then do the big brand new system build early next year (once all the Vista/DX10/R600 vs 8 Series stuff has died down a little).

What are your thoughts?

syke · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:43

Pablo72 said:
To be brutally honest, I have no real practical reason other than the fact I fancy doing a little upgrading on my system. My current set-up can handle most stuff I throw at it... although with the advent of Oblivion and Company of Heroes, the system has only recently begun stuttering.

So, with a little Chrimbo money, I was going to do a small upgrade to keep me going for another year... and then do the big brand new system build early next year (once all the Vista/DX10/R600 vs 8 Series stuff has died down a little).

What are your thoughts?

If it was me, id sell the Gfx card and get a 8800GTX with the extra added..that way money is saved aswell. You can use the extra to save towards an upgrade later.

The 8800GTX would be a great addition.

Pablo72 · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:44

MRBARKER said:
If i was you i would upgrade to DX10 and wait a couple months to upgrade cpu , motherboard , memory , you could still upgrade to Vista also and run with 939 ok

I will be upgrading to core2duo soon thats the way togo , but i still think 939 socket has life yet

This is exactly what I was thinking. I was going to do a brand new system build this year, but decided that the 939 socket is good for a while longer... certainly if I drop an X2 into it.

As for graphics cards, while I totally love my 7800GTX 256mb... I feel the calling of a 8800 GTS!!!!!

MRBARKER · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:47

Syk3 said:
If it was me, id sell the Gfx card and get a 8800GTX with the extra added..that way money is saved aswell. You can use the extra to save towards an upgrade later.

The 8800GTX would be a great addition.

I would agree

buy 8800GTS or GTX , then save your money for upgrade for cpu , motherboard , memory later in year , or if your loaded buy a new whole system but i would not , if you see in my sig my spec runs like a dream and nothing is overclocked

syke · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:47

Pablo72 said:
This is exactly what I was thinking. I was going to do a brand new system build this year, but decided that the 939 socket is good for a while longer... certainly if I drop an X2 into it.

As for graphics cards, while I totally love my 7800GTX 256mb... I feel the calling of a 8800 GTS!!!!!

Yeah that system along with a 8800GTS or GTX would run till late this year maybe the next. Although i would try get a C2D asap ;]

Just imagine later on:
E6600
2-4GB RAM
8800GTX

MRBARKER · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:52

Remember you don`t have to spend thousands , i will be getting something like this soon + you need a DX10 card on top

Or just get a DX10 card and upgrade later

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Pablo72 · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:53

Syk3 said:
Yeah that system along with a 8800GTS or GTX would run till late this year maybe the next. Although i would try get a C2D asap ;]

Just imagine later on:
E6600
2-4GB RAM
8800GTX

Very true, guys... to all your opinions on this. I can't got into it too much as my system was originally bought from a competitor, for a large sum of money... however, over the past year, I have added to the system, and now feel the need to self build. This was to take place this year, but from reading these forums, I came to the decision that there is life in the old 939 still... and should I really blow another 2 grand on a breand new system, only 18 months after buying the last one!

So, a few tactical upgrades this year was going to be the order of the day... and put off the big build.

syke · 11 Jan 2007 at 12:56

To be honest, at the moment if you feel it has life left in your machine id go for the 8800GTX (yes the gtx

) because you can use that in your upgrade machine.

Pablo72 · 11 Jan 2007 at 13:15

Syk3 said:
To be honest, at the moment if you feel it has life left in your machine id go for the 8800GTX (yes the gtx ) because you can use that in your upgrade machine.

But by going to GTX I could run into a PSU problem... to say nothing of the X2 CPU becoming a real potential bottleneck (excuse me if I'm talking ********, I read these pearls of wisdom on another forum!).

I'm not sure if my PSU has the 2 power cables needed for the GTX - this is why I was thinking more along the lines of the GTS. Anyway, I could always migrate the GTS into an SLI set-up next year!

MRBARKER · 11 Jan 2007 at 13:18

be safe get a GTS u can always overclock , people said my FX57 would bottleneck with GTX but it was fine , i got GTS version as i dont play that many games anyway

U could alway speak to overclockers tech a find out

Make sure you have a 550 + PSU