Geforce 480 on an older motherboard.. worth it?

[Evolution_13]

Hey all, my current setup is a Core 2 Quad Q9650 (3 ghz) on an Asus P5N32-E SLI plus Motherboard with 8 gigs of ram and a Geforce GTX 275.

Despite the fact that mobo is SLI capable I've decides against sticking two video cards in it as everything would be a very tight fit in my current case and I'm worried about heating and ventilation. also the tab broke off one of the pci-e slots so the second card might wobble a bit..

So, If I wanted to upgrade to a Geforce 480.. How much performance would I loose putting a newer PCI-e 2.0 card on my PCI-e x16 mobo? (I did some research when I got the 275 and found it barely uses any of the extra bandwidth) Would I perhaps be better off with a slower 400 series card that would still give me a significant performance boost?

My CPU is the best my motherboard can handle.. is it "worthy" of a 480? will the combination be able to handle the games of 2011 at the higher graphics settings? Or should I just wait till I can get an i7 or equivalent mobo and CPU before getting a new graphics card?

Thanks in advance!

 

[hang-the-9]

You should really not see any performance loss due to the interface. And either way, if you can afford to buy the card now, go ahead and then move it over to another build later on when you feel like upgrading the motherboard. Core 2 Quad at 3 gig should handle any games for several years.

 

[Evolution_13]

Thanks The other thing going through my head was if I just upgraded the Graphics card now, I'd probably end up waiting until the 400's were considered old before I went for a whole new system.

 

[nforce4max]

Don't bother unless your games/apps are already maxing out your card or already suffering due to limited vram. Don't bother with a 768mb GTX 460 and the 1GB version is ok and got one my self but they are only as fast as a GTX285 at stock speeds so a GTX470 or a 480 isn't a bad idea even though the GTX580 is coming out in like a week from now. >.> would like to nuke the shader only instead of the whole core when overclocking.... Miss Riva Tuner

 

[Evolution_13]

Don't bother unless your games/apps are already maxing out your card or already suffering due to limited vram. Don't bother with a 768mb GTX 460 and the 1GB version is ok and got one my self but they are only as fast as a GTX285 at stock speeds so a GTX470 or a 480 isn't a bad idea even though the GTX580 is coming out in like a week from now. >.> would like to nuke the shader only instead of the whole core when overclocking.... Miss Riva Tuner

I know in my heart that this is actually a really good answer, but when it comes to games I'm a maximum prettyness kinda guy, and I'm wondering if I'm missing out on anything by not having a DX11 card. Were I to get a 480 or better, I'd go for one with a gig and a half of memory at least, as that's what my 275 is. Now that I know that the 500's are comming out, would it be worth sticking one of those in my present rig? >.>

 

[nforce4max]

It is knowing how the pace of bloatware has increased to ware my single GTX 460 is already maxed out even at low res and have to overclock it just to be playable.

 

[notty22]

Your platform will work, here is a thread where a fellow went gtx 460sli with a O/C 9650. http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1552813&highlight=gtx+460+sli+775
Those are very good results.

 

[Viper98]

If it could handle GTX 270 , then it can Handle GTX 460 for sure .

 

[Evolution_13]

Best answer selected by Evolution_13.

 

[Mousemonkey]

This topic has been closed by Mousemonkey