FSX graphics card selection Help...

Hello.. have a nice day.. I am an old man and I a have an old Dell XPS 600 : Intel pentium D 935, 2 Gb Ballistix 667, Nvidia nForce4 SLI X16 MCP sli capable mobo.. Well; I need upgrade my video card (Nvidia 6800GT).. Can you help me with any Suggestions.. Thanks a lot.. Bye

upgrade our cpu and get a 9800gt/4850,fsx is heavily cpu intensive

Hi all. On a similar note, which upgrades would be most beneficial for improved frame rate and performance of both FlightSim X and X-Plane 9? Specs are below.

I am looking to upgrade my graphics card. I picked up a second 8800GT to run SLI and accidentally fried it. Turns out a modem card underneath it was blocking the fan and it overheated and is now dead. Since then I thought I'd be better off getting a much newer card rather than two older 8800GT in SLI, which apparently doesn't improve flight sim performance much anyway. What kind of effect would each of these have for me, and what would be your recommendation? Price/performance ratio is a consideration. Looking to get the most bang for the buck.

Processor:

Should I OC my processor or upgrade, and what would be the performance difference for flightsim? I think my heatsink is sufficient to OC the processor. The only real upgrade on a 775 processor I can see is this:

Intel Core 2 Quad Q9650 3.0GHz LGA 775 95W Quad-Core Processor Model BX80569Q9650
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819115130 but that is a $320.00 upgrade.


Graphics:

Thinking of something along the lines of an ATI 4870 X2 or a 5870, or another recommendation. I've read the 5870 is comparable but with one processor core. And DX11. Is this the case or with the 4870 X2 be more powerful. I'm not interested in DX 11 capabilities for now, maybe my next build in a couple years but not now. Simply looking for the more powerful card. Possibly the 5870 will draw less power and run cooler? My power supply is a consideration. Looking to spend no more than $400.00 on graphics upgrade, but can spend less if there's comparable performance for less money.

SATA HD:

You tell me. Would a different drive show better performance in FlightsimX and X-Plane? Or is mine good enough. Also, what about RAID or striping?

OS:

Windows 7. I know Vista is an elephant. Will Win 7 improve performance? One thing I hate about FlightSim X is the long delay when clicking on dialogue boxes such as choosing an aircraft or location and whatnot. Wondering if this is a Vista problem.


Thanks for the input.







MSI P6N SLI Platinum LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 650i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813130081

Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz 2 x 4MB L2 Cache LGA 775
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819115017

Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme CPU Heatsink
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835109140

Patriot Extreme Performance 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820220144

GeForce 8800GT 512MB graphics card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814127311

Western Digital Caviar Blue WD5000AAKS 500GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6822136073

AeroCool ZERODBA S620 620W ATX12V / EPS12V SLI Certified CrossFire Ready Modular Power Supply
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6817331002

Windows Vista Ultimate SP2

ATI 5750 or better

probably 5870 is older. 4870 X2 is new, and X2 means double the memory. 4870 has 1GB memory, X2 means 2GB. And for the first time, 4870X2 has 512 bit of GDDR5 memory bus, 1600 stream processors and a lot better than other ATI cards. It should be very expansive, though.