Video card advice

I need to replace my GF2 GTS cause I'm pretty sure it has a heat problem and
plus I'd like to upgrade for better 3D performance in games. I play the
following games. Half-Life and GTA3. GTA3 seems to be very demanding.
Although I do have only an 800 MHZ Athlon and 256 meg of RAM I assume the
slowdown I get in GTA3 is because of a lack of video card performance.
Anyway I'm debating the need for a DX9 video card. If there is not real need
for a Directx9 video card for another year or 2 then I might as well upgrade
to a GF4 ti 200. I'm still a little worried about ATI's drivers and the
stuttering problems I have heard about. I could get an ATI 9700 non pro for
$200 or a nice ti200 for $100.

On Sat, 28 Jun 2003 22:12:47 GMT, "grendel"
wrote:

I need to replace my GF2 GTS cause I'm pretty sure it has a heat problem and
plus I'd like to upgrade for better 3D performance in games. I play the
following games. Half-Life and GTA3. GTA3 seems to be very demanding.
Although I do have only an 800 MHZ Athlon and 256 meg of RAM I assume the
slowdown I get in GTA3 is because of a lack of video card performance.
Anyway I'm debating the need for a DX9 video card. If there is not real need
for a Directx9 video card for another year or 2 then I might as well upgrade
to a GF4 ti 200. I'm still a little worried about ATI's drivers and the
stuttering problems I have heard about. I could get an ATI 9700 non pro for
$200 or a nice ti200 for $100.


I don't know whether GTA3 stresses the CPU or video card more, but "in
general" your Athlon 800 is very significantly slowing down gaming,
and while a faster card will improve gaming, the Athlon 800 will even
futher slow down the faster card, and then the PC133(?) memory will be
another bottleneck. For example, I'm testing out a system for
someone right now, in it is an o'c GF2GTS. Here's some semi-random
info to consider (note that this aren't "tweaked" systems, just
whatever performance was seen "randomly" without changing any settings
from previous values) (Celeron on 133MHz FSB/Mem PC133, Athlon XP on
DDR333 FSB/Mem DDR):

Processor Video Card 3DMark2001 Score
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Celeron @ 900MHz GF2GTS 2505
Celeron @ 1.2GHz GF2GTS 3224
Athlon XP2800 GF2GTS 5010
Celeron @ 1.2GHz GF3TI500 5240
Athlon XP2800 GF3TI500 9120


Now consider that your current Athlon is just "barely" faster than the
Celeron @ 900 (not a significant difference considering the
performance spread between those parts and today's CPUs & video
cards).

Of course the GF3TI500 is a fair percentage slower than the GF4TI4200,
and further slower than the Radeon 9700, but it does show a difference
(sorry but no faster video cards are sitting around unused here to be
available for testing). There are relevant graphs at Tom's Hardware
that show this even better, but also show how some games aren't very
dependant on the CPU:

http://www6.tomshardware.com/graphic...charts-02.html

Rather than consider only a single game like GTA3 you ought to
consider "all" games, performance averages/trends, since inevitably
you'll be playing something else sooner or later.

What I would do is first upgrade the motherboard, processor, memory,
since that's ultimately needed anyway, and will enhance performance at
everything. There would be large gains with even (currently-budget
priced) components like a first-generation nForce2 board plus Athlon
XP2000, then if the gaming is still too slow consider a GF4TI4200 or
if some time elapses, card prices change, reassess what's available.


Dave

kony wrote :

Although I do have only an 800 MHZ Athlon and 256 meg of RAM I assume the
slowdown I get in GTA3 is because of a lack of video card performance.

Definitely not the videocard. If you really want to play GTA3 on such an old
pc, you need 1 gb of RAM. Wich should cost much less than a new video card.
The Athlon 800mhz is a bit outdated to play GTA3 too.
A CPu well over 1ghz would be better. I play vice city on
an athlon1200, with 768mb of ram, and a geforce2 MX400 card. Can't say that
it runs smoothly when there are lots of
people around, but it's overall pretty enjoyable.

Anyway I'm debating the need for a DX9 video card.

Well, dx9 cards just have a few more effects in videogames made for dx9.
GTA3 isnt made for dx9 neither is Vice City.
But Half-Life2 probably is. However when you buy a videocard, you should
compare all the bandwidths and fill rates with some other cards. For
instance a Geforce4 4600
has more bandwidth and a higher fill rate than a GeforceFX 5600.

On Sun, 29 Jun 2003 07:19:56 +0200, "Zink" wrote:

kony wrote :

Although I do have only an 800 MHZ Athlon and 256 meg of RAM I assume the
slowdown I get in GTA3 is because of a lack of video card performance.

Definitely not the videocard. If you really want to play GTA3 on such an old
pc, you need 1 gb of RAM. Wich should cost much less than a new video card.
The Athlon 800mhz is a bit outdated to play GTA3 too.
A CPu well over 1ghz would be better. I play vice city on
an athlon1200, with 768mb of ram, and a geforce2 MX400 card. Can't say that
it runs smoothly when there are lots of
people around, but it's overall pretty enjoyable.

