Is my GPU good enough for my resolution?

[srynznfyra]

Hi
I like to game in my spare time, but I was wondering if my GPU was good enough for my resolution of 1440x900. I have a 9800 GT, and play games such as Crysis and GTAIV, but I can't run Crysis on enthusiast/very high and GTAIV lags a bit (due to CPU though - gonna upgrade that soon).

So if you have any recommendations, please tell me, and btw price can't be higher than £200 cause I'm not gonna spend that on one piece of computer hardware.

Btw, I'll only get an nvidia card as they have better support for Linux (my primary OS), and I don't have an SLI board, plus some games don't support SLI.

Thanks,
Fela

 

[ac3144]

Hi,
So are you looking to upgrade your gpu or are you wanting opinion on whether your gpu is good enough?

BTW we need more info on your system specs to recommend a gpu. What's your PSU, CPU, Mobo etc.

And BTW try to be polite..
AC

 

[srynznfyra]

Hi,
So are you looking to upgrade your gpu or are you wanting opinion on whether your gpu is good enough?

BTW we need more info on your system specs to recommend a gpu. What's your PSU, CPU, Mobo etc.

And BTW try to be polite..
AC

Wasn't I polite enough? I said thanks, lol. Anyway:

Yeah, I was just wondering if you thought I had to upgrade my GPU, I'd rather not and I'd only be able to next year.

Okay, my specs (I meant to post them, I was going to lol):
CPU: Athlon X2 6000 Brisbane 3.1GHz 2x512KB L2, gonna upgrade to PhenomII 940 X4 soon
Memory: 2x2GB DDR2 800 PC2-6400 CAS 5-5-5-18
GPU: 9800 GT 512MB DDR3 PCIe v.1 @ 100MHz PCIe bus (default)
HDD: with games on it, bog standard 250GB SATAII drive
420W Thermaltake dual rail PSU, I'm sure I'd have to upgrade this if I got a new GPU, I'd take that for granted.


thanks again
Fela

 

[blackhawk1928]

Well your card is really good, you wont be able to run crysis with enthusiast or very high settings with it, crysis is very power munchy game, and besides there is no point in upgrading becuase you are bottlenecked anyway, by your ram, cpu, and powersupply, and motherboard When you get a new computer then upgrade your card.
Example:
-You have only 4GB of dual channel 800mhz ram
-New machines to play crysis and consuming games/apps have;
-6GB+ of triple channel 1066-2000mhz RAM with QPI instead of FSB and low latency
-wait until you get a new system to upgrade

 

[snow cakes]

depends, because the 9800 doesn't support dx10 which is probly why it won't let you put settings up to very high. I would suggest upgrading to a card that is now supporting dx10 with pci-16x 2.0 just because most upcomming games are going to be pretty demanding in graphics. (well the games i'm looking to buy) You can upgrade to a gtx260 or a 4870 for under 200 easy and you will see a good improvement. If you upgrade you might need to upgrade your psu also, so its all about the money in your case and what your willing to put out.

 

[OvrClkr]

I agree, dont upgrade your video card. Just lower your res to 1080x1024 and make sure all settings are on "Medium". Then you can try xAA but the higher the AA the less frames you will get (lag).

If you want to play Crysis with all settings on "High" and have smooth gameplay you need to save up...um... like about 1,500$ at the least....But that amount can be reduced if we knew what hardware you have at the moment.

Please post your specs so we know what we are working with here.....

And BTW try to be polite.. <--- ?????? lol

Sorry, it looks like the specs were posted while I was typing this message....ooops....

 

[OvrClkr]

depends, because the 9800 doesn't support dx10 which is probly why it won't let you put settings up to very high. I would suggest upgrading to a card that is now supporting dx10 with pci-16x 2.0 just because most upcomming games are going to be pretty demanding in graphics. (well the games i'm looking to buy) You can upgrade to a gtx260 or a 4870 for under 200 easy and you will see a good improvement. If you upgrade you might need to upgrade your psu also, so its all about the money in your case and what your willing to put out.

Um..... The 9800GT does support DX10 ......He just needs to upgrade his card to at least a 9800GTX/GTS 250 to get better frames. Taking in consideration that the GTX/250 should work with his PSU, and if not then its time for a PSU upgrade....

 

[snow cakes]

....the 9800GT supports....DX10...a little reading goes a long way.....
http://www.nvidia.com/object/product_geforce_9800gt_us.html

like I stated above...its linux that does not support DX10

yea sorry I mistakin it for the ati 9800xt

 

[Dekasav]

Wow.... that's a huge mistake (not in how bad it is, but how different the two cards are).

 

[srynznfyra]

Okay. Lots of replies. Thanks to ALL who replied.

@ blackhawk1928: I don't have FSB, I have an AMD CPU ie. I have hypertransport which includes a built in memory controller in the CPU, much like core i7 which you are talking about. Toms hardware have proven that 4GB is more than enough for almost all games, and definitely Crysis. Your PSU can't bottleneck, it can only make the system crash.

