Just received.........

[fastwunz]

my HIS ATi X1900XT Ice Q 512mb - cant wait to get it installed.

However, im changing from an Nvidia 7800Gt EE to an ATi card- So, are there any things that i need to take into consideration when removing the old and installing the new?

Obviously i need to delete the Nvidia drivers etc - but is there anything else that i should be doing to make sure all goes swimmingly?

Thanks

 

[fastwunz]

As said, Drivercleaner Professional is pretty much a must-have.

excellent -thanks guys - i cant wait to see how much better it is than my 7800GT EE - what do you guys rekon? 20%?

 

[fastwunz]

Bit more than that, the X1800XT is about on par with the 7800GTX 512MB now that ATI drivers have improved in the last year and a half. So the X1900XT will be a fair bit better than that.

REALLY? sweet! so i should be pretty happy with this card then yes? hehehehe

 

[fastwunz]

I just went from an X1800XT to an X1900XT and the difference was lovely to me, so I think going from a 7800GT will blow you away.

excellent - well im still worried about installing it etc - ive not got a crossfire compatible mobo - but im not going crossfire anyway! So it should be fine - lets just hope i dont do something particularly stupid and drop the ****** thing

 

[fastwunz]

Spare pair of pants there as well eh.

Cracking upgrade, enjoy.

yep - new kecks on standby for any card damage situations!

 

[fastwunz]

yep - new kecks on standby for any card damage situations!

one thing i should have mentioned - i sold my 7800 for £120! lol - think my mate (whon is rather well off) was secretly trying to do me a favour!

 

[fastwunz]

Yeah, I did that once with my 6800GT, slipped right out of my hands, luckily I caught it before it hit the floor.

blimey - thats impressive! my old 6600GT - i kicked one of the 'resistors'? off it within a min of installing it in my card. I had only just bought the damn thing - the great thing was, the owner of the shop i bought it from took it back and sent it off for repair - he then gave me one of his Sli'd 600Gt from his own machine as a replacement until the one i broke was swapped for a new one!! now you dont get customer service like that very often!

 

[fastwunz]

I think the big lumpy things are capacitors. I've always been very careful with my graphics cards but for some reason I never am with my sound card which costs almost as much. I think I just like graphics better

Went from a 9800Pro here to a 7600GT and it just stunned me. Hope you get just as good a boost

yeah i hope so - ive got a really nice sound card that i simply havent bothered to install - not bothered really as the onboard sound is more that adequate!

 

[fastwunz]

Which sound card is it?

i cant remember - its a soundblaster Audigy something or other - about two years old now - never used - its on a black board.

 

[fastwunz]

Youv'e not installed it . Im sure once you install it you will really notice the diffence in sound quality. They are one of those things that you dont realize how good they are untill you try it.

WEll i may install it then...............

Ive got the new card in now - its brilliant!! i ran a quick 3DMark 05 and from 7600points with my old 7800GT Extreme - ive not got 10943 points at stock!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[fastwunz]

Although - i do have one tiny problem. Ironforge was really busy last night in WoW and my FPS dropped to around 21!!!!!!!! this is strange because it never seemed to drop that low with my old 7800GT - i am of course running everything on max settings but im baffled at the low FPS - any thoughts?

 

[fastwunz]

You've got me there. Isn't there an option to play World Of Warcraft in Direct3D or OpenGL mode? Try switching it to the other. I'm not sure about the option because I don't play it, I just heard about this option.

well, i need to get used to the Catalyst control pannel - its slightly baffling when it says crruent core clock 500mhz - requested 621 mhz etc - makes you wonder which it is running when you are playing games! its a really stupid design!

 

[fastwunz]

Those are the 2D/3D clocks, when you open a game or something it goes from current to requested.

My advice would be to ditch Catalyst Control Centre/Panel and grab ATI Tray Tools, it's a much better software with many more features and uses much less system resources.

It is complicated when it comes to overclocking, but you can follow guides online (there's one stickied in this forum I think) to get it done in no time. I think it also has Overdrive 3.0 support for simple overclocking.

yeah i just had a butchers at that guide and its pretty useful - my mate came over last night and helped me install the card but reccommended that i only use the catalyst tools - think ill try the ones you mentioned - thanks for the advice about the clocks that are shown - i was worried for a momment!

Going back to the WoW thing - i get 140FPS in other places lol!