Best choice out of X800GTO2 upgraded or 7600gt for AGP

[Johnny21a]

I'm looking to upgrade my graphics card on my old system (Athlon64 3400, 1G Ram, ATI 9600XT AGP). I don't want to spend too much money as I will be upgrading to a quad core in about six months. I just want something to allow me to play current and some of the new games. I am an occasional gamer so I don't really care about all the bells and whistles. I just found a deal on a used Sapphire X800GTO2 with unlocked pipelines and flashed bios which makes it effectively an X850 XT PE (correct me if I am wrong). I can get it for 100 euros. I'm also considering an 7600GT which I can get for about 160 euros. From the benchmarks i've seen I would say the X850 performs just a bit better. But should I factor in the 7600's support for Shader Model 3 ? Will there be more games in the near future that require it like the new Splinter Cell ? Any feedback would be appreciated. Thanks guys...

 

[TurdBurglar]

I'd opt for the unlocked X800GTO^2. It will best the 7600GT in most games and do it at a cheaper price. Sm3.0 should have no bearing on this decision, especially since you stated that you do not care about the bells and whistles. The ATI card offers more performance at a cheaper price. Easy decision in my eyes.

 

[Johnny21a]

It won't best the 7600gt by that much. And considering that SM3 will be required for some future games I still don't know for sure. SM3 is required for Splinter Cell Double Agent, it won't play on older SM2 cards... Still it is a matter of price...

 

[pauldh]

I'd go with the used card as it would be >= performance and honetly 160 euro's sounds like alot of money for a temporary card for a casual gamer.

 

[quantumsheep]

I'm looking to upgrade my graphics card on my old system (Athlon64 3400, 1G Ram, ATI 9600XT AGP). I don't want to spend too much money as I will be upgrading to a quad core in about six months. I just want something to allow me to play current and some of the new games. I am an occasional gamer so I don't really care about all the bells and whistles. I just found a deal on a used Sapphire X800GTO2 with unlocked pipelines and flashed bios which makes it effectively an X850 XT PE (correct me if I am wrong). I can get it for 100 euros. I'm also considering an 7600GT which I can get for about 160 euros. From the benchmarks i've seen I would say the X850 performs just a bit better. But should I factor in the 7600's support for Shader Model 3 ? Will there be more games in the near future that require it like the new Splinter Cell ? Any feedback would be appreciated. Thanks guys...

The x800GTO2 is NOT an x850xt, as the clocks are far slower. However it does have the same number of pixel pipelines and vertex shaders. If you're int overclocking you could possibly up the x800GTO2 to x850xt speeds if you're lucky, but i'm not too sure about the overclocking abillity on x800GTO2s.

On the decision between the 2 the x800GTO2 is a far better card than the 7600GT, end of.

 

[Johnny21a]

Thanks for the feedback guys. But as it turns out there aren't any AGP X800GTO2's. This card was only available for PCI-X. So I guess I would have to go with the 7600GT. Or do you think I should go with one of the lower end cards like 7300GT or 7600GS ? Will the 7300GT have any performance advantage over my 9600XT ? and what about the 7600GS ?