Looking to upgrade my AGP card - a.t.m. i have a Crucial Radeon 9700 and would like to upgrade it to something of higher spec, any ideas?

Systems an Intel P4 3.2 Prescott @ 3.5 with MSi motherboard, 450w power pack. I'm not convinced that i will see any improvement by swapping it all out for a 64bit setup, so going for the cheaper option, and just upgrading the gfx card

 

http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/produ...uct_uid=100961


Nice for the cash £178vat

 

This may help you decide on which AGP card:

http://www.tomshardware.com/2005/07/...vii/index.html

 

i would stick with the ati and overclock it! save money up then get a 64 bit machine

 

Great Links guys - thanks!

The Toms link makes me see how slow the present gfx card really is, whilst the ebuyer link shows me how cheap it is to upgrade! Magic!

 

Funny you should say that, as i've just been looking at the 64bit AMD CPU's - and most of the time in the CPU benchmark tests it come in behind the p4 3.4 chip. This in mind its going to cost alot to upgrade the m/b/, ram, CPU and the gfx card to the spec i have now (though it would be 64bit admittedly).

I think with the X850XT my current system will be good for another two years - at which time i'd throw £1k at it and upgrade again??

 

another 2 years! ...u must be joking

AMD and 7800GTX is what you need now
ps PCI express of cause

 

The CPU/MB and ram are just over a year old, where as the gfx card i bought Feb03 so thats been good for almost 3yrs of gaming; and it wasnt the fastest card you could buy at the time either.

I dont think 2years is unreasonable?

To upgrade the whole lot i'd be looking at least £700 so for the sake of £200 to get another 2yrs life i dont think its that bad. If i was to upgrade everything then in two years it would only need doing again anyway?

 

I've just placed the order for the X850XT above - thanks Lightning101 for the heads up!

 

Thats a good price. Not even overclockers can beat that price.

 

Yep the XTPE is the best AGP card currently, with the 6800ultra a close second/third.

 

Looking at the Toms Hardware chart it looks as though the games benchmarked, the ATi AGP cards came both 1st and second on a majority of them. XTPE and XT. The 6800 ultra came only second to the XTPE on Pacific Pilots.

 

If the xt n xtpe came 1st on the majority which it does, then I think the 6800 comes 2nd overall

 

Wait for the nvidia 6800GS cards to come out, they are due about now and apparently very good. Theres an article about them on Firingsquad or Tomshardware.

 

What ever!

 

I read somewhere about the 6800 coming out, and it been a let down. Carnt remeber wheer, i spent three days on all mannor of sites reading up on what to buy, both gfx card wise and complete system wise.

Interesting to see that when i ordered my card ther was 37 in stock, and now theres only 24, couple more days they'll be down to their last 10

 

Said that too soon - only 9 left in stock as i type!

 

6800 GS can be had here:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/6800_Series.html

and here:

http://www.komplett.co.uk/k/ki.asp?sku=316258&cks=SER

Not sure how they compare with the 6800 Gt though, prob slightly better but not as quick as the Ultra?? So still not as quick as the X850 Gt...

 

3D Mark 2005 the 6800 Ultra is no where near the XT850 (around 20%faster); which at this point in time is the fastest AP card you can buy

Absolutely no difference speed wise between the AGP and PCIX version of the card either!

 

I jus won a new X850XT Platinum Edition for £240 off fleabay Feckin bargain. Oh n its AGP for my ageing mobo, a bit of a rarity in AGP

 

Just looking at that site with the Benchmarks on... damn my Gfx card is slow!!!