EVGA 7800 gs or XFX 7600 gt

[cephalopodfetish]

Sorry to make a post just asking: Which one? but I don't really know when comparing the cards which features are most important i.e. core clock speed vs pixel pipelines and memory interface. I also don't know if either or both of these would be bottlenecked by my current system.

I'm looking for advice on which of these cards would be a better purchase for an older agp rig. I currently have a pentium 4 3 ghz processor and 1 gig of ram. I had to replace a power supply and the 9800 pro it fried. I picked up an an Antec earthwatts 380watt psu but have yet to replace the video card.

I'd really appreciate any advice about which features are most important and which brand is more reliable. They are almost exactly the same price and it seems like my power supply would be adequate for either.

The specs are:

7800 GS

Chipset Manufacturer NVIDIA
GPU GeForce 7800GS
Core clock 430MHz
PixelPipelines 16

Memory Clock 1300MHz(effective)
Memory Size 256MB
Memory Interface 256-bit
Memory Type GDDR3

7600 GT

Chipset Manufacturer NVIDIA
GPU GeForce 7600GT
Core clock 580MHz
PixelPipelines 12

Memory Clock 1500MHz
Memory Size 256MB
Memory Interface 128-bit
Memory Type GDDR3

The links to newegg are:

7600 GT
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16814150210

7800 GS
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16814130274

Sorry for the long post. Thank you very much in advance for your help.

 

[jeff_2087]

None of the above!

7900 GS KO
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130056

edit: oh geez a 380W PSU? how much 12v does it have

 

[kaotao]

At stock, they perform about the same. If you're into OCing, the 7800GS is the way to go. If not, the 7800GS is still probably the way to go because after MIR it's cheaper.

 

[Ananan]

The input I can give:

I replaced a 7600 GT with a 7800 GT, and the 256-bit card is worlds ahead of the 128-bit card. For my particular setup it was a great investment.

I don't know how a 7800 GS compares to a 7800 GT in real world gaming or how it oc's. The 7800 GT I got won't overclock at all from its stock settings of
470 MHz and 1.10 GHz.

 

[kaotao]

None of the above!

7900 GS KO
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130056

edit: oh geez a 380W PSU? how much 12v does it have

He's looking for AGP.

 

[jeff_2087]

Wow, I should read.

 

[Ananan]

I should read too. I still would take a 256-bit card over a 128-bit card.

 

[kaotao]

The higher core and mem speeds of the 7600GT make up for it's crippled 128-bit interface.

 

[cephalopodfetish]

Thank you very much everyone for the input.

Jeff 2087: The 7900 you linked makes me wish I was ready to upgrade to PCI Expressbut between the motherboard and a new PSU it would be too expensive right now.

Ananan: the 7800 does look pretty good but i'm a little concerned about the power supply requirements.

Kaotao: I probably wouldnt be overclocking either of them as I'm inexperienced with overclockling. I'm be inclined to agree with getting the cheaper one if performance is about the same but I'm concerned about some of the reviews about the evga 7800 gs being somewhat unreliable and particuarly one about the power supply requirements being deceptive.

Pros: Can't tell because I can't get the board to run.

Cons: Published spec is wrong Most power supplies can't handle this chipset.

Other Thoughts: The nVidia spec states that a 350W or higher power supply is required to run the 7800GS. The manufacturer states (over the phone) that this spec is very misleading. The real spec is 19-20 amps CONTINUOUS (not maximum) on the 12V rail. Many power supplies, even in the 500-600W range, do not provide this much current at 12 volts. Check your power supply carefully before you buy this card.

My PSU is rated at 17 amps over the first 12v rail and 15 amps over the second rail (link: http://www.antec.com/specs/EA380_spe.html ) so if those are the real requirements are that high I might have to get the 7600 gt. There's of course contradictory review about The Power requirements:

Huge upgrade from my previous FX5600XT. Now I run every game at 1280x1024, max details on everything, with solid framerates. Minimal power requirements, I'm running it off a 250W (300W max) Dell PSU, and its stable as anything. Got this one $25 cheaper than listed on newegg today (2/25/2006), so its a great deal.

So unless someone has more information about the power supply specs or experience running the 7800 on a similar PSU to mine and and the out of box performance is almost identical I'm leaning towards the 7600 gt.

Thanks again for the advice and info about the relative power of the cards.

 

[cleeve]

The 7600 GT and 7800 GS perform almost identically. In fact, the 7600 GT will win by a tiny margin in most stuff:

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/02/01/agp-platform-analysis/page5.html

On the other hand, the 7800 GS is probably the better overclocker due to it's 256-bit memory interface.

Another option: the X1650 XT AGP should beat them both by a small margin, and it's $140 after rebates on newegg:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161064

 

[kaotao]

Looks to me like you've got sufficient amps to run either card.

 

[TSIMonster]

I would definitely go with the x1650XT

 

[cephalopodfetish]

Sorry to keep asking all these questions but I'm not sure about how to calculate if i have the necessary power for the X1650 XT. I read on newegg that it required 30 amps on the 12v rail and my PSU is rated at 17 amps on the first rail and 15 amps on the second rail. Are these individual amps the max numbers available or are they combined with something else to find the maximum power available.

Unfortunately i picked up the power supply at CompUSA as the store was closing down (so it can't be exchanged) and I'm on a somewhat tight budget so i'm sort of wed to the PSU at this point. The power supply is an antec earthwatts 380 watts (specs: http://www.antec.com/specs/EA380_spe.html )

If the X1650 XT would work it would be a very tempting option at 140$

Thanks again for taking the time to help.

 

[kaotao]

Here's an excellent PSU reference...

http://forumz.tomshardware.com/hardware/PSU-101-ftopict198276.html

 

[TSIMonster]

your PSU will be perfectly fine!!! The x1650XT doesn't need that much power to run. When it says 30 amps or whatever, it is talking about the combined amps.

My x1950Pro only uses 18 Amps, I couldn't imagaine a x1650XT using more then that!!!