Maven
Premium
join:2002-03-12
Canada
| Decent video card for Athlon 64 X2 4200+ 2.0 GHz /w 2GB RAM?
Hello,
My Geforce 7600GT just busted, so now I'm shopping for a decent PCI-E video card. I'd rather go for a lower end card - all I really want is a DVI output and good performance in The Sims 3, which is the only game I play.
My relevant specs are
Athlon 64 X2 (W) 4200+ 2.0 GHz
2000 MT/s (mega transfers/second)
Socket 939
2 GB DDR2 RAM
Would getting a low end GeForce 9 series be overkill for this system? What about ATI cards?
Thank you |
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Maven
Premium
join:2002-03-12
Canada | Looks like my system only supports PCI-E v1, which is something to consider. |
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beerbum
Premium
join:2000-05-06
Reading, PA
clubs:
1 edit | reply to Maven
are you sure it's pci-e v1 which equates to a card with a 3/4 inch connector.. doubt you'll find a video card with that..
now unless you mean PCI-E 1.0, different story..
I would suggest nothing less than an 8600 GT card if sticking with nvidia.
--
The good may die young, pricks live forever... |
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Maven
Premium
join:2002-03-12
Canada | reply to Maven
Yes, I meant 1.0
I figured it was pointless to get a card from the 9 series.
Thank you |
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beerbum
Premium
join:2000-05-06
Reading, PA
clubs:
| said by Maven  :Yes, I meant 1.0 I figured it was pointless to get a card from the 9 series. Thank you it's not pointless if you can get one at a decent price.. I picked up a refurb 9800GT direct from ECS for $30.. not a thing wrong with it except it made me get another card to do SLI 
--
The good may die young, pricks live forever... |
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xyxvv
@tds.net
| reply to Maven
All cards are version 1 compatible, How much PSU do you have? the prices on the Radeon HD4 series cards are dropping fast as the HD5 cards are coming out around the time Win7 comes out, They will be supporting DX11. »www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi···%3A40865
Your system will still do fine in most current titles with just a gpu upgrade, »www.guru3d.com/article/cpu-scali···cessors/
»www.hardocp.com/article/2009/05/···scaling/
»www.firingsquad.com/hardware/$50···age5.asp
Unless you play GTA4 or run MS Flight Sim you will see almost no difference in most games as the quality settings and resolution go up. |
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asdfdfdfdfdf
@Level3.net
| reply to Maven
I just checked a number of options and this 9600gso with a rebate is one of your best, least expensive options:
»www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.as···14121320 |
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asdfdfdfdfdf
@Level3.net
| reply to Maven
I meant to add that this pulls only 10-20w more than what you have now so, unless you are pushing your power supply to the very edge, you should be ok.
The picture shows it coming with a power adapter so if your card didn't need a 6 pin connector and your power supply doesn't have one you can use two free molex connectors.
If you have any doubts about post the brand/model of your supply or the brand/model of your computer if it's a big name machine. |
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pnjunction
Teksavvy Premium
Premium
join:2008-01-24
Toronto, ON
 ·TekSavvy Solutions..
3 edits | reply to Maven
You can't have DDR2 with socket 939. You either have DDR1 or an AM2 setup. Also the 4200+ runs stock at 2.2 GHz (mine is OC'd 25% all the way 2750 with extra cooling though).
The 9600gt is a pretty good value. I wouldn't go much higher than that unless you're planning to upgrade the system soon. I didn't see much difference when I upgraded my 9600gt to a radeon 4870 after my 9600gt busted, but I did see a big difference going from the 7900gs I had before that to the 9600gt.
Beware of PCIe 2 cards and old mobos though, my old socket 939 (Asus A8N-E Nforce4) board needed a BIOS upgrade to boot when I got my 9600gt. Check your mobo's downloads page.
Edit: 9600gso would be good too if you want to spend $60 instead of $80, it seems to be over 80% of the speed of the GT. |
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pnjunction
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Premium
join:2008-01-24
Toronto, ON
·TekSavvy Solutions..
| reply to Maven
said by Maven :Looks like my system only supports PCI-E v1, which is something to consider. It's supposed to be backwards compatible, although you may need a BIOS upgrade like I did with my board.
If you don't see anything on your mobos BIOS page, you might want to ask around or e-mail them or something.
