Is this a worthy step up? I am still using CRT so I am not stuck at resolutions, playing games (CS:S, CoH, BF2, BF2142) at 1280 x 960 @ 75hz, medium to high settings. I eventually want to step up to a 1440 x 900 or greater resolution LCD. Should I keep my x850 or step up to x1950pro, again, just to be clear, this is all AGP platform. Or should I wait for quad core, dx10, vista to work in kinks and do a ground up in a year?
epox nForce3 mobo
fx-55 san diego (939) 260 x 11 = 2.86ghz
2 gigs g.skill pc4000 ddr500 @ ddr520
x850 xt pe
audigy 2 value
viewsonic crt a91f+
I'm assuming my fx-55 @ 2.86 can push the x1950pro to the max.. (bad assumption?)
The best you're gonna do is to be able to see more "eye candy" on SOME games. I was able to turn up the AA and AF on some games but that was the extent of the improvements. No jump in FPS and some games like Darkstar One, actually performed worse. COD2 stopped playing altogether with the latest install of DirectX 9c. Makes you really hate gaming sometimes.
Go for it if you need SM 3.0 compatibility. You should see a nice improvement depending on the game/app considering your specs - certainly enough of a boost to justify the purchase. You definately will see the biggest increase with shader intensive newer titles - the X1950 Pro will flex it's muscles and shine, thoroughly spanking that X850. Probably your best bet if you want to hang on to AGP claw, tooth, and nail. DX10 hardware won't be put into said cards, or at least it's very unlikely since nVidia and AMD want to kill AGP off as soon as they can.
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