r600 quick Q

[inshadows]

Apologies if a similar Q has already been answered.
Long time reader, rare poster

I have a rather archaic pc and have just got a proffesional loan, part of which will be going towards spending £1250ish on upgrading.

I have already decided my main components but the sticking point is the graphics card, i would dearly love the best one available coz its the only time i will be able to afford to upgrade for at least 3 years plus once i qualify i will have little time for gaming

The question is.... as a British person when is the best prediction for a widely available release of r600. I know I will kick myself if it comes out the week after I upgrade if i get an 8800GTX. I read some preliminary stuff in Dec on HExus about a March release and thats too far away but i wouldn't mind waiting till Feb. Theres some talk about late Jan, what is this based upon.

In summary do if I buy an 8800GTX now is there enuff time before r600 for me to shrug off the improvement as an inevitability of pc hardware or should i hold fast.

Cheers guys

PS i game at 1280 x 1024 and i know thats underusing the power but this pc must last for 3 years and it would be nice if icould play at max for the whole time

 

[Apache14]

That a tough question. The R600 is scheduled for release in late Jan early Feb so i would say it would be widely available in mid Feb at the latest. But as u game at 1280x1024. There probably won’t be much difference between the 8800gtx and R600 at that resolution. Iv asked the same question as well and i went with the 8800 and i don’t think i will regret it :roll:

 

[inshadows]

Thanks very much. I was kinda leaning toward the 8800GTX due to being able to get it probably 2 months earlier and also because i lack another pci express card to last until then.

Will order next day delivery on Thursday as I fingers crossed have Friday off. I think if no new details come up will go for it then.

Intel Core 2 DUO E6600 2.40GHz Retail / Asus P5B Deluxe / 2GB GeIL PC2-6400C4 DDR2 Dual Channel Kit - Bundle
(£512.26)

Zalman CNPS9500-LED Aero Flower (Socket 939/754/478/775) CPU Cooler
(£32.89)

Creative X-Fi Xtreme Gamer Soundcard - Retail £49.99
(£58.74)

Corsair HX 620W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-620HXUK)
(£99.86)

SpeedLink Medusa SL-8793 5.1 ProGamer Edition (heads too big for Razer headset)
(£42.42)

BFG GeForce 8800 GTX 768MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail
(£387.74)

Total : £1,178.49 (god i wish that could be in dollars)

 

[krisz]

The only reason why you might want to wait until the R600 gets released though is to see if Nvidia will drop their prices on the 8800 or not. You might save some money for yourself

 

[Grated]

R600 looks to be a bit faster (if we can trust the early benchmarks). But 8800 will get you going for 3 years . As krisz said, the prices could drop when the R600 comes out so that could mayby help a bit.

 

[krisz]

The hardest part is to wait though
Trust me i know. I had an 8800 GTX and i sent it back because i saw the prices coming down. Right now i am waiting and using a 7300 GS until it is time to get the 8800GTX again. Yes i suffer

 

[ARM]

Where are you getting your parts from?

Anyway, about that bundle deal, it would would be cheaper to get an

Abit AB9 Pro (£90)
2GB pc 5400 (667mhz) ram (£150)
E6600 retail (£200)

Total £440

from www.scan.co.uk

You don't need ddr2 800 for an E6600. DDR2 800 ram has an fsb of 400mhz, while the E6600, at stock clock, has an fsb of only 266mhz.
With the ddr2 667, you could still OC the E6600 to 3ghz without changing the speed of the ram, as this would be a 1:1 fsb ratio. (333mhz*9=2.9ghz)

Secondly, have you seen the prices cuts that will be happening later this year on the Core 2 Duo and Quad? It might be worth waiting for that and possibly getting a quad core for much the same price as the dual core is now.

 

[Darkchyld]

@inshadows, while the 8800 is unquestionably the fastest card out now one of my questions is is it the "best"? I have become aware of some issues involving older games and compatibilty. My research has also indicated that in many cases ATI deliveres better visuial quailty in DVD playback and some games and only a small FPS loss. I have decided for myself to wait for the R600 and mate it with the ATI 3200+600 chipset in crossfire. It will be my first realy hi performance PC so I'm being pataint for a little longer.. :lol:

 

[Apache14]

As your useing £ i presume your in britan. So we will probably haft to wait an extra week or so to get the R600 cards anyway. As when i was looking at the 8800 for the first week they where out they where all eiter out of stock or pre order.

 

[inshadows]

ARM Thanks very much for the reply. Was going to buy from overclockers. I chose the motherboard because of the layout, i did consider the AB9 Pro but chose against it because i prefer Asus and i dont like the position of the IDE connecter and i prefer the extra PCI slot, although i concede otherwise the ab9 would be a better choice. THe choice of Ram was based upon the CAS4 and the ability to maintain the FSB synchronously as high as poss. However i will check out scan becaues their retail e6600 is cheaper.