@ct1615: Crysis doesn't run on Linux (well, not including wine), but I dual boot windows and Linux. I can play Crysis on similar framerates, except it goes a little bit down in battles, to maybe 20 or so FPS, which I don't mind if it's only occasionally. The new CPU might fix that. My FPS fluctuates quite alot though, it can be as low as 17 fps but as high as 45 fps.

@snow cakes: the 9800 does support DX10, it says on the box and everywhere else. It does let me put the settings at very high, it just doesn't play it very well at that quality. Ie. framerates of like 3fps or so. I know that I would need a new PSU to upgrade the GPU and the CPU together. Plus my mobo doesn't support PCIe 2.0 (my graphics card does btw).

@OvrClkr: Umm, I assume you meant 1280x1024, in which case it would be slightly MORE pixels than what I have now. I've tried a lower resolution of 1280x800, but that just looks crap. I don't play games in windowed mode. Also, I want it on high cause I think medium looks mediocre (as it would suggest lol). And I definitely DON'T need to save up 1,500 pounds (not dollars) to play crysis on very high even! thanks anyway for your post.

@ct1615 again...well yeah I run windows for games, Linux for everything else.


Okay, I think I'll upgrade my CPU later in the year when I have the cash, then I'll think about upgrading GPU. I am pretty sure it's actually a CPU bottleneck, cause when I overclocked my GPU by 200Mhz core and 300MHz memory, there were absolutely no improvements in the crysis benchmark.

Thanks for ALL your posts, guys!

 

[megamanx00]

The 9800GT is fine for your resolution. If you're willing to spend money on a new GPU just so you can play Crysis on very high, then get a GTX 260 216. A 9800GTX+/GTS250 will run it just as fine, but you may as well spend a little more on the 260 to make the upgrade worthwhile. Even though your current CPU will hold it back a little, you'll be fine when you upgrade to a 940. As for GTA 4, that game just has issues.

 

[srynznfyra]

can crysis even run on Linux @ ultra high? linux supports DX10?

About this post. 1) sorry if I was misleading but I run my games on windows and everything else on Linux.

2) You don't need DX10 do you for very high? I run XP and there's a very high hack for XP, but XP can't run DX10 can it? I don't know really. My forte is Linux, not windows.

EDIT: Wine on Linux only supports DX9 I'm pretty sure. So yeah, no DX10 at all on Linux. Linux supports OpenGL instead though.

 

[megamanx00]

Well, I believe WINE translates DX9 calls into Open GL calls. Anyway the very high hack is to enable the DX9 version of very high. It is a very high level of detail, but some of the effects, like certain shadows, are not as good as the dx10 version. Honestly though you spend more time shooting things than admiring the shadow a tree is casting on a rock so to me it's not a big deal. I prefer the DX9 version simply because it runs faster myself.

 

[srynznfyra]

@megamanx00: Okay, that's what I was suspecting. When I do upgrade my GPU, I'll get a GTX280 then in case I ever get a big screen. But that won't be any time soon.

@ct1615: Umm, yes you can't run on very high on xp by default, but there's a hack for it. Yeah, i wasn't gonna get ATI anyway (I also knew about the Crytek/nvidia partnership), and if I do upgrade my video card I'd want to get something substantially better than what I have now (see previous paragraph). Is it possible to change the draw distance in crysis? there isn't an option for it in the options page, but is there a configuration file you can change to do that? Also, if I changed the draw distance, would it also change the AI-detecting distance with it? If it didn't, I'd have enemies shooting at me that I couldn't see! lol. I always have the shadows at medium btw, I don't mind having crap shadows.

@megamanx00 again: I totally agree, I just want it to look good but not 'too' good, so I actually shoot the guys and stop looking at the sea and trees all the time! lol. Also, you need a high framerate to be able to shoot the guys. And pick them up and throw them.

 

[srynznfyra]

OMG! R U NUTZ??!!

I would just toss your PC out the window now and build a brand new $2,000 system just to see that shadow on a rock...some fifty yards away....at 8X AA....crysis isn't even worth playing without it....its like playing Doom I.....not even the same game...in fact I think the story and game-play is entirely different without those long distance shadows....

If that wasn't supposed to be a joke, you are a very sad person.

 

[OvrClkr]

The 9800GT is fine for your resolution. If you're willing to spend money on a new GPU just so you can play Crysis on very high, then get a GTX 260 216. A 9800GTX+/GTS250 will run it just as fine, but you may as well spend a little more on the 260 to make the upgrade worthwhile. Even though your current CPU will hold it back a little, you'll be fine when you upgrade to a 940. As for GTA 4, that game just has issues.

I agree...well done.....

 

[srynznfyra]

Okay, from the variety of posts I've recieved, I've come to the conclusion that it's not worth upgrading my GPU for gaming at my resolution. If one of the most GPU-hungry games around wouldn't really see the need for it, I'm not gonna bother. There's two reasons I'm gonna upgrade the CPU though, 1, cause GTAIV would definitely benefit, amongst other games, as well as video rendering which is a right pain without a decent CPU. Think, add an effect, wait an hour, oh no that effect sucks, add another one, wait another hour, oh maybe that clip was better off without effects...lol. Yes you can see I like to edit video.