Upgrade GFX or MOBO/CPU??

Gardinen · Sep 5, 2004, 11:22 AM

Hello there!

I was thinking of making an upgrade for my computer. Although I don't know if I should upgrade my GFX card or CPU/mobo...or maybe both

Please help me out

dipstick · Sep 5, 2004, 04:59 PM

For gaming you will see the biggest benefit from a gfx card upgrade. I say a X800pro/6800GT will do the trick

Gardinen · Sep 5, 2004, 07:32 PM

Okey. Well I was thinking of getting myself this baby and maybe flashing it to an XT card, if that's possible.

Vampyromaniac · Sep 5, 2004, 07:43 PM

what baby?

Judas · Sep 5, 2004, 08:48 PM

i beleive an X800 pro or something that'll flash to XT? not sure... link or name is missing ..

Gardinen · Sep 5, 2004, 08:55 PM

oh hehe sorry:

http://www.webhallen.com/prod.php?id=31748

I just ordered it so... The second thoughts and regrets are getting to me now, I can feel it. But maybe it was a good buy??

UberLord · Sep 8, 2004, 10:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gardinen

oh hehe sorry:

http://www.webhallen.com/prod.php?id=31748

I just ordered it so... The second thoughts and regrets are getting to me now, I can feel it. But maybe it was a good buy??

Personally I would have gone with a CPU/mobo upgrade as the 9700 you currently have is mainly CPU limited.

I'm moving from a P4 2.5 512 meg to a AMD 64 3500 (939 pin) 1024 meg and keeping my 9800 pro and I fully expect a much better performance increase than going to the best graphics card.

This setup is costing me Â£438 inc VAT whereas the new card would be Â£375 including VAT

Gardinen · Sep 8, 2004, 11:06 AM

Well, I know that my CPU will limit the power of the X800Pro. Although I might get myself a new descent motherboard and CPU in about four months or so.

~~HawK~~ · Sep 8, 2004, 11:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UberLord

Personally I would have gone with a CPU/mobo upgrade as the 9700 you currently have is mainly CPU limited.

I'm moving from a P4 2.5 512 meg to a AMD 64 3500 (939 pin) 1024 meg and keeping my 9800 pro and I fully expect a much better performance increase than going to the best graphics card.

This setup is costing me Â£438 inc VAT whereas the new card would be Â£375 including VAT

At first I thought the same, then remembering how little I got out of changing from XP2400(266fsb) to a XP3200(400fsb)..
The best speed increase only came now that I have upgraded to a 9800pro from a 9700non pro, so I think it is not to bad doing the X800 Pe first and later the MOBO/CPU upgrade, having a speed increase twice

But if you don't like the PE Gardinen, I might be persuaded to swap my 9800pro with your PE....

Gardinen · Sep 8, 2004, 11:36 AM

Well, it's not the XT PE version, "only" the Pro VIVO version.
Although the flashing from Pro VIVO to XT PE is very tempting. And I might do that...if possible with that perticullar card

.
It might not be possible if its been lasercut. Fingers crossed

UberLord · Sep 8, 2004, 01:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by HawK

At first I thought the same, then remembering how little I got out of changing from XP2400(266fsb) to a XP3200(400fsb)..
The best speed increase only came now that I have upgraded to a 9800pro from a 9700non pro, so I think it is not to bad doing the X800 Pe first and later the MOBO/CPU upgrade, having a speed increase twice

But if you don't like the PE Gardinen, I might be persuaded to swap my 9800pro with your PE....

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the 9700-non pro has half the number of pipes and is clocked lower that the 9800 pro has so I'm not suprised. However, the XT has the same number of pipes as the 9800 pro and is just clocked higher.

So in your case, you would probably get a better benefit from a new card, but in his case I'm not too sure about if this would be better, hence my comment.