Darkchyld- i have read about the compatibility issues and was hoping that i could play the other games while updates became available. I do prefer ATI for some reason and i see what u mean about the quality.

If i waited to see the winner can any1 recommend a 100 pound graphics card that would at least allow me to run bf2142 @ 1280 x 1024 on whatever settings. My current setup has AGP.

Thanks again guys for the helpsies

 

[krisz]

I'm being pataint for a little longer.. :lol:

The question is will ATI follow Nvidia and release the high end chips first and then the Mid range later or the other way around.

 

[krisz]

can any1 recommend a 100 pound graphics card that would at least allow me to run bf2142 @ 1280 x 1024

That's all i play these days as well. It looks a little different after using the 8800GTX and now on the 7300 GS 800x600 res low settings

 

[Apache14]

For i would say either a 7900gs £112 or for a bit more The x1950pro £126 either one should run 2142 well

Found both on O/C's

 

[inshadows]

Thanks again for all your replies. Not one flaming, thats gotta be a record. have looked on scan, will prob buy all but cooler and graphx card from there. Changed the mobo to the Asus P5N32-E SLI NF680i coz it has 2 pci slots plus a better upgrade path. (although i doubt ill ever gett 2 8800gtx in sli its worth having it as an option if i hit it rich and get a monster monitor).

Asus P5N32-E SLI NF680i SLI £176.24
Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 Retail £198.21
2GB (2x1GB) CorsairTwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC2-6400 (800 CAS 4) £180.53
Speed-Link MEDUSA 5.1 Vibrating ProGamer Headphones £43.11
620W Corsair HX Series Modular PSU £96.35
Creative SoundBlaster X-Fi Xtreme Gamer £56.62
Total £764

An 8800GTX and a CPU cooler brings it up to £1200 which is £50 under budget, but thats just 100 quid for a temporary graphics card and thats given that the 8800GTX drops by 50 quid. Maybe id be better off waiting for the mobo to come back into stock and deciding then.

Apologies for wittering but i wont see this kinda money again for at least 2 years so its a big decision.

IS

 

[celewign]

<From "Napolean Dynamite", with editing>
INSHADOW: "It's a [inshadows sick new PC]."
ME: "It's got shocks, pegs, LUCKY!"


-cm

 

[inshadows]

apologies for the use of the word wittering

 

[Ford_Prefect]

I give the 8800 series less than 12 months before something else is release to replace it. It's not a "true" DX10 card, so once Vista appears it's performance with DX10 will suffer.

 

[krisz]

I give the 8800 series less than 12 months before something else is release to replace it. It's not a "true" DX10 card, so once Vista appears it's performance with DX10 will suffer.

LOL now where did you get that info from?

 

[sailer]

I give the 8800 series less than 12 months before something else is release to replace it. It's not a "true" DX10 card, so once Vista appears it's performance with DX10 will suffer.

The 8800 is a true DX10 card, but the drivers haven't been released for DX10 under Vista yet, or they have been released but aren't working properly. There is a bit of an argument going on between Nvidia and Microsoft about this. I don't know what the right answer is.

Either way, if the timeframe of the build can be in Feb, I'd wait until the R600 is released. Like was said earlier, it would feel terrible to buy a 8800 and then find out the following week that the R600 beat the 8800 in the benches, and maybe was a bit cheaper to buy as well.

Neither of these cards will show their true potential unless they are on a Vista machine and running DX10, rather than just speeding up a XP machine on DX9. If Vista is the OS, none of the DX9 cards will run DX10. They might be able to do some things that a DX10 card can do, but not everything.

 

[celewign]

OMG this thread just go hijacked onto the "8800 OMG I DON'T THINK IT IS REALLY THAT GOOD OMG OMG OMG" line...

Enough already.
-cm

 

[The_Abyss]

At least hold on the the R600 benchmarks (proper ones that is) if not the availability before buying the system.

 

[celewign]

I'm not completely sure that there ARE any good R600 benchies. I would say that I need three sites with benchmarks to really believe that the R600 (final form) has been benched. I don't see three sites, I see one. And that one is sketchy.
-cm

 

[The_Abyss]

Precisely - sorry - I was being a little too tongue-in-cheek.

 

[celewign]

Oh.
Sorry for my failure to detect your sarcasm.
Can we still be friends?
-cm

 

[kaotao]

The only reason why you might want to wait until the R600 gets released though is to see if Nvidia will drop their prices on the 8800 or not. You might save some money for yourself

The only reason? It also will probably be better than the G80s. At least that's what one would expect. It'd suck to come late to the party with an inferior product.