Replacement for 9800 Pro is...

[alershka]

I appologize if this appears twice. I had an issue when I tried to
post before.

I have an AGP 9800 Pro with 128 mb in my P3 1.4ghz machine with 512mb
of RAM. The machine is maxed out on processor and RAM so I'm thinking
of replacing the video card. Will I see an increase in performance
moving to an X700? I'm sure I'd see improvement going to an X800 but
I'm not sure if it's worth the money since my motherboard only does 4X
AGP.

Thanks.

 

[ofn01]

I appologize if this appears twice. I had an issue when I tried to
post before.

I have an AGP 9800 Pro with 128 mb in my P3 1.4ghz machine with 512mb
of RAM. The machine is maxed out on processor and RAM so I'm thinking
of replacing the video card. Will I see an increase in performance
moving to an X700? I'm sure I'd see improvement going to an X800 but
I'm not sure if it's worth the money since my motherboard only does 4X
AGP.

Thanks.

I am pretty certain that the X700 is PCI-E only? [at the moment?]
Also one thing to note - I suspect that any faster video card will be
CPU limited so might not actually achieve much. Modern games like Doom3,
HL2 etc. need a fast CPU as well as a fast video card.

 

[Julian Richards]

I appologize if this appears twice. I had an issue when I tried to
post before.

I have an AGP 9800 Pro with 128 mb in my P3 1.4ghz machine with 512mb
of RAM. The machine is maxed out on processor and RAM so I'm thinking
of replacing the video card. Will I see an increase in performance
moving to an X700? I'm sure I'd see improvement going to an X800 but
I'm not sure if it's worth the money since my motherboard only does 4X
AGP.

Many games (eg UT2004) use the processor heavily so that graphics card
upgrades are not as good an upgrade as you would think, certainly not
the most cost effective anyway. UT players are going for Athlon 64s
and raving about the improvement.
--

Julian Richards
computer "at" richardsuk.f9.co.uk

XP Home
L7S7A2 motherboard
Powercolor 9800 SE 8 pipelines 438/364 with Omega drivers
1 GB RAM
10 GB + 80 GB HDs
CD+DVD/CDRW drives

 

[Doug]

Julian is your Powercolor 9800 SE actually a 9800 Pro? You're getting a
better core overclock than I'm getting w/my 9800 Pro (416). But my memory
can go to 380, though that's not much of a diff.

 

[Doug]

For older games (the ones for which your system isn't CPU limited) you'll
see a definite improvement. I'd bet Quake III-based games will probably see
a significant improvement. You'll probably be able to play older games at
the highest resolution. For newer games (e.g. Far Cry, UT2004 and Doom3) you
probably won't see much of a gain in perf.

It would seem to me to be a worthwhile upgrade, because you can always use
that vid-card in a faster system. They still make high-perf AGP boards
right? That way you could always use the vid-card in a faster rig.

I just recently got a Mobile Athlon 2600+ to replace my Barton. My Barton
was running at 2300Mhz while the Mobile Athlon is running at 2600Mhz, the
only noticeable difference (aside from cooler temps) is that my Doom3
benchmarks now run consisitently at ~44FPS, whereas before the variance was
anywhere from 40FPS to 44FPS. This on an NF7s v2.0, 9800 Pro (o'clocked to
416/380).

 

[Julian Richards]

Julian is your Powercolor 9800 SE actually a 9800 Pro? You're getting a
better core overclock than I'm getting w/my 9800 Pro (416). But my memory
can go to 380, though that's not much of a diff.

It's an SE but with an Arctic Cooler at the higher speed.

--

Julian Richards
computer "at" richardsuk.f9.co.uk

XP Home
L7S7A2 motherboard
Powercolor 9800 SE 8 pipelines 438/364 with Omega drivers
1 GB RAM
10 GB + 80 GB HDs
CD+DVD/CDRW drives

 

[DaveL]

No you will not see an improvement going to an X700 pro and it won't plug
into your AGP slot either. Plus as someone already pointed out, your
motherboard/cpu/ram speed is what is holding you back.

DaveL

 

[Mike]

The 9800pro has plenty of power for q3 based games and the older games you
mention. Even far cry and hl2 run well at high settings (no AA or AF
though), 1024 or 1152 res. Unless you're playing the latest games and want
very high settings there's no point in upgrading the card imo.

Mike

 

[MCheu]

I appologize if this appears twice. I had an issue when I tried to
post before.

I have an AGP 9800 Pro with 128 mb in my P3 1.4ghz machine with 512mb
of RAM. The machine is maxed out on processor and RAM so I'm thinking
of replacing the video card. Will I see an increase in performance
moving to an X700? I'm sure I'd see improvement going to an X800 but
I'm not sure if it's worth the money since my motherboard only does 4X
AGP.

Thanks.

Assuming you can find an AGP mounting of that chipset, I don't think
it would be worth the money for the performance you'd gain. The way I
see it, both nVidia's and ATI's release schedule works in spurts.
Basically they'd release a new video chipset that's *REALLY* new, with
all sorts of new features and/or a significant boost in performance vs
the previous generation. In between, you'd see just minor increments
being sold at fairly inflated prices compared to the "slower" cards.
Typically it's just tweaking the clock speed or reworking the design
to make it run cooler. This seems to be one of those plateau periods
for both companies. The 9800 Pro is still a pretty decent video
chipset.

