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New graphics card time

Man of Honour
Joined
17 Oct 2002
Posts
160,182
I'm going to buy an 8800GTS.

But before I do, some exciting questions for you all as it's been a number of years so I infested this part of the forums :p

I play Eve Online and, now, Armed Assault. I game on a 19" CRT or a 17" LCD (dual display, but I don't use both at once for games). Therefore, my max gaming resolution is normally about 1280x1024. I like to running everything at max everything. Great looking games = win. My Radeon 850XT PE now sucks and I often get 10fps in Armed Assault at 1024x768.

I was set on getting an 8800GTS 640Mb. But then Nvidia launched the 320Mb version, which would appear to do the job at a considerable saving. So I decided actually, this would make more sense.

Does it?

Next up. Which card to get? I've noticed stuff like the BFG 8800GTS OC. Is there any point in the overclocked cards or do all GTS's overclock anyway so I can just clock it myself?

And the burning question. 8900. Is it soon, should I wait?

Thanks in advance!
 
320MB would seem the decent move. There have been loads more companies launching the 8800 320MB, Gigabyte have now released a version of the card. There's also eVGA, BFG, Leadtek, Gainward, Foxconn, Asus, POV, XFX, MSI, Inno3D - Might be best researching for reviews.

I have a BFG and I can't fault it. Comes with a lifetime warranty and brilliant customer support. Most of the specficiations on the cards are very similar if not the same. So I would be deciding on the company itself and how good its reputation is etc. BFG seems a sensible option!
 
Pretty much all graphics cards are built to the reference design now (and have been for a few years, Asus still being an exception - wierdos) so generally offer the same performance and roughly the same overclocking potential however some have better coolers than others which helps.

If the BFG OC isn't going to cost you much more than say £10 extra I'd go for it but if it is I'd save the cash as mostly the overclocks you can achieve yourself if necessary. :)
 
yeah and the overclocking doesn't make a huge difference anyway unless you're a benchmark whore.

go for the 320mb gts Fox. its the best value card and it'll offer all the performance you need for a long while to come i would have thought:)

I'd go for a standard clocked one with the best support, so my vote is BFG. might cost more than other 320mb GTS's but the lifetime warranty and great CS is worth the extra.
 
Sounds like a BFG 320mb then. And only £199 to preorder from OcUK......

When is it out?

I guess the 8900 isn't worth hanging on for?

I'm going to run it with my 3200+ A64 for now. If it still sucks I'll get a new CPU but I'll see how it goes.
 
[TW]Fox said:
Sounds like a BFG 320mb then. And only £199 to preorder from OcUK......

When is it out?

I guess the 8900 isn't worth hanging on for?

I'm going to run it with my 3200+ A64 for now. If it still sucks I'll get a new CPU but I'll see how it goes.


thats the best way to do it, like i said in the other thread. For some reason, i dont see the point in upgrading with a new cpu or an entirely new pc if you dont have to. Getting the card first will enable you to make a choice on the rest of the pc:)
I guess the 8900 isn't worth hanging on for?

i dont think so, i can see them releasing the 8900gtx only at first and that will affect the 8800gtx's price, but not much else. the 320mb gts is a bargain right now:)

one question, what psu do you have?
 
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Hiper Modular PSUs have recently got a bit of a reputation for unreliability but if you've had it this long it is probably fine. They seem to normally die quite quickly or they just work. :)
 
I didnt have one die on me in a year. Although when I thought my first one died and it didnts OCuK changed it anyway as I thought it was broke turned out to be the motherboard. My second one was running rock solid but I changed it for a corsair so i dont have to hassle if it did blow up ect :).
 
[TW]Fox said:
It's been fine for 18 months, do these blow up or something? It was the forum favourite when I got it.

Yeah well as everything hardware only news is bad news an they have more than enough of that, still im sure they dont all go out with a bang :)
 
Hiper's seem to be going out of fashion with a 'bang' :p.

The 8800gts 320mb is a steal, if you can find the 8800gts Mondeo edition, that's even better ;)
 
Dave2150 said:
Doesnt sound like it, thats a very sub par PSU, infact you cant even shift them on the MM anymore due to their terrible reputation.

Well everyone on here was going on about them as if they were indeed the best thing since sliced Hovis when I bought it :p
 
Thing about Hiper is they seemed to spring up from out of nowhere (as far as I was concerned at least) around 2yrs ago and quickly built up a good reputation. Same thing happened with Tagan.

But we digress. 320meg 8800GTS is deffo the best value card at the moment, cost around £185 and the only thing (significantly) faster is the 8800GTX costing nearly twice as much.
 
my brother in law had a hiper 580 watt psu which blew up on him.lucky it didnt take out any other parts, after that he got an enermax noisetaker 600w,in my opinion enermax are the best psu you can buy
 
setter said:
hiper psu's are like a well made bomb,theyre guaranteed to go off

Mine only lasted 2 months before giving cold boot issues and swings in voltages, got a 700 watter ocz now, much happier :D
 
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