Nvidia GeForce4 MX 420 and upgrades

[Tom]

Considering the imminent release of Doom 3, and HL2 not long after that, what cards should I upgrade to?

I have a 1.7GHz AMD Athlon (it should be 1.8 but it won't run at that speed for some reason), Asus A7N8X deluxe MB, 512 dual channel RAM, and onboard sound.

I don't want to spend a fortune, but any recommendations are welcome

Thanks

 

[Dr_Weasel]

I think the recommended specs are for a 2.4GHz processor (XP2400) plus a DX9 capable GFX card so something like a ATI 9700 or 9800 should get 'most' detail at 30fps and not break the bank.

I havent checked your specific mobo, but you might be able to chuck a 2400 straight in with possibly a bios upgrade.

 

[tris-]

you dont even need a BIOS update. i got the first release of that board with a 2400xp in it.

 

[JBP|]

A radeon 9800pro would be the minimum requirement if you want to play with a decent fps and atleast some of the pretties turned up quite high

 

[.Wilier.]

If it was me Tom, Id be looking for a new CPU and GPU.

Ebuyer have XP2800 Bartons at £60, on your Asus board, they will closk to 3000 speeds withough too much trouble. Couple that with either a FX5900 XT (which can easily reach 5950 speeds) or a 9800 pro each for around £130-140.

That should see you right.

 

[smurkin]

Theres a very good doom 3 technology site here which is based off picking apart the code of the leaked alpha....might be worth a post.

Prolly only 3 weeks now

/edit iirc minimum spec is an intel 2.4c, so that athlon may not cut the mustard

 

[Sar]

Celerons are slower than Athlons, by a fair margin IIRC.

I assume that's what you meant by the "c"?

The minimum CPU is a 1.5Ghz P4, and recommended is at least a 2.4

 

[Nightchill]

The "C" refers to an 800mhz fsb supported with the i875 chipset (Canterwood). Hyperthreading ones

edit: I think

 

[smurkin]

yah, the c is a more recent revision. Sorry I cant remember where I got that info....theres so much crap talked of d3...

but here

PC Gamer recommends:
2Ghz CPU
512 MB ram
Radeon 9800
5-channel audio

Lowest supported GPU is a Geforce 4 MX (worse than Geforce 3)
Supported cards:
GF 4 MX
GF 3
GF 4
GF FX (and higher)
ATI 8500s, 9000s and higher

from here

http://www.doom3world.org/index.php

 

[Tom]

If I buy the Radeon 9800, will this work ok on HL2?

 

[inactionman]

Yup, HL2 was designed with ATI cards in mind, just like D3 was designed for nVidia.

You may want to add another 512Mb of RAM while you're at it, everything performs better with a gig these days.

 

[JBP|]

just dont buy an nvidia card that has FX in its name and you cant go wrong

 

[tris-]

i was just looking here - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/9700_to_9800_Series.html

goto the bottom and there is the 9800 pro and 9800 pro ultimate, apart from the price i can see no difference. anyone more in the know who maybe knows something not shown on there?

 

[Nightchill]

I suspect the difference will be in core and memory clock speeds tris.

 

[Tom]

ffs, all I want to do is play a couple of games and its going to cost me a fortune!

I can sell the old cpu on ebay, I doubt I'll get anything for the gfx card but you never know. I think I'll look at getting a fast cpu and a reasonable gfx card.

 

[tris-]

so the best ATI cards, would be the XT then? or is like nvidia where XT is the shittest ones?

 

[inactionman]

Tom, everything's worth a bob or two at computer exchange, you tried there? You also get a lot more for trade-in than cash!

Which reminds me I have a lot of spare computer bits I need to get rid off, nothing fancy, just a few old GFX cards, some HD's, a 52x CD writer, a couple of ethernet cards etc. guess I'd better pop down to CEX at tottenham court road.

As for graphics cards tris, get a good 9800 pro, and you'll have no trouble. You can't get for better for 120ish notes! The XT is the super fast 9800, but the difference between it and the pro just isn't worth the money, tbh. The pro will run both D3 & HL2 no probs, obviously not at the highest detail levels or anything, but I doubt the hardware currently exists for that!

Saying that I'll be putting a new computer together later this year, and I'm going for the nvidia 6800 GT, but with an eye on SLI'ing them in future, so basically waiting on decent PCI-Express motherboards with 2x PCI-E x16 slots, plus the prices of socket 939 processors to get reasonable!

 

[tris-]

inactionman, as you can see i wouldnt know a good ati from a bad apple. about as much as i know is sapphire is a good brand for ati cards and 9800 are the ones to buy. but which 9800 is the best one, in your oppinion?

 

[Uriel]

From what I understand, having seen quite a few threads similar to this one, a Radeon 9800pro (or equivalent) and an Athlon XP 2000+ / P4 2.4 will play Doom 3 quite comfortably on 'medium' settings. Even the most expensive/cutting edge hardware currently available won't be able to render the thing in its full beauty so unless you've got money to burn I'd wait until the next (next) gen stuff comes out before spending much more.

Furthermore, if you've still money left after upgrading your graphics card (which should be your top priority) then I'd add another 512 megs of ram. Otherwise, depending on what you have running in the background things might not be as smooth as they ought since Doom 3 requires a minimum of 384 megs to run.

The above kit should be more than adequate for HL2.

As far as the question regarding which Radeon to buy goes... I've got a Sapphire and I've not had a problem with it. Although I've not tried another brand I think their performance is about the same across the board. Also, IIRC the 'ultimate' version of the Sapphire 9800pro only differs from the 'atlantis' in that it has a fanless cooling design.

 

[inactionman]

The sapphire 9800 pro on offer at ocuk is a good buy (the £120 + VAT one). I bought my OEM herc 9800pro from them for the price about 2 months ago! It's much of a muchness, as only about 3 or 4 companies actually make the PCB's anyway, so you're basically paying for a name/colour/fan!

 

[JBP|]

the biggest difference between a pro and XT cards is clock speeds (and weight due to the humungos fan needed to cool the XT)

and a nifty little thing in the cats called Overdrive..

OVERDRIVE™ maximizes the performance of your graphics accelerator by dynamically increasing the speed of your graphics processor to the optimal level. By constantly monitoring the temperature of the graphics processor the maximum clock speed is always maintained.

Desktop Help for Windows 2000, © ATI Technologies Inc., Version M3

 

[tris-]

ok one final Q then. i use a FX5600XT. i plan to buy that 9800pro card. how much perf increase am i going to see?

 

[Dr_Weasel]

According to Toms Hardware, on Call Of Duty, you will get just under a 100% frame rate improvement.

 

[tris-]

heh, if thats the case with a standard 5600 then i will get hell of a load more with the XT version

 

[Sar]

/me wubs his new 9800 pro

 

[Clown]

/me wubs both his 9800 pros that he got for about the same price Sar got one

 

[Cask]

Sell me one Clown. You can't use both at the same time and you don't even use your computer anymore.

 

[Tom]

Is this worth getting (today only)

http://www.scan.co.uk/todayonly/

 

[Tom]

Also, anyone know what the fastest CPU I can put in my Asus A7N8X deluxe is? I haven't got a clue.

 

[Cask]

Good question that Tom, was wondering that myself as I have that board. Looks to me that it depends which version of the board you have. If it's version 2.0 or later then it'll have FSB 400 support built in, but if you have 1.xx version then you'll need to get the bios update to enable the support. With FSB 400 it should take the barton 3200+ no problem.