I'm one of those rare people still using a CRT monitor, Viewsonic G225FB (20" viewable). Although it supports up to 2048x1536 resolution, I'm running most of my games at 1280x960 or 1600x1200.
I tried an ATI HD5870 video card and didn't see much improvment in fps with the games I play (mostly racing games), perhaps 10% or so. In addition all HD5xxxx video cards have a bug that forces refresh rate to 60hz when using a 16:9 resolution, an annoyance on a CRT monitor where 75hz and 85hz (or faster) are the preferred rates. In case you're wondering, I use 16:9 resolutions when capturing "widescreen" videos from games, mostly for youtube uploads, mostly 1280x720 (it looks vertically streched when recording, but the captured videos will have the proper aspect ratio).
I considered a nVIdia card, but there's less speed gain with these, and apparently more variation in the quality of these cards depending on who make these.
CPU's are a similar issue. I currently have a X6800 Core 2, 2.93ghz, and for most games, more cores isn't going to help much, just the cpu clock speed.
Looks, like I'll be waiting for the next genreation of cpu's and video cards before I buy a new system.
I tried an ATI HD5870 video card and didn't see much improvment in fps with the games I play (mostly racing games), perhaps 10% or so. In addition all HD5xxxx video cards have a bug that forces refresh rate to 60hz when using a 16:9 resolution, an annoyance on a CRT monitor where 75hz and 85hz (or faster) are the preferred rates. In case you're wondering, I use 16:9 resolutions when capturing "widescreen" videos from games, mostly for youtube uploads, mostly 1280x720 (it looks vertically streched when recording, but the captured videos will have the proper aspect ratio).
I considered a nVIdia card, but there's less speed gain with these, and apparently more variation in the quality of these cards depending on who make these.
CPU's are a similar issue. I currently have a X6800 Core 2, 2.93ghz, and for most games, more cores isn't going to help much, just the cpu clock speed.
Looks, like I'll be waiting for the next genreation of cpu's and video cards before I buy a new system.