GTX 256mb , or x1900xt ?

[courtney4]

Basically ive ordered a PC from a custom build PC site. I ordered a geforce 7800 GTX 256mb Ram . However, they have built the whole system but do not have any of the GTX cards in stock atm. With the new release of this x1900 or whatever i was thinking i might ask for them to give me one of those cards instead.

I dont want to buy 2 GFX cards, but i want to buy an sli/crossfire motherboard so i can possibly upgrade later. So, i ordered a Asus A8N-SLi Deluxe nForce4 SLi. Obviously the 7800 would fit, but if i change to x1900x i would need a new mothervboard if i wanted to use crossfire.

So, i could choose this motherboard 'Asus A8R-MVP Crossfire (Socket 939) '. And because it is cheaper than the sli board there would be very little if any difference in price if i asked for a x1900x instead.

My question is this. I dont want an amazing graphics card, Im not really a big gamer im just sick of having all my friends playing games which my PC can barely run. this is prolly the last PC im gonna get bought for me and its gotta last me thru university. I want to be able to play games such as BF2 , WoW, CsS on highest settings very nicely. I also want to be able to ensure that my PC will be able to handle any games in the next 3-4 years (not on best graphics, but comfortable graphics). If the Pc company let me, would i notice any difference , performance wise, from buying the cheaper motherboard? Will it effect my whole system speed? Do u think that the x1900x is better than a gefroce gtx 256mb as its only 42 pounds extra on this site.

any help appreciated
thx

PS. do motherboards all come in the same colour? ones black and ones yellow and id prefer a dark one as my PC case has a see-through pannel.

 

[cleeve]

A single X1900 XTX will do what you're looking for if you *are* a hardcore gamer. If you're not a hardcopre gamer then it's overkill. But if you want something that'll last 4 years, well it's a good choice I guess. But tere are no guarantees in the graphics card industry.

If you REALLY want upgradability, sure, get the Crossfire board.

 

[courtney4]

thx for your comments. But i have another query. With ATI cards i have seen labels such as **crossfire addition**. Do u need special versions of cards to use crossfire?

If you do, do you reckon it would be best for me to just stick with 1 x1900xt? Is it worth me buying an Sli motherboard if i am never going to use Sli? does the sli part add a significant price or is it worth me buying a cheaper motherboard or even crossfire motherboard (just incase). What i really want to know is if there is any performance difference between those different motherboards.

 

[matthead]

Unfortunately you will need the crossfire version to utilize crossfire. I think they are at the most $100.00 more than the standard but I may be wrong. What kind of PS did you purchase? I believe the 1900 series are power hogs and if you do plan on in the future to use Crossfire make sure you can support it.

 

[courtney4]

thx matt, i think i have ordered a 550W psu.

Can i just clear this up.

Crossfire needs 1 **crossfire edition card** as the master card.

and a normal one as the slave card? or do they both have to been crossfire edition so that if i wanted to do crossfire i would have to buy 2 new cards and could not use the standard x1900xt at all?

 

[lordroddington]

yup, you only need one crossfire edition card. the slave can be a regular xt version.

 

[RichPLS]

Buy a X1900XT or XTX, they are about $530 to $590 respectively and all are crossfire ready.
The Crossfire Edition 1900 is what you need to run two in CF mode, and its price is in the middle around $570ish, so for CF you need a CF ready card and a CF edition card.

 

[cleeve]

What i really want to know is if there is any performance difference between those different motherboards.

No, if you're only using one card, you won't see a performance increase over a regular "non-SLI" motherboard.

Unless you're a big fan of SLI, just save your cash and get a high-quality non-sli/x-fire motherboard. Put the extra cash into other high quality components, like RAM or a nice Power Supply.

When it's time for you to upgrade in 3 or four years, it'll be cheaper to get a whole new card anyway, because the technology moves so fast. Thatr's why SLI/X-fire isn't a great deal for upgraders.

 

[courtney4]

well ive sent them an email saying i would possibly like to change to a x1900xt and a crossfire motherboard

Cleeve, i think you are right about the motherboards. But, the company im buying off only has 1 motherboard board option for non Sli / Xfire systems. The asus A8n-e.

