Ok here's the scenario.

I currently have a good gaming rig that works great. I also have my old computer that got me through college that I have upgraded over the years to keep me gaming until I built my new rig. I would like to use that old computer to run a bot/secondary account for some games. Even ones I'm currently beta testing that the NDA prevents me from discussing much further.

Here's the current specs of my older system.

Old Intel Socket 478 mobo.
Intel P4 2.6Ghz (Upgraded to the fastest P4 the mobo could take)
1GB (2x512MB) PC2100 266Mhz DDR SDRAM (Have to check when I get home if the mobo can handle 2x1GB of this memory)
Antec Earthwatts 430W PSU (Recent Upgrade from the old 165W PoS that was in it originally)
ATI Radeon X700pro 256MB AGP 4X Video Card
WD 40Gig HDD IDE(Might have to upgrade that soon.)
Windows XP Pro 32-bit
17" Samsung LCD (1280 x 1024)

Right now the system can handle itself ok in some games with the settings turned pretty far down. I'm thinking if I can upgrade to 2GB of memory and upgrade the graphics card again I may be able to get smooth framerates in games on the system. Also possibly play upcoming games that are coming out not named Warhammer: Age of Reckoning that I may or may not be beta testing atm.

As I stated I need to check and verify that my mobo can support 2GB of memory.

For the graphics card, I saw the Radeon 3850 is being released on the AGP bus. That being said, my CPU will bottleneck the crap out of that card. Big waste of $$$ for my situation imo. I also feel that the X1950pro will also be bottlenecked by my CPU.

So I'm leaning towards the X1650pro. I dont believe that the 256MB vs the 512MB card matters in this situation since I'm gaming at 1280 x 1024.

My question is this. Do you guys feel that my 2.6Ghz P4 Socket 478 will bottleneck the X1650pro? Would it even bottleneck the X1650?

Any other suggestions for cards? I want to try to get the cheapest/best card for this system without spending too much on a card that is bottlenecked.

Thanks for any help.

Im a little confused about your processor what do you mean by "Intel P4 2.6Ghz (Upgraded to the fastest P4 the mobo could take)" Am i correct in assuming that you know there is a 3.0GHZ Prescott for that socket but your actual MOBO dosent suport it?
If that is the case then on a 2.6 the 1650 pro would be a good choice but to be honest in your situation i wouldnt worry that much about the CPU restricting the performance of the card. Personally i would be looking at a 7600GT or a X1650XT (Must be GDDR3 though much better than a GDDR2 card). If you get a more powerfull card that as you put it would be bottlenecked by the CPU that just means that you can have all the bells and whistles turned on all the time, It really comes down to price/performance and while yes some caution is required a card that is a little better than what your CPU can keep up with wont hurt.
Mactronix

The maximum FSB the mobo supports is 400. Because of that the fastest CPU is can take is the 2.6Ghz P4.

I don't prefer to buy any computer hardware on ebay and the only x1650s I can find only have GDDR2 memory. 7600gts and x1950s are becoming very difficult to find, especially at a good price...

problem is your system is nowhere near what a i865pe/P4 2.6C would be even. Many games it just won't be enough. But, you have an X700 pro, so yes I say there is room for improvement. The X1650 pro would be a good option IMO price/performance gain wise. Make sure it's not a 64-bit one as those crippled versions have appeared. Best would be a 128-bit GDDR3 version, but you will probably have to settle for GDDR2 now.

Going above the X1650 pro presents a problem. The X1650XT, X1650GT, and 7600GT are clearly a step up, but are also priced around $100 AR making the HD2600XT a much better option for under $120.

here ya go, prices have dropped to about $100 shipped no rebates and this card is better than the X1650XT or 7600GT. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814102711

Matter of fact without fsaa it can often keep up with the X1950 pro and it trounces the 7900GS in some of the new games.

That card would be great but its an 8X. This mobo is only 4X so I would probably need a 4X/8X card for fear of frying an 8X in my 4X slot.


I was only looking to spend around $75 but I jumping to $100 is fine. Money isn't really an issue here, I just don't want to put anymore money into this computer than I have to because I know its beyond being a decent computer. Upgrading from 1GB to 2GB and the vid card from the x700 is hitting the absolute roof on this pig.