~~HawK~~ · Sep 8, 2004, 02:20 PM

Then I'll correct you

X800 pro has 12 pipelines as the 9800pro has 8 (as does the 9700),
X800pro has 6 vertexpipelines vs the 9700/9800pro have 4
9800 has a bandwidth of 3200mb/s, and 9700 does 2200mb/s due to lower speeds
and the x800 almost has double speed on anything else, according to him:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2195&p=5

But I needed a good card for my mom to replace the burned out KyroII wich seemed to have indefinite CPU scaling, (but not that good cooler) and needed at least a 9700 for her to do MS-Trainsim
Saw the 9800pro for 200 euro so went for it, to give my mom my old 9700

WisMerHill · Sep 8, 2004, 03:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gardinen

Well, it's not the XT PE version, "only" the Pro VIVO version.
Although the flashing from Pro VIVO to XT PE is very tempting. And I might do that...if possible with that perticullar card

.
It might not be possible if its been lasercut. Fingers crossed

ViVo's aren't lasercut and the version you've selected features the quick 1.6ns ram (600Mhz) that will do the XT speeds . Basicly if they haven't changed it like Powercolor, MSI and Sapphire did (they put on 2.0ns ram on the back to make it impossible to obtain xt speeds) you just need to flash your bios to enable your 16 pipelines.

As to the fact of which to upgrade, a new subsystem with a 9700Pro will give something like a 4000 point gain (AMD64 3500+ 3Dmark01) and leaving the subsystem intact and taking the x800 will give even more points. So i think you chose right tho real world perfomance could swap it around depending on the application/game.

Gardinen · Sep 8, 2004, 07:10 PM

Well sadly the memory chips ain't visual because of the fairly large heatsink and other metalstuff on top of the chips. At least not visual without taking the stuff of. But I don't feel like doin that with a brand new card.
I'm actually not quite shure if I'm gonna flash the card at all, on the first day. Something could go wrong.

Vampyromaniac · Sep 8, 2004, 08:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by UberLord

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the 9700-non pro has half the number of pipes and is clocked lower that the 9800 pro has so I'm not suprised.

correction: the plain 9700 is simply a lower-clocked 9700Pro, same pipes and everything. 9800Pro had same pipes also, but higher clocks and new core

Quote:

Originally Posted by UberLord

I'm moving from a P4 2.5 512 meg to a AMD 64 3500 (939 pin) 1024 meg and keeping my 9800 pro and I fully expect a much better performance increase than going to the best graphics card.

I think you'll like that

I just went from xp1800 to A64-3000, massive incraese for my 9700Pro

UberLord · Sep 9, 2004, 12:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vampyromaniac

correction: the plain 9700 is simply a lower-clocked 9700Pro, same pipes and everything. 9800Pro had same pipes also, but higher clocks and new core

Bleh - must have got my wires crosses somewhere. I'm sure a non pro-ati something had less pipes than the pro version.....

pr0digal jenius · Sep 9, 2004, 02:22 AM

uberlord...i think your thinking of the SE's, nto the non-pros

the only exception might be the 9500s, i seem to recall the 9500 pro being far and away better then the 9500 NP

CDsDontBurn · Sep 9, 2004, 02:34 AM

i say a better upgrade would be a video card. Although the CPU/MoBo will bottleneck the gfx card a bit, there will still be some noticable improvements vs. the old card.

Sep 5, 2004, 11:22 AM	#1
Gardinen DriverHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Trollhättan, Sweden Posts: 512 Rep Power: 0	Upgrade GFX or MOBO/CPU?? Hello there! I was thinking of making an upgrade for my computer. Although I don't know if I should upgrade my GFX card or CPU/mobo...or maybe both Please help me out