I looked on overclockers, that board is about 72 pounds. The Xfire board i would get is 82 pounds. i think it would be better, given the circumstances, to get the Xfire board if i do get a x1900xt.

 

[courtney4]

I thought so. Will it give me better FPS and better image quality than the GTX in games such as BF2, WoW and FEAR?

does anyone think a 'Asus A8R-MVP Crossfire (Socket 939)' motherboard would hinder my system compared to say a Asus A8N-SLi Deluxe nForce4 SLi . my Specs are as follows

AMD 64 x2 4400+
2GB pc 3200 RAM (2x1gb)
400gb hard drive (2x 200gb)
dvd-rw, cd r-w floppy etc..
550w PSU
radeon x1900xt

If the motherboards wont make any difference, then the price i think actually works out at about 2 pounds cheaper to get a supposedly better ATI card. Im just thinking there has got to be a catch somewhere, surely?

 

[courtney4]

That's a pretty good Crossfire mobo, DFI also has a good Crossfire motherboard.
Will it give me better FPS and better image quality than the GTX in games such as BF2, WoW and FEAR?

Yes, it'll give you better image quality, and probably better FPS, but image quality for sure.

sweet, i will probably go for the x1900xt then . Ive never had an ATI card b4 ive always stuck to nvidia so im scared lol ><

 

[courtney4]

bah i made a mistake the X fire board + x1900 will be around 20 quid more but thats no problem.

are Sli boards just in general slightly more expensive than X fire then?

 

[courtney4]

urgh im such a noob, and im so confused. So many different options, what makes it worse is that ive already paid for a system with a 7800 GTX 256mb but i think they let you change your order.

i dont really know what to look for in a motherboard, why are some 120 quid and some only 80 quid.

 

[gentrie2001]

Just FYI.... Make sure you have a large enough case. I just got my X1900 and it's a pretty long board (It's hitting my drive bays). Not I have to get a bigger case. Good luck!

 

[ivoryjohn]

The ASUS A8R-MVP has some issues, and some very vocal detractors. I purchased the board myself, and had problems getting the audio drivers to recognize the hardware (W2000). XP users complained of the same problem. A fresh install requires a lot of service pack and update juggling to get the stock drivers loaded.

Some OC'ers are griping because you can only raise the core voltage by .1 volts, but I understand that is really quite normal, and I think they were used to XP voltages of 2.65v where X2 voltages (like my opt 165) are around 1.35.

The board was a decent performer. Some of the CMOS was easy to understand, but many pages were hard to find.

I am sending mine back because ASUS claims you must put a SINGLE Video card in the slot nearest the PCI slots, and even a skinny card with no fan makes the PCI unusable cutting you down to only two slots. (The DFI I got lets me use all 3 pci slots until the day I add a second CF card).

The regulators are a bit weak and only time will tell whether the board is a good one.

 

[courtney4]

The ASUS A8R-MVP has some issues, and some very vocal detractors. I purchased the board myself, and had problems getting the audio drivers to recognize the hardware (W2000). XP users complained of the same problem. A fresh install requires a lot of service pack and update juggling to get the stock drivers loaded.

Some OC'ers are griping because you can only raise the core voltage by .1 volts, but I understand that is really quite normal, and I think they were used to XP voltages of 2.65v where X2 voltages (like my opt 165) are around 1.35.

The board was a decent performer. Some of the CMOS was easy to understand, but many pages were hard to find.

I am sending mine back because ASUS claims you must put a SINGLE Video card in the slot nearest the PCI slots, and even a skinny card with no fan makes the PCI unusable cutting you down to only two slots. (The DFI I got lets me use all 3 pci slots until the day I add a second CF card).

The regulators are a bit weak and only time will tell whether the board is a good one.

thank you for your input. I am not actually making the PC and it will be fully tested making sure everything will work before i get sent it. They will have to sort the problems out if there are any i guess.

I was reading this http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/ati_radeon_x1900_xt_preview/
OMG the x1900xt actually owns the 256mb GTX.

