AGP GFX cards

[Influenza]

Im after a new GFX card , currently got a radeon 9600XT but games are starting to run a bit crap on it lately.
I dont really wanna upgrade my motherboard etc..... had enough hassle with that last year.

Theres 2 im looking at atm , either GF 6600GT or a radeon 9800 pro , bearing in mind the radeon is 50 quid cheaper.

Anyone got any suggestions?

 

[Sycho]

You can get a 6600gt for £120-130 from most places and it's by far more future proof, this doesn't mean the 9800pro is a bad card however it is infact still very good but if you got the money and want the best value i would say 6600GT.

 

[Crookshanks]

What CPU are you using? You may have read in magazines about the need to "match" the cpu power with the graphics power - and thought (as I did) "yeah yeah yeah I'm sure a better graphics card will be much better". As someone who's been through this recently - I really can say though that matching is important - you really won't see any improvement changing your graphics card if the games you play are cpu limited.

It seems to be that the latest generation of graphics card are SO powerful that the CPUs are lagging behind. Unless you are planning to run games at 1600x1200 then you probably won't notice much difference between either of the two cards you listed above (assuming you are running on a mediocre cpu, say around a 1900+ to 2600+ AMD or Intel equivalent). As Sycho says though - the Geforce offers support for a later revision of directx, whereas the ATI Radeon is significantly cheaper.

 

[Influenza]

Running a P4 3.0 gig Prescott on an Asus P4C800-E Deluxe and got 1 gb Corsair 2x512 matched pair DDR400.

Ive had the card for about 2 years , i only upgraded the motherboard/cpu and memory last year.

I usually research everything im gonna buy but theres not many AGP cards about these days.

 

[Crookshanks]

Oh I'd go for the more expensive card with that then - you've got plenty of cpu there

 

[Void959]

Don't confuse the two, the 6600 GT is the mid-range of the current generation, whereas the 9800 is the top end of the previous generation, both in terms of value and performance the 6600GT is far better.

 

[Influenza]

Aye i ordered the 6600 , this 9600XT is the only radeon ive had and i remembered how many compatability issues (crashing 2-3 times a day on 2 different motherboards) i had with it , so itll be my last radeon

 

[Dorin]

Aye i ordered the 6600 , this 9600XT is the only radeon ive had and i remembered how many compatability issues (crashing 2-3 times a day on 2 different motherboards) i had with it , so itll be my last radeon

heh, just ordered 850xt pci_e radeon will my first radeon, hopefully no compatibility issues there .d