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Which graphics card?

lolage

lolage

lolage

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I am in a big mess at the moment, im in the middle of specing me a gaming rig. I want to play games such as

BF2
Oblivion
Bioshock
Crysis

Im not sure if to get a
ATI X1950pro 512mb
or stetch to the 8800gts 320mb. Would i notice that much difference? Would the 8800 play crysis?

If the 8800gts is going to struggle im thinking if i should go GTX but its a big price jump. If i were to get the x1950pro id probably have to forget about Crysis..

Im worried if i buy 8800gts il regret not putting extra to gtx if it struggles with crysis.

Any thoughts? Thanks.
 
I'd stay clear of the 320Mb GTS as more and more games are going to demand the extra memory and this causes big slow downs with the GTS.

So it's the 640Mb GTS if looking that way.

Bang for bucks you can't do much better than a 2900 pro. If you can afford the extra get ths 8800 640Mb GTS. The extra money gives you about the same gain in performance compared with extra money spent.

A lot depends what the spec of your gaming rig is as to whether you will see the benefit of the GTX and also what resolution are you playing in?
 
Il be using

e2180 overclocked to 3ghz hopfully
2gb ram
520watt corsair HX
playing in 1680x1050

If thats helped.
 
Greebo said:
I'd stay clear of the 320Mb GTS as more and more games are going to demand the extra memory and this causes big slow downs with the GTS.

So it's the 640Mb GTS if looking that way.

Bang for bucks you can't do much better than a 2900 pro. If you can afford the extra get ths 8800 640Mb GTS. The extra money gives you about the same gain in performance compared with extra money spent.

A lot depends what the spec of your gaming rig is as to whether you will see the benefit of the GTX and also what resolution are you playing in?
Click to expand...

Also i thought benchmarks showed that the 640mb version diddnt alter much performance difference over the 320?
 
You seem to have missed the 512Mb 2900 Pro thats just come out, could be perfect for you. A decent amount of RAM (unlike the 8800GTS) and DX10 support (unlike the X1950).
 
Once the 2900 pro is clocked to XT speeds it should be about on par with the 640mb GTS, but id agree with the above, 320mb GTS is not the way to go, thats only a stop gap, tide me over card imo, as the 320mb will not be enough for the newer games that are coming along with thier bigger textures etc..., thus requiring more memory, so you may find your going to have to upgrade it again in a couple of months.

Id go with the 640mb GTS over the 2900's , as the 2900's can not run Dx10 very well at the moment due to their Dx10 drivers being attrocious, so if you got one of those you would have to wait until ATi sorted the Dx10 performance out, and you don't know when that will be, in Bioshock for example, in Dx9 they get about 70+, yet when switched to Dx10, they drop over 30+ frames, and can only manage a humilitaing 42, thats at 16x12 with 0xAA/16xAF, which is slower than even the 320mb GTS in Dx10!!!, where as the Nvidia cards don't drop any frames at all switching from Dx9 to Dx10, they actually go up a bit, so id go woth the 640mb GTS as its the safest option, or if you can afford the £300, the GTX. :D
 
Last edited:
lolage said:
Also i thought benchmarks showed that the 640mb version diddnt alter much performance difference over the 320?
Click to expand...

It doesn't in 99% of games. If fact in most it is identical. However, there are now a few games out there where if you go for ultra setting, the textures are too large for the 320Mb of memory the GTS has and it slows down a lot.

The chances are with new demanding games this will continue. I'm sure i've seen a benchmark with world in conflict where the 320Mb is only half the fps of the 640Mb card. In saying that even a GTX runs world in conflict like a pig.
 
The 2900 and 8800 debate rolls on.

The 8800GTS 320 is a good card. There is a small risk that you may have to turn down the detail or AA AF if you're running at a high res when newer games come out.
Quake 4 has High + Ultra settings, 512 is needed for Ultra but I'm hard pushed to see any difference, certainly doesn't affect gameplay so even with a 256M card it plays great.

I can't see the 320 version of the 8800 card causing any issues, when a game comes out that needs more that 320 for max settings it will still look great a notch down.

Paying an extra £50-60 just in case is like saying ... oooh a GTX is better and will last longer, just buy a GTX. We all have to make choices and £50 saved now goes towards the next card or hardware upgrade.

Same goes for the 2900. The XT is a little expensive with uncertain drivers in DX10 but the Pro looks a bargain and clocks to XT without any issue. Looking at the prices advertised elsewhere it could be even more of a bargain when stock arrives elsewhere in the UK.

Buy what you can comfortably afford, you can never future proof a PC and you don't have to have the best hardware available to have a great gaming experience.

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