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Upgrade to a 8800 GT?

Soldato
Joined
4 Dec 2002
Posts
14,520
Location
North Lincolnshire
Well guys I've been out of the graphics card loop for a while and upgraded my monitor yesterday to a rather nice 22inch one (from a 17 inch) and a few games I play a feeling the punch lol.

System spec is

E2180 (2gz stock) at 3gz
Abit IP35 motherboard
2gb Geil DDR2 RAM
250gb WD harddrive
Creative labs X-FI soundcard
Nvidia 8800GT 512mb (G92 chip)
Corsair 520W PSU

Now I've not got a fortune to spend (about £200 budget ish) and I'm gonna be looking at going to a quad after xmas as well. Ideas?
 
Permabanned
Joined
31 May 2007
Posts
10,721
Location
Liverpool
It'll be quite a sizeable upgrade actually.

It'd be around 2-3x the performance I'd imagine at the upper end of performance.

Whoops, got my numbers mixed up there. :p
 
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Associate
Joined
31 Oct 2007
Posts
2,455
Location
Gods County(Allegedly)
IMO waiting for a coupla months is best idea ; partic. if your 8800 gt is more or less coping.
Probably best performance buy @ moment would be 5850 but possibly overkill if your gaming at 1680x1050.
I'm running this http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-116-GW&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=927 at the moment (upgrade from a 512mb 4870) and it runs my games/monitor @ 1920x1200 o'k. Currently looks a bit overpriced though :(
If your happy with Amd then would probably go for the cheapest 4890 as best budget buy.
Or you could wait for Nvidia to bring its 'new' (?) range out and see where pices end up .
I've decided that as my 260 deals with everthing I throw at it at the moment it would be a waste to invest in a 5850 (tempting:)) so I'm hanging on in the hope that when nvidia brings its next gen out there is a bit of a price war :D
 
Associate
Joined
23 Oct 2002
Posts
1,342
Location
Cheltenham
I had an 8800GTS that unfortunately died and decided that my screen would look better in solid beige. If it hadn't died I would probably have waited till January before buying. As it is now though if you really want to upgrade now for £200 it would be sheer madness not to buy the 5850, it has no competition at the moment.
 
Caporegime
Joined
8 Jul 2003
Posts
30,062
Location
In a house
At the res on a 22" (if its 1680x1050), then its not worth getting a 5850, as im on that res and was going to go to one from my 1gb 4870, but after reading the reviews, and seeing thats its mostly only 8 frames faster, im passing.
 
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Soldato
OP
Joined
4 Dec 2002
Posts
14,520
Location
North Lincolnshire
At the res on a 22" (if its 1680x1050), then its not worth getting a 5850, as im on that res and was going to go to one from my 1gb 4870, but after reading the reviews, and seeing thats its mostly only 8 frames faster, im passing.

Sadly the native res of the screen isnt 1680x1050, its 1920x1080

Samsung P2270 screen

Had to turn off AA and AF from most of my games but Fallout 3 at the native res chugs abit :(

I'll have a look at the 5850s
 
Soldato
OP
Joined
4 Dec 2002
Posts
14,520
Location
North Lincolnshire
Now I would throw in another 2gb of ram and try to squeeze another few hundred mhz out of your e2180.

When i made the build I originally had 4gb of ram but I couldnt use all 4 dimms at the time as DIMM4 appears to be shorting the chips. Had to RMA the 2nd set

Might look at some cheap 4gb (2x2gb pairs) though now seen as DDR3 has taken hold and see what I can get to.
 
Soldato
Joined
6 Feb 2004
Posts
7,765
Location
Rugeley
The 58** series are running on beta drivers atm so they won't be getting the max from those cards for a month or two then you will really see the performance jump massively.
 
Soldato
Joined
6 Feb 2004
Posts
7,765
Location
Rugeley
Even at 1680x1050 i would still get a 5850 just means you can put more AA on than if you was on a 4870/4890 series, will also mean on games you will be able to put more eye candy on and get better fps.
 
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