would you wait for the 9x card?

[guitarxe]

consider my situation:
i bought a system about 2 and a half years ago thinking it would be da bomb and play all games at great frames for a while. my system is 2 gigs ram, X2 3800+ and a 7800gtx (256mb).
i can't play anything that has come out in the last year with any sort of good performance. i want to save up for a new GPU and was thinking of buying the 8800GTX, but that card has come out a year ago, and so i would be buying an old product. same thing as with the 7800gtx.. it wasn't new when i bought it, it was already a year old, so it only lasted me about a year.
would you buy the 8800GTX now if you were in my shoes? or would you wait untill nvidia comes up with its 9x series some time in spring or so?

 

[Onus]

I would wait a month for the 8800GT to come out, look at benchmarks, then re-evaluate the decision. You're also going to reach a point where that X2 3800+ is going to bottleneck a highend GPU.
Another thing to consider is your PSU. Is it big enough and of sufficient quality to handle a high-end GPU? If not, choose one from Tier-3 or better from this list:
http://www.tomswiki.com/page/Tiered+PSU+Listings?t=anon

 

[maximiza]

I have the same 7800gtx, Had it since the fall of 2005. I am still finding DX9 games that I have not played yet. My warrenty expires on my current rig in April 08. Then I might make a switch to DX10.whatever with Vista 64bit but then again maybe not. It really depends what you think you will need DX10.0 for now.

 

[erocker]

do you use s939 or AM2? I think a processor upgrade would help too! You also have to think that there will always be something better in the works.

 

[sunny27]

if u've got socket 939 get urself an opteron Dual core --175,185 and overclock
if u've got socket AM2 get urself an AMD 5000+ x2 black edition and overclock it!!!
and get a good psu too.

 

[guitarxe]

im on s939, and i do plan on getting a better CPU eventually, but the first thing i am going to upgrade would be my GPU (a more powerful PSU goes along with it, of course). there was an arcticle on this site that someone pointed me to, which showed the X2 3800+ paired up with an 8800GTX, and it was performing quite nicely.

i just don't want to do what i did last time, where i bought a year old card, instead of waiting a few months and getting something newer.

and speaking of dx10, is there any word yet when they will be making one that runs on XP? (i'll be darned if i install vista...)

 

[EricVPI]

dx10 never on xp.

 

[rogerdandy]

guitarxe, I have a similar system to yours but i have a 4400+ CPU and I've had no problems running the latest games. Mind you I also have two 7800gtx in sli but i have been impressed by the ability of this machine to run new games. I'd hold out if i were you. maybe get a new cpu if you're itching to upgrade.

 

[ethel]

jtt283 is correct - wait until the 8800GT comes out (next week) and then evaluate which card to get. Better still, wait until the ATI 2950 comes out (next month) as this may shake up the market even more.

 

[desidude006]

like mentioned before, get the 8800gt or HD2950

 

[itotallybelieveyou]

8800 GT sli ohhhh

 

[guitarxe]

i don't get it. isn't the GT going to be somewhere in between the GTS and the GTX in it's performance?

 

[itotallybelieveyou]

No! 9 series gonna take another like 5months

 

[guitarxe]

well, i can wait till around march or so. my first year ends around that time.

how much faster can we expect the 9 to be than the 8? is it going to be as faster as the 8 is over the 7? and will i absolutely have to have vista to realise it's full potential?

 

[guitarxe]

dx10 never on xp.

man i really don't want vista =(. that thing sucks up waaaay too much cpu.

and i heard that there is some kind of protection in place so that you can only install it 3 times before you have to buy a new cd-key? whats up with that?

 

[StevieD]

How about waiting until official specifications, pricing and maybe a couple benchmarks are released so that you can make an informed decision.

At this point in time, with your existing equipment, you can afford to wait 3-4 weeks for the official information to be released.

 

[systemlord]

I am in the same shues as you, and next month (November 1st) I will be replacing my 7800 GTX 256MB card with the 8800 GTX. My system is GPU bottlenecked now and my GPU is capping my frame rates on new games at about 39 FPS on Oblivion, graw 1 & 2.

