Nvidea or ATI?

[Anewbie]

i haev recently gotten a brand new computer it has the E8400 cpu, 4 gb of ram, good mother board ( i think its a DS3P PS5) and a 9800 gt 512mb graphics card. im considering getting another 9800 but was wondering wheter buying a 4870 1g would be better?

 

[Nica Guy]

if u already have a 9800gt u should just get another one...
unless you can sell it for a good price...
9800gt in sli outperform even a gtx 280...

 

[4745454b]

If you have a P35, you can't run SLI. Any/all Intel boards 965 and higher that have more then one PCIe slot only support CF, not SLI. You would also need to make sure that you have a PSU that can power two of those cards. Running two 9800GT's in SLI would be a good idea, but if you have the P35, that option doesn't exist.

What is your budget like? What motherboard do you have? What games do you like to play? What resolution do you play at? What PSU do you have? As always, the devil is in the details, and we need to know much more.

 

[Nica Guy]

oh lol didnt see he mentioned mobo

 

[Nica Guy]

since u wont be able to sli and crossfire is not that good with the p35 (16x,4x i think it is) u should sell the 9800gt and get either a 4870 or a 9800gx2....

not sure of this but i think u can change the 16x,4x to 8x,8x and that way u could crossfire decently...

 

[Anewbie]

Sorry folks i have a dodgey memory >< my motherboard is a GA-EP45-DS3P dont know where i came up with the other nmbers and letters! Sorry. My PSU is 700W so i think ill be fine in that department

 

[4745454b]

Doesn't matter. P45 still won't SLI. Only the new X58 will do that. You could also still have a $h!7y 700W PSU. 700W's from a poor company might equal PSU or even worse, GPU death if pushed to hard.

Answer the questions and I'll suggest a video card.

 

[Anewbie]

Uh that sucks. You can tell im a newbie. What would you suggest as a card then?

 

[geckoar]

I have a 4870 512 card and It is really good. I had a 3870 but with the 4870 i can max all my games at 1920x1200(but cyrsis warhead is at all gamer at 1920x1200) Its a good card I dont know about the 9800GX2 as most of the hot air is vented into the case and not out. I picked up my card for 249.99 at newegg about a month ago. Well good luck.

I also run a 9950 at 2.85ghz
4gb of DDR2-800 runing at 407 speed
a 4870 512 clocked at 750/1000 just a mild oc on the ram for now.

 

[Anewbie]

Well at present i have the 9800 GT so if i upgrade ill either get the 280 or the 4870. Which ones better and why?

 

[kelfen]

I vote 4870 because it has more value being that it supports Directx 10.1 and I remember a article on toms stating that NVIDIA is going to support 10.1 also on there next gen graphics cards. which means future games might use it.

 

[Anewbie]

Well because they are so close would i be better of waiting till next year sometime when they bring out all the new cards?