If that's your only upgrade path, I'd say save your money until you
can rebuild or get a new rig. The reason being that most of the new
motherboards for the new CPUs like the AMD64 chips don't have an AGP
slot -- just PCI-X. That's sort of another reason to avoid upgrading
your AGP video card at this time.

 

[Augustus]

I appologize if this appears twice. I had an issue when I tried to
post before.

I have an AGP 9800 Pro with 128 mb in my P3 1.4ghz machine with 512mb
of RAM. The machine is maxed out on processor and RAM so I'm thinking
of replacing the video card. Will I see an increase in performance
moving to an X700? I'm sure I'd see improvement going to an X800 but
I'm not sure if it's worth the money since my motherboard only does 4X
AGP.

You need a processor and m/b upgrade, not a video card. I run a 9800 Pro on
a Barton 3200 Nforce2 setup and there is nothing I can play at good
framerates at 1024x768 4XFSAA. 1152x864 and 1280x1024 for most games. Even
if you stuck an X850XT in that system, your framerates would not change to
any degree. You are severely CPU and memory limited currently.

 

[Augustus]

..and there is nothing I can play at good framerates at 1024x768 4XFSAA.

1152x864 and 1280x1024 for most games.

Oops , that should read "nothing I can't play"....

 

[sbb78247]

I appologize if this appears twice. I had an issue when I tried to
post before.

I have an AGP 9800 Pro with 128 mb in my P3 1.4ghz machine with 512mb
of RAM. The machine is maxed out on processor and RAM so I'm thinking
of replacing the video card. Will I see an increase in performance
moving to an X700? I'm sure I'd see improvement going to an X800 but
I'm not sure if it's worth the money since my motherboard only does 4X
AGP.

Thanks.

Stick with what you have. The 9800 is above and beyond what you have
CPU/mobo wise. Unless you are ready to upgrade everything, live with it.

S

 

[GMAN]

I appologize if this appears twice. I had an issue when I tried to
post before.

I have an AGP 9800 Pro with 128 mb in my P3 1.4ghz machine with 512mb
of RAM. The machine is maxed out on processor and RAM so I'm thinking
of replacing the video card. Will I see an increase in performance
moving to an X700? I'm sure I'd see improvement going to an X800 but
I'm not sure if it's worth the money since my motherboard only does 4X
AGP.

Thanks.

The 9800 Pro is already faster than that system you are running it in so you
will see no improvement adding a better card.

 

[Julian Richards]

The 9800 Pro is already faster than that system you are running it in so you
will see no improvement adding a better card.

Plus an Athlon 64 + mb is cheaper and will speed up everything, not
just 3D games.

--

Julian Richards
computer "at" richardsuk.f9.co.uk

XP Home
L7S7A2 motherboard
Powercolor 9800 SE 8 pipelines 438/364 with Omega drivers
1 GB RAM
10 GB + 80 GB HDs
CD+DVD/CDRW drives

 

[J. Clarke]

For older games (the ones for which your system isn't CPU limited) you'll
see a definite improvement. I'd bet Quake III-based games will probably
see a significant improvement. You'll probably be able to play older games
at the highest resolution. For newer games (e.g. Far Cry, UT2004 and
Doom3) you probably won't see much of a gain in perf.

It would seem to me to be a worthwhile upgrade, because you can always use
that vid-card in a faster system. They still make high-perf AGP boards
right? That way you could always use the vid-card in a faster rig.

For AMD64. Intel's 900 series chipsets have no AGP support--you'd be
limited to an 800 series or earlier or a non-Intel chipset for Intel.

 

[Doug]

But he could also get a mobile athlon for $100.00 and overclock that in his
current rig.

 

[Mike]

There's planty you can't play at those settings, including hl2, doom3, far
cry, etc..
Unless you're into slide shows.

mike

 

[ofn01]

There's planty you can't play at those settings, including hl2, doom3, far
cry, etc..
Unless you're into slide shows.

mike

I can play HL2 at 1024x768 with 2xAA and 8xAF or 1280x1024 with noAA and
2xAF on high settings (but only reflect world) with no problems at all
on a 9600XT (yes a 9600XT) on a P4-3.0, 1GB DDR400. I have to drop Doom
3 down to 800x600 with high quality though to get it running decent but
it runs fine. I suspect it would work at 1024x768 on medium quality but
I have no tried it.

Far cry ran fine at 1024x768 on medium quality. Therefore with a 9800
Pro being 30-40% faster I suspect that the poster who said he can't play
those games well is right.

 

[Ben Pope]

But he could also get a mobile athlon for $100.00 and overclock that in his
current rig.

Really? Where do you buy the adapters to get a Mobile Athlon into a "P3
1.4GHz machine"?



Ben

 

[Mike]

I have an xp3200 with a 9800pro and I've run those games. HL2 chokes with
even 2x AA. Far cry was ok at 2xAA 2xAF at 1024 with mostly high settings.
It all depends on what you consider a decent framerate. I look at the
consistent framerate, not what I get when running down a hall.

Mike