What is the exact mobo model? Chances are if you poke around with Google searches you'll get answer or find people using PCIe2 cards with the board. |
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Maven
Premium
join:2002-03-12
Canada
| reply to Maven
Well now I'm considering going with a GeForce from the 9 series.
To clarify, here are the full specs of my motherboard
»h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/docu···=3184140 |
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pnjunction
Teksavvy Premium
Premium
join:2008-01-24
Toronto, ON
·TekSavvy Solutions..
1 edit | Ah OK it's an early AM2 board.
A 9600gt or similar should work. A google search dug up a few people using that configuration here, here and here.
I think the only question left is whether your power supply and cooling are sufficient to run this thing. It's not that much of a hog, but if you've got a 300-watt or less supply and shoddy cooling like just a piddly 80mm fan at the back (or even worse just the PSU fan) things could get ugly. At least one of the guys I found running that setup upgraded the PSU, one had 350W (could be stock) which is the recommended minimum for the card.
Which HP model do you have? |
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asdfdfdfdfdf
@Level3.net
| reply to Maven
Given the price of the 9600gso I linked to, the fact that the performance between the two is very similar, the 9600gt is generally more expensive, and the 9600gt draws more power I would prefer the gso.
If you were relatively happy with your 7600gt any of these will surpass your needs. |
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pnjunction
Teksavvy Premium
Premium
join:2008-01-24
Toronto, ON
·TekSavvy Solutions..
| Hold on I just looked an while the clock rates are a bit lower for the 9600 GSO is apparently has 96 processor cores instead of the 9600 GT's 64. Apparently it is an 8800GS (G92) with a nerfed memory interface rather than a downclocked G94-based 9600GT (link).
It seems that the GSO lags behind the GT from 10% to much more in demanding applications because of the slower RAM interface (clocked a bit lower, mainly 196-bit instead of 256-bit) but burns about the same amount of power because of the extra processor cores (link, actually quite a bit more at idle!).
In summary, buy it if you want because it's cheaper and offers almost the same performance, but you're not saving on power or cooling requirements. |
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asdfdfdfdfdf
@Level3.net
| reply to Maven
I won't argue the point since I don't have benchmarks to corroborate the atomicpc numbers that I checked to refresh my memory.
I'll revise my post to say that if the 7600gt was acceptable then I see no reason to spend the extra money for the 9600gt, which will have similar performance. |
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kw
Premium
join:2004-06-12 | reply to Maven
Get a Voodoo 3 2000 |
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pnjunction
Teksavvy Premium
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join:2008-01-24
Toronto, ON
·TekSavvy Solutions..
1 edit | reply to asdfdfdfdfdf
said by asdfdfdfdfdf :
I'll revise my post to say that if the 7600gt was acceptable then I see no reason to spend the extra money for the 9600gt, which will have similar performance. It's only $20 more, how about better performance for less power?
Idle power is even worse for the power bills. Assuming it's on 24x7 and $0.10/kWh it's almost $2/month. Only on for 12 hours a day it's only $1/month but you'd still get that $20 back within 2 years.
I actually noticed by power bill go up when I upgraded from a 9600gt to an HD4870, this thing really sucks back the juice. The cooler is piping hot even when it's idling. |
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MnR
Premium
join:2002-05-27
Iron Mountain, MI | reply to Maven
Hi,
You should really check the forsale forum on this board. Look at the thread by nagetech.
He has some video cards at a very reasonable price.
MnR
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No one is listening until you make a mistake! |
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Maven
Premium
join:2002-03-12
Canada | reply to Maven
One more question - Which card runs cooler/quieter in the 9 series?
This is important for me because the 7600gt sounded like a small vacuum cleaner. |
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pnjunction
Teksavvy Premium
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join:2008-01-24
Toronto, ON
·TekSavvy Solutions..
| This review says the 9600GT is a bit quieter than the GSO under load (42 dBa vs 44) and much quieter when idling (38 vs 43). Actually the GT seems to be quieter under load than the GSO idling.
This will depend on whether you get one with a fancy cooler but you're probably looking at ones with the standard reference coolers.
I can speak from experience because I had a reference 7600gt as well as a 9600gt. The 7600gt seemed to be noisy all of the time while the 9600gt was whisper quiet at idle. Under load the fan on the 9600gt would ramp up (as seen in the numbers above) but it still wasn't that noisy and when you're playing games it isn't as big of a deal.
I was impressed with the quietness at idle when I got the 9600GT because having a GPU fan roaring while you're surfing the web can be annoying. |
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