Any 8x card will work fine in a 4x mobo; it'll just be limited to running at 4x. There shoudn't much of a bottleneck running an X1650Pro or HD2600XT like the previous poster suggested and it'd make a worthwhile difference in gaming.

you neednt worry about frying an '8x agp' card, in a '4x agp' slot, as agp is backwards compatible by design. agp express is a different issue though... as its not really agp, but dual pci, and 'can' fry agp cards due to the voltage supplied being just too much, so its best to check with the manufacturers to see if your card is compatible, if you are in fact dealing with agp express.

If you check sapphires spec sheet, you will see the AGP 2600XT is 4x/8x.

See if this link works: http://www.sapphiretech.com/en/pro [...] -vga-1.xls

Hmm. Guess I was wrong. I could've sworn 8X cards can fry in 4X slots... I can't find anywhere stating that its true though.

If thats the case, $100 shipped for the 2600XT might be the winner...

Some 8x Cards will even work in 2x slots. The notches where the contacts are are spaced differently depending on the required voltage so you wouldn't even be able to physically put it in if it wasn't compatable (without a whole lot of force at least).

-MikeM

You could buy an ASROCK Dual mainboard (DUAL VSTA 775 isn't sold anymore I think, but the DUAL 4 CORE is cheap, at least in Europe, 50€ ).

It takes your old RAM and AGP card as well as a PCIe card. It's designed for upgrading from the 478 to the 775 world. You need a slot 775 CPU, for example the most inexpensive D2C you can find (which will still be faster than your P4; I use the E6300, which is about 120€ I think).

This should be enough for a MMORPG-bot at lowest settings in most current MMORPGs. Check my sig, I have such a "low-end" system, and it runs some current games just fine (LOTRO, The Witcher, both at medium settings at 1280x1024 at 20+ fps), with an even slower video card than yours.

If it's not enough, and you must upgrade the VGA, then you at least have a much wider choice, as you can take AGP or PCIe, not just AGP.

WARNING: my board has a known driver incompatibility with the GF8800 line in XP (Vista is fine). I don't know if the DUAL 4 CORE has the same problem. But I know pretty sure that you don't want to buy a GF8800 for a P4 CPU anyway.

I dont want to buy a new mobo, I know that is the most logical way to go but then I would have to purchase a new OS as well. I have looked into mobos that will take the CPU/Ram/GPU I have now as well as newer CPUs/Ram but those things are few and far between and at least $70 shipped. Not to mention $100 for new OS and I still need a video card. I know this old system is limited but I'd like to just keep it going as long as I can before I look at building a whole new computer to replace it.



Also, you guys don't think the CPU I have will bottleneck a 2600XT? I should add the 2.6 P4 I have only has 512KB of L2 Cache, not 1MB like the newer P4s. Or would such a small cache be made up for by 2GB of ram and 512MB of ram on the video card?

What's killing you is an old P4 chipset with 400Mhz bus and no dual channel DDR support. The newer 800 bus P4's (C for northwood or E for prescott) on an i865pe or i875p mobotherboard would be alot faster. Even then I have a P4 2.6C on an i865pe and already see it's quite slow for many the newest games.

But I would not be overly concerned about "bottlenecking" You will be cpu bound quite often especially at lower resolutions and the HD2600XT won't be able to give you all it could on a faster system. But, no use buying a slower card like the 7600GT for the same or more money. If you could get a 7600GT or X1650XT or GT for $70, then those would be good options. But prices aren't that way, so I think the 2600XT will give you very good improvements over a X1650 pro GDDR2 to justify going above one of those.

If you have time and want to expore this more, these are the reviews for you. The HD2600XT is about like the X1950 pro without fsaa but usually quite a bit behind it with fsaa. But as you can see the X1950 pro can shine even in older games on an XP 2500+, which is about like your P4. The second part of the review shows you that the XP2500+ is clearly holding the 1950 pro back quite often, especially at lower resolutions. So a 7600GT would be a nice level to shoot for, but again not at current prices = the HD2600XT.


http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/0 [...] -analysis/
http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/0 [...] -analysis/

Given that you have a 4x slot and a 400Mhz FSB on a Northwood, I would stick with the X1650Pro, even if it has DDR2 (my 7600GS does, and it does just fine). It'll be a big improvement over what you currently have and it'll stick to the "not pouring more money than I need to" idea.

Edit: Beyond that, I'd say the HD 2600XT is your best choice, since they now have [supposedly] fully-functional drivers.