Sep 5, 2004, 07:43 PM	#4
Vampyromaniac confutatis maledictis Join Date: May 2002 Location: somewhere dark Posts: 5,974 Rep Power: 77 System Specs	what baby? __________________ *Digitalis 3.3* Athlon 64 3000 // ASUS K8V SE Deluxe // 1024MB PC3200 (2-2-2-10 1T) ATI All-In-Wonder 9700 Pro // 20" Dell 2005FPW (DVI) M-Audio Revo 7.1 + Philips Acoustic Edge // Klipsch ProMedia 2.1 320/16 Western Digital WD3200KS + 120/8 Seagate 7200.7 NEC ND-3550A 16x DVD±RW + Lite-On 52x24x CD-RW Antec Sonata case // 480W Antec TruePower personal bests \|\| Aq'3: 46796 \| 3D'01: 20461 \| 3D'03: 6336 \| 3D'05: 2677 \| PC'04: 4605 \| PC'02: 7691,9092,1250

Sep 9, 2004, 02:34 AM	#18
CDsDontBurn Lurking DriverHeaven Join Date: May 2003 Location: Southern California Posts: 22,779 Rep Power: 235 System Specs	i say a better upgrade would be a video card. Although the CPU/MoBo will bottleneck the gfx card a bit, there will still be some noticable improvements vs. the old card. __________________ Her First Day \| A year later

Sep 5, 2004, 04:59 PM	#2
dipstick HardwareHeaven Extreme Member Join Date: May 2002 Location: USA Posts: 3,609 Rep Power: 71 System Specs	For gaming you will see the biggest benefit from a gfx card upgrade. I say a X800pro/6800GT will do the trick

Sep 5, 2004, 07:32 PM	Thread Starter #3
Gardinen DriverHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Trollhättan, Sweden Posts: 512 Rep Power: 0	Okey. Well I was thinking of getting myself this baby and maybe flashing it to an XT card, if that's possible.

Sep 5, 2004, 08:55 PM	Thread Starter #6
Gardinen DriverHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Trollhättan, Sweden Posts: 512 Rep Power: 0	oh hehe sorry: http://www.webhallen.com/prod.php?id=31748 I just ordered it so... The second thoughts and regrets are getting to me now, I can feel it. But maybe it was a good buy??

Sep 8, 2004, 11:06 AM	Thread Starter #8
Gardinen DriverHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Trollhättan, Sweden Posts: 512 Rep Power: 0	Well, I know that my CPU will limit the power of the X800Pro. Although I might get myself a new descent motherboard and CPU in about four months or so.

Sep 8, 2004, 11:36 AM	Thread Starter #10
Gardinen DriverHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Trollhättan, Sweden Posts: 512 Rep Power: 0	Well, it's not the XT PE version, "only" the Pro VIVO version. Although the flashing from Pro VIVO to XT PE is very tempting. And I might do that...if possible with that perticullar card . It might not be possible if its been lasercut. Fingers crossed

Sep 8, 2004, 02:20 PM	#12
~~HawK~~ Banned Join Date: May 2002 Posts: 2,092 Rep Power: 0	Then I'll correct you X800 pro has 12 pipelines as the 9800pro has 8 (as does the 9700), X800pro has 6 vertexpipelines vs the 9700/9800pro have 4 9800 has a bandwidth of 3200mb/s, and 9700 does 2200mb/s due to lower speeds and the x800 almost has double speed on anything else, according to him: http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2195&p=5 But I needed a good card for my mom to replace the burned out KyroII wich seemed to have indefinite CPU scaling, (but not that good cooler) and needed at least a 9700 for her to do MS-Trainsim Saw the 9800pro for 200 euro so went for it, to give my mom my old 9700

Sep 8, 2004, 07:10 PM	Thread Starter #14
Gardinen DriverHeaven Senior Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Trollhättan, Sweden Posts: 512 Rep Power: 0	Well sadly the memory chips ain't visual because of the fairly large heatsink and other metalstuff on top of the chips. At least not visual without taking the stuff of. But I don't feel like doin that with a brand new card. I'm actually not quite shure if I'm gonna flash the card at all, on the first day. Something could go wrong.

Sep 9, 2004, 02:22 AM	#17
pr0digal jenius Delete Me Join Date: Mar 2004 Posts: 14,648 Rep Power: 0	uberlord...i think your thinking of the SE's, nto the non-pros the only exception might be the 9500s, i seem to recall the 9500 pro being far and away better then the 9500 NP