The time to upgrade is when your system is struggling in running games smoothly at 60+ FPS, so that is the logical thing to do. So what if a 8900/9800 GTX comes out in spring, I'm sure the 8800 GTX will serve me well for a year and a half no-matter what game I through at it. I don't remember the 7900 GTX 512MB being a huge upgrade at the time it came out.

 

[englandr753]

There will always be something new coming out to make you wish you waited. You should wait long enough to see the official results of the 8800GT and go from there. Your CPU will be the bottleneck once you make an upgrade on your GPU. The problem with upgrading a 939 socket CPU you can get a much faster AM2 for nearly the same price.

I would hold off and let the results come out, see where the prices fall after the new products enter the market and find a good combo motherboard/cpu and go for it.

You can sell your items you take off your system on ebay and recover the cost of the motherboard and maybe the CPU. You will only be out of pocket the cost of the new GPU and maybe a new PSU.

The possibilities are endless...

 

[englandr753]

Here's your proof that directX10 will not be on XP...

http://letskilldave.com/archive/2006/10/17/DirectX-10-for-Windows-XP_3F00_--Repeat-after-me_3A00_-No.-No.-No_2E00_.aspx

 

[tbiggums]

Damn I've got a 939 x2 4200 and an x1950xt and was hoping to hold out for 9800 but from the looks of it there will be a bottleneck. Ill probably be going for the 8800gt or 2950 as long as they run Crysis decently.

 

[pchoi04]

I'm somewhat in your shoes right now except my build is just over a year old. I bought my 7950GT late summer 2006, and with a big monitor (24" 1920x1200) I'm finding it hard to play newer games. Games like HL2, and CS:S no problem playing the highest graphics at 1920x1200, but I can feel it strugle on games like GRAW2.

I will be upgrading to a quad core here in a few weeks from my E6300 and I've got money for a 8800GTX but like you I really dont want to buy a video card thats a year old. Last year I bought the 7950GT knowing that the 8800. This time I want to make sure I get the best available card when it comes out. But the wait game is always dangerous.

 

[theuprightman24]

The longer you wait the closer you will get to a release of a better card...


My advice would be wait and see what the GT will be like -- at the end of the day the GTX will be better (maybe not price/performance) but it would make no commercial sense to release a new card (GT) if it will be useless within 6 months.

PC gaming / hardware industry IMO is realising they have to make the current hardware survive for a little bit longer -- as the 360 is a fairly good machine with more to offer -- M$ unlike sony know that its in the software be it better programmer or making sure its easier for development teams... (shame on you Sony).

Technology always moves on -- can't stop that!!!!

To be fair I was a "if I can't play it at max detail then I ain't gonna bother" boy! But really medium and good are still pretty damn good at least equal to the 360s of this world.

So wait for the GT and if it gets glowing reviews and bets the 640GTS I would get that -- I AM!

 

[lakedude]

Here's your proof that directX10 will not be on XP...

http://letskilldave.com/archive/2006/10/17/DirectX-10-for-Windows-XP_3F00_--Repeat-after-me_3A00_-No.-No.-No_2E00_.aspx

Whatever! Here is "proof" that you are wrong:

DX10(alpha version) for XP:

http://www.technospot.net/blogs/download-directx-10-for-windows-xp-from-alky-project/

 

[systemlord]

Whatever! Here is "proof" that you are wrong:

DX10(alpha version) for XP:

http://www.technospot.net/blogs/download-directx-10-for-windows-xp-from-alky-project/

Can't MicroSoft take action to prevent this from happenning? If not then Vista sales will suffer greatly.

 

[englandr753]

Lakedude, this may simulate direct x10 but this is not released or supported by microsoft so go ahead and install this on your system and try to get patches to fix compatibility issues from microsoft.

You install that and your asking for issues. I seriously doubt that microsoft will allow this once it becomes widespread knowledge. This looks like a nice lawsuit waiting to happen and lets ask ourselves who has the most money to fight this to the end, microsoft or Alky?

This would be great if it sticks and actually works but I have my doubts...