The Official Graphics Card and PC gaming Thread

GM he doesn't need to upgrade. I need to vent my frustration.

WHY ARE PEOPLE UPGRADING THEIR PERFECTLY GOOD P35 MOTHERBOARDS? THERE IS NO NEED TO SWITCH TO P45 or X48 ATM, unless you want crossfire).

 

for e-peen (unless im gonna get banned for that comment)

and its what us upgraders do. we spend on stuff not needed. i wont notice the difference to the eye between a Qcore at 2.4 and Qcoer at 3, but i'd still OC.

IMO i want to squeeze my E2140 to 3.2 (but will i notice the differnce between 3.1 and 3.2?) NO, but id like te 100% Oc. But if this board has more Voltage selections i bet i could get it stable at 400

 

Dude, do you have any idea of how much I used to upgrade? But even I wouldn't ditch a great board like the DS3 at this point in time.

 

If you have to put some "fearful" comments in parenthesis then you might not need to say it!!

Boozer,
I here ya. BUT you know some people and their need for the latest good deal or newest part. I have a P35-DS3P which has CF capabilities already. NOT that I'll use it but there it is... hehehe.

You know with the prices of the HD4850 coming down.. the GM might look a CF setup in the NOT so distant future... any comments on that GFX BOYS????

...gm

 

good point GM, next time i shall, maybe then my subtle british humour will come through (where it should have done before).

and GM i woundnt CF with that board as the PCIE lanes would turn to 16x for the primary 4850 and 4x for the secondary, thats why a p45 is much better as it allows dual 8x and the x38/48 even better as it allows FULL dual 16x.

BUT CF 4850s will eat any res upto 1920x1200 stuffed with loads of AA and AF jsut as a snack

 

You know what's funny is I didn't really buy the mobo (P35-DS3P) with the intentions of a CF configuration. I just wanted something different than everyone else was using at the time. lol. It's a brilliant board and I won't be upgrading it anytime soon. If I would have had the extra money at the time, I would have purchased a DS4 or DQ6 mobo.. I think the X38's had just come out so they were ridiculously expensive in my mind... and it wasn't for a CF config anyway. ....

thanks for the input.

....gm

 

Yeah, I wouldn't CF unless I was on X38 or 48 with 16x for BOTH cards

 

Really, 8x vs 16 x doesn't make much of a difference. The 8800GT gets close to the same performance as 16x all the way down to 4x. After that, it chokes. My point is that most card don't take full advantage of PCI-E x16 let alone PCI-E 2.0. That's why AGP cards were showing near identical performance to their X16 counterparts.

 

Actually the 4850 DOES take a performance hit on 8x.

 

The HD4850 is a powerful card. I'd expect a performance loss on 8x, let alone 4x, which I think the second lane on a P35 chipset runs at.

I only upgraded my board for crossfire, and that's genuine. The piles of USB and firewire ports were just an added bonus.

 

Basic Graphical performance chart: (reference point of 1.00 is for HD2900XT) - numbers are a multiple of the performance of this card, a mean across three current games tested at three high end resolutions, AA/AF enabled.


HD3870: 1.08
8800GTX: 1.49
9800GTX OC: 1.53
HD4850: 1.78
HD3870X2: 1.86
GTX260: 2.08
HD4870: 2.11
GTX280: 2.28
9800GTX OC SLI: 2.56
HD4850CF: 2.68
HD4870X2: 2.95+, up to 3.8
GTX280SLI: 2.95+, up to 4.1
HD4870CF: 2.98+, up to 3.9
HD4870X4: 3.00+, up to 6.0

 

That almost makes me want to get an X38/X48 board and CF 2 4850s

If I decide to go dual graphics, which I might, an X48-DQ6 or similar is already in the budget(probably going to find something cheaper). It's not like I buy much else with my money anyway, lol.

I'm just having an internal conflict... stay with my well priced, well built budget oriented rig that I searched for all the best prices for; or throw that out the window and go high-end like I did with the Evga 680i and the 8800GTX.

Admittedly, having been there, high-end is the thing to have. Way more features and much cooler extras. I am more than satisfied with my current rig's performance, but I still have the itch to upgrade, lol.

Being that it's the last summer I have before college, I should just bite the bullet and treat myself to a whole separate build with my E6750 and throw a Pentium E2160 into my P35.

Eh, so many options. That's why I'm waiting before I make another upgrade. I'm not entirely sure what I want to do.

I like my current rig a lot. But It could be so much faster. And I already just bought the 8800GTS 512MB, so it would be such a shame to get rid of it now.

What do you guys think? Throw a cheapo processor into my P35 and use the E6750/ Mushkin XP RAM for a whole new build? or just recycle all my components and go dual 4850 with an X38/X48???

 

The 8800GTS is still worth a fair bit. If you have the means or cashflow, do the upgrade then sell the 8800 to offset the cost.

 

That's what I was thinking of to begin with. I might just stick with my original plan and sell the 8800GTS for a 4870. It would probably be the most cost effective plan.

Not to mention I still have my 8800GTS 320MB around here somewhere, which is admittedly a pretty fast card. And 2GB of Patriot DDR2 667 RAM, a 250GB WD Caviar SE16, my Thermaltake Armor which I couldn't bring myself to sell, and some other stuff I can't think of atm.

With all the parts I have, I should almost make a new build anyway, though with a different case and a new PSU as the fan controller on my Liberty 620 is out of whack. The Armor will make a return for dual graphics if/when it happens

 

Why not Sell them both? You could probably afford a 4870 off of those without having to spend much extra at all. The 8800GTS 320 is still a reasonable card, but it's not cutting edge any more. On the scale I printed, it's probably between 0.9 and 1.1, as you see the 4870 is double that, if not slightly more. The 8800GTS 512 would be about 1.3, and the 8800GT 1.2.

 

id say about £50 for the 320 and about £80 for the 512 = 130 so thats a nice 4850, esp with them being £111, so you could get in a nice 3rd party cooler (S1 rev2 with fan)

 

He's american...
Oh and don't get the S1 rev 2, get the HR-03GT. Buying a quality cooler is very important.

 

A single 4850 wouldn't be much of an upgrade, but a 4870 is a fairly nice upgrade, considering the resolution I play at.

If I get a 4870 I might sell the 320MB and put the 512MB in a separate build. It's just such a good card that I really I don't want to get rid of it. Plays everything maxed right now, bar Crysis/FSX.

And honestly, budget isn't an issue. I just don't want to get really extravagant.

 

i agree but witht he 4850 id look to xfire, and its damn nea impossible to do that with the HR-03GT

 

Then wait for the T-rad2. use two S1 rev2s and there's double the chance to destroy a card using the cooler's absurd install process.