Need some advice.

[Palinko]

Okay so heres my situation. I got 350$ for Christmas and I want to boost my computer. What my specs are currently are:

Nvidia 6800 XT PCI-E
MSI Neo4 Mobo (71-25)
Compaq V700 Monitor
Some crappy case
1 gig DDR RAM
Athlon 3200+ 64 bit (64 bit is useless because I don't have 64 bit Windows )

The new additions I am adding for sure are:

A 19" Inch LCD for 129$
Apevia aspire x-plorer 60$

What I'm thinking about getting is:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814130062
That's the GC I'm thinking about getting. However I'm skeptical because I have 161$ left over and I want a GC that will show an improvement with what I play. Right now the game I'm playing is FEAR so yeah.

The other choice is whether or not I want a gig of Mushkin RAM. It would make games run better and stuff.

Like I said if the GC will not improve my PC then I'll go with the RAM but I need someone who knows what they are talking about.

Help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[almerac]

ok, a 7600Gt will be leaps and bounds better then your xt, and you will notice a ton of performance gain in games. i would also recommend you take that extra $40 and get a good cpu cooler (if you dont have one) and get that 3200 to 2.6 or 2.8 ghrz. which will overall, make your system much more responsive and noticeably faster in games. if you could work it in a a 7900gs would be good to, because they are now reasonable in price, and overclock like crazy. another gig of ram will not increase performance like anything comparable to just getting that XT out of your system.

 

[WR2]

The 1280x1024 performance difference between 6800XT vs 7600GT isn't enough IMO to justify spending that $110 upgrade to get the 7600GT.
On the other hand getting the 7900GS $156 after rebate would be a worthy upgrade. Be sure to check that your power supply is good for the 7900GS 400watt 20amps

 

[almerac]

um...... ill give you the benefit of the doubt and ask you to please link to some benchmarks, because last i checked a 7600GT beast a 6800ultra, and pounds a 6800Gt, and the 6800XT is the weakest of the 6800 series, so weak that last i checked at 1280X1024 the 6800XT was getting a run for its money against a 6600GT. i am pretty certain that a 7600GT is much much much more powerful then a 6800XT.

 

[Track]

The GPU is the ONLY things that really matters.
Spend as much as u can on the graphics card.

X1800GTO - 120$
7900GS - 175$
X1950 Pro - 200$
X1950XT - 250$

 

[Palinko]

So what I'm reading here is that the RAM would not be a good idea but upping the graphics card is. I'm using FEAR as an example because it is a game that requires a lot compared to other games.

In FEAR I can usually tell when something is going to happen when my computer starts to go a bit slower and it is noticeable. Will getting a new graphics card solve this? I'm thinking when it loads I get an FPS drop right?

PS: I just got another 50$ from my sister so I'm up to 400 dollars to spend total. After that I'm left with 211 dollars to spend. So a graphics card under 200$ would be nice. Thats what I'm going to look for.



EDIT: Solved

 

[Real999]

As I already mentioned in an earlier post, take this 7600 gt for 80 $ !!!!

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814143049

deal of the year !!!

 

[WR2]

i am pretty certain that a 7600GT is much much much more powerful then a 6800XT.

7600GT is about 40% better than 6800XT. Thats not "much x3", not compared to other video cards that are that much more powerful than the 7600GT.
The 6800XT is about 15% more powerful than a 6600GT in FEAR. http://www.guru3d.com/article/content/286/12/
A 7600GT is about 50% more powerful than a 6600GT http://firingsquad.com/hardware/nvidia_geforce_7600_gt_performance/page14.asp
And a 7900GS is about 50% better than a 7600GT in FEAR http://firingsquad.com/hardware/nvidia_geforce_7900_gs/page11.asp
Since there are no head-to-head benchmarks with all the same AA/AF settings, etc you'll need to estimate the relative performance vs cost.
I make it out to be about 40% performace boost for $110 with the 7600GT
Against 90% performance improvement for $156 with a 7900GS

 

[Slappy_Slime]

the vid card would be the best upgrade, but if you can, bump-up the mem just a little if ya can, at least 512 or more! so you will have mem total of 1.5 gig or more, im assumming your running windoze xp, that O.S. and a few other back ground services takes a good chunk of your 1gig mem that you presently have. But if ya can, try to match up your mem sticks with the one you have now, as in manufacture, timmings, etc...

 

[enforcerfx]

What is your current powersupply? I'd throw that 350 at this and this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814102021

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820145505

If you need a new powersupply, this is efficent:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817104954

Have fun