Ollie Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 Ok, so i am building a PC for someone and I have chosen all the components except the RAM and GPU. I am building this on a budget so I think I can afford up to £80 for a graphics card. I have a 9800 pro and it is an awesome card, but these are still expensive. I was thinking maybe Nvidia for this system as I haven't had one before. What would you recommend. It will be used for playing games like WoW and the sims and zoo tycoon etc. I have bought an AMD 2800 CPU and an 80gig Sata drive, so with some PC3200 ram this machine will be quite capable for these games, I just need a good GPU. Thanks in advance for all your help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colin Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 If you can add another £15-£20 onto that budget then I would recommend a 6600GT which can be found here. You may be able to find it alittle cheaper if you look around. Are you looking for an AGP or PCI-E? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ollie Posted January 27, 2006 Author Share Posted January 27, 2006 Oh yeah, AGP. I have been looking at the 6600GT, how does it compare to the 9800 pro? I guess its DX9? What would be the ATi equivalent? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The-Ironflame Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 The X800 GT Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Colin Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 Oh yeah, AGP. I have been looking at the 6600GT, how does it compare to the 9800 pro? I guess its DX9? What would be the ATi equivalent? It was originally intended to compete with the 9800pro, but the 6600GT pissed all over it. It's a pretty sound card, and includes SM 3.0 aswell, so the card is quite future-proof still. Considering the SM3.0 support then I think it has to be a DX9 card......but don't quote me on that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ollie Posted January 27, 2006 Author Share Posted January 27, 2006 The X800 GT So the 6600GT is better than the 9800 pro? EDIT - Sorry didn't refresh before posting this. Ok, this is all great stuff, what is the 9800 pro equivalent, is it the 9550? Also, why is the 6600 so much cheaper than the x800? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DCK Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 The 6600GT probably won't improve much over a 9800 Pro, if at all. Especially if your 9800 has 256 MBs of video memory it'll be great at a lot of games still. Maybe if you can find a good 6800XT (which cost about the same as 6600GT) that you can unlock and overclock a bit it'll be an improvement (still depends on your luck however). The Radeon 9800 Pro can still pretty much hold its own against those mid range cards though. It's a DX 9 card, just not a DX 9.0c card like the GeForce 6 series - meaning that it doesn't have Shader Model 3.0 and some slight improvements made. Have you tried overclocking it to an 9800XT? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ollie Posted January 27, 2006 Author Share Posted January 27, 2006 TBH for the difference I can't see the point in risking the card with a flash. I found this: http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?rb=15612245158&action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=81344 Many of the reviews people say that they upgraded from a 9800pro and have seen a big difference! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DCK Posted January 27, 2006 Share Posted January 27, 2006 It doesn't get more than 30% performance anyway, and if you're willing to flash (which you can reverse), you'll be closing that gap to 10%. The 6600GT is a nice pick, but I don't think it's worth the 80 quid if you can wait a while until the Radeon X8 series makes a price drop. If you decide to go for it now I reccommend looking for a 6800XT - it's a little under the 6600GT performance-wise but has far greater overclocking potential - you can unlock up to 8 more pixel pipes and some shaders, as well as overclock the core by 30%. They're basically 6800 GTs that haven't made the GT mark. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ollie Posted January 27, 2006 Author Share Posted January 27, 2006 If you decide to go for it now I reccommend looking for a 6800XT - it's a little under the 6600GT performance-wise but has far greater overclocking potential - wow, this is confusing, so your saying that the 6600GT is better than the 6800XT at stock level, even though the model number is less? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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