Thx again for everyones advice sorry to be very needy but if i dont inform the PC company soon they might not allow any changes to the order.

 

[courtney4]

ok im pretty dam sure i want the Asus A8R-MVP motherboard with a x1900xt.

Can i ask what you guys think about my rig, i wanna know if im getting skanked.
---------------------------------------------
CPU
AMD® ATHLON® 64BIT X2 4400 1MB L2 Cache

Memory
2048 MB DDR400 PC3200 WITH LIFETIME WARRANTY! (2x1GB)

Motherboard
ASUS® A8R-MVP: DUAL DDR, S-ATA, 2 x x16 VGA, 3 PCI

Hard Drive 1
SATA 200 GB HARD DISK @ 7200rpm 8mb cache

Hard Drive 2
SATA 200 GB HARD DISK @ 7200rpm 8mb cache

CD Writer/Combi Drive
16X DVD ROM WITH 48X CD ROM

Dvd Writer
4x +R DUAL LYR DVD WRITER (16x +/-R) (& RW) + 40x CD-RW (£25)

Graphics Card 1
512MB RADEON X1900XT PCI Express + DVI + TV-OUT

Graphics Card 2
NONE

Sound
HIGH END ONBOARD 8 CHANNEL SOUND (RECOMMENDED)

Modem
56K MODEM

Network Facilities
ONBOARD LAN & WIRELESS 802.11G NETWORK CARD (£12)

Floppy Disk Drive
1.44MB FLOPPY DISK DRIVE

Memory Card Reader
NONE

Case
Black Neon Bubble case + Neon Extreme Kit!

Power Supply & Cooling
550W DUAL RAIL PSU, 120mm fan & 19.2 dBA CPU Cooler - for SLI (£45)

OS Required
MICROSOFT® WINDOWS® MCE 2005 (inc. Remote, CD & licence) (£99)

Monitor
NONE

TV Card
DIGITAL TV CARD (TV/Radio/Remote/Pause Live TV) (Special: £32)

Total order Price
----------------------------------------------------------------
£1540.00
---------------------------------------------------------------

 

[cleeve]

Looks like a mean lean mutha to me, only thing I might add would be an audigy 2.

 

[RichPLS]

The A8R-MVP overclocks the X2-4400 as far as anyone.
I can get my Opty 175 just under 2700MHz, which I believe is about the limit of the CPU.

I like Asus board, very fast and reasonably stable, and very easy to overclock.
I do not like the one card arrangement, but it still woops DFI's effort.

http://techreport.com/reviews/2006q1/asus-a8rmvp/index.x?pg=1

 

[TheGreatGrapeApe]

urgh im such a noob, and im so confused. So many different options...

i dont really know what to look for in a motherboard, why are some 120 quid and some only 80 quid.

The motherboards also come with additional features on top of Sli and Xfire. Some will come with 8 SATA header instead of 2-4, some will come with better audio options, more robust mosfets/cooling/bios features. There's alot of little things that make up motherboaard options and pricing. It can get confusing, but look for the options YOU need, and then decide between what you're left with, usually the higher the price the more additional features, although there are occassional exceptions/deals.

I'd also say forget the Crossfire card, until you want to use crossfire. All X1900s are crossfire ready, so buy the one you prefer for the price. Then when you are interested in crossfire buy a crossfire card when they are likely to be cheaper. You may also find that instead of Crossfire/SLi you don't want to buy another card so much as move to the next generation, which may overall be a better value, offer better performance, and likely offer totally new features (likely the case with the R600/G80 next gen cards). For those reasons I'd say forget the crossfire card until you actually use crossfire.

Just FYI.... Make sure you have a large enough case. I just got my X1900 and it's a pretty long board (It's hitting my drive bays). Not I have to get a bigger case. Good luck!

GTX and X1800/1900 are the same length, so it wouldn't matter either way. All the new boards are long, but there's no short option anymore to much voltage regulation and memory space needed, not to mention the HSF assembly.

If anyone's thinking of these for an SFF or even mini-atx they're likely to find them very cramped, just cabling alone.