Video Card Performance limit

chadster

Distinguished
Aug 25, 2002
4
0
18,510
Hello, I've noticed in many video card reviews, they have "CPU Scaling".. meaning your video card is being held back?? Umm.. I have a P3 550mhz and G400 32mb.. would a GF4 Ti4200 help me significantly in current and future games, or would it just be held back by my outdated CPU? Because if it is, I'd just buy a new system altogether. Thanks in advanced!
 

eden

Champion
Some games will make little to no difference on the CPU even when going from an 800MHZ P3 to a 2.53GHZ P4. I personally recommend upgrading it all, but not waste SO MUCH. Going to around a P4 2.26GHZ which you can overclock to 2.8GHZ and above safely, or an ultra cheap price/performance winner, the AXP 1600+, which you can try your luck at OCing it, otherwise it's still very good for today's games, and only costs around 55$ Retail, last I heard.

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When buying an AthlonXP, please make sure the bus is at 133MHZ, or you will get a lower speed!
 

Hadi

Distinguished
Jul 16, 2002
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18,630
go for eden's advice. though I think for a GeForce ti 4200 you shouldn't go for a P4 2200 and this is because of the scaling matter that you mentioned.

so change your system and the best performance/price is for <AXP 2000+ .

you can have a look for CPU prices(and other components) in <A HREF="http://www.toshardware.com" target="_new">http://www.toshardware.com</A> and choose for yourself.
 

phsstpok

Splendid
Dec 31, 2007
5,600
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25,780
Scaling just means performance increases proportionally as speed increases. CPU Scaling means performance increases as CPU speed increases. This does not mean that you will not get better performance from a faster video card. It just means that you get even more performance from that video card when paired with a faster CPU.

A better CPU/system <b>AND</b> and a better video card would be the best upgrade but if budget is a concern upgrade the video card now and the system later.

A Ti4200 will give quite a boost over a Matrox G400, even with just a P3 550 in 3D games. You'll also be able to play games at higher resolution than you probably are playing now.

To give you an idea of what you might gain I did a quick check at MadOnion.com for some 3DMark2001 scores. Systems like your P3 550 get mostly under 1000 3DMarks with a Matrox G400. With a Ti4200 and P3 550, several users are getting over 4000 3DMarks a few even over 4500.

The highest score is recorded for any Ti4200 with any system is over 13,000 3DMarks. Those scores are with highly overclocked Ti4200s and highly clocked P4 systems but it shows you how much better a Ti4200 can do with a better system. The card grows with the system, if you will.



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