Anyway I'm debating the need for a DX9 video card.

Well, dx9 cards just have a few more effects in videogames made for dx9.
GTA3 isnt made for dx9 neither is Vice City.
But Half-Life2 probably is. However when you buy a videocard, you should
compare all the bandwidths and fill rates with some other cards. For
instance a Geforce4 4600
has more bandwidth and a higher fill rate than a GeforceFX 5600.


Uhhhhh, i didn't write that, the OP did.

However, it's extremely unusual for any game to need, significantly
benefit from a system having over 512MB of memory.


Dave

On Sun, 29 Jun 2003 07:26:52 GMT, kony wrote:

However, it's extremely unusual for any game to need, significantly
benefit from a system having over 512MB of memory.

BF1942 is the only game I have played that pretty much needs 512MB and
benefits from more.

Andrew.

[email protected] wrote:
On Sun, 29 Jun 2003 07:26:52 GMT, kony wrote:


However, it's extremely unusual for any game to need, significantly
benefit from a system having over 512MB of memory.


BF1942 is the only game I have played that pretty much needs 512MB and
benefits from more.


IL2 Forgotten Battle can use all 512mb plus something.

"grendel" wrote in message
...
I need to replace my GF2 GTS cause I'm pretty sure it has a heat problem
and
plus I'd like to upgrade for better 3D performance in games. I play the
following games. Half-Life and GTA3. GTA3 seems to be very demanding.
Although I do have only an 800 MHZ Athlon and 256 meg of RAM I assume the
slowdown I get in GTA3 is because of a lack of video card performance.
Anyway I'm debating the need for a DX9 video card. If there is not real
need
for a Directx9 video card for another year or 2 then I might as well
upgrade
to a GF4 ti 200. I'm still a little worried about ATI's drivers and the
stuttering problems I have heard about. I could get an ATI 9700 non pro
for
$200 or a nice ti200 for $100.


The slowdown in GTA3 is cos it's a ****e conversion. I have an XP2100 and
Radeon 8500 and still get stutters. I've heard of people with the latest
geforce and Radeons getting stutters. I've also heard of people with older
systems than yours that have no problems at all. I played it on a P3 867
(GF2 also) for a few weeks with no problems. It just suddenly started
getting funny about the time I reached the second island (I'm sure it's cos
I changed Detonators- I was using version mid-20-something when it was
working).

Anyway, my Radeon 8500 was a big difference to my GF2 TI (except on GTA3!),
and I picked it up cheap on ebay. And despite it's number, it's much better
than a 9000 and 9100, and *possibly* (if not probably) the new 9200. I
reckon the 8500 is about equivalent to that GF4 ti200 you mentioned (but
cheaper). You could find a 9500 for a little over the price you mentioned.

GTA3 Vice city is a better conversion- I just don't like it much! Half-life
is ancient- a TNT2 will do that! Half-life 2 will need a meaty card, and it
looks like Doom 3 will need something the size of a small house from the
early benchmarks I've seen.

"kony" wrote :

Uhhhhh, i didn't write that, the OP did.

whoops ^___^

However, it's extremely unusual for any game to need, significantly
benefit from a system having over 512MB of memory.


1 gb of RAM always helps in a game like GTA3 that has ram leaks. Try it ! It
runs very smooth with 1 gb. Of course you need a decent processor and
videocard too.

GTA3 runs just fine here in 512MB on a P4/1.6

"kony" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 29 Jun 2003 07:19:56 +0200, "Zink" wrote:

kony wrote :

Although I do have only an 800 MHZ Athlon and 256 meg of RAM I assume
the
slowdown I get in GTA3 is because of a lack of video card performance.

Definitely not the videocard. If you really want to play GTA3 on such an
old
pc, you need 1 gb of RAM. Wich should cost much less than a new video
card.
The Athlon 800mhz is a bit outdated to play GTA3 too.
A CPu well over 1ghz would be better. I play vice city on
an athlon1200, with 768mb of ram, and a geforce2 MX400 card. Can't say
that
it runs smoothly when there are lots of
people around, but it's overall pretty enjoyable.

Anyway I'm debating the need for a DX9 video card.

Well, dx9 cards just have a few more effects in videogames made for dx9.
GTA3 isnt made for dx9 neither is Vice City.
But Half-Life2 probably is. However when you buy a videocard, you should
compare all the bandwidths and fill rates with some other cards. For
instance a Geforce4 4600
has more bandwidth and a higher fill rate than a GeforceFX 5600.


Uhhhhh, i didn't write that, the OP did.

However, it's extremely unusual for any game to need, significantly
benefit from a system having over 512MB of memory.


Dave

The ati 8500 is not equal to a GF4 ti4200. Closer to a GF3 ti200.
Dave

"Li'l ol' me" wrote in message
...
"grendel" wrote in message
...
I need to replace my GF2 GTS cause I'm pretty sure it has a heat problem
and
plus I'd like to upgrade for better 3D performance in games. I play the
following games. Half-Life and GTA3. GTA3 seems to be very demanding.
Although I do have only an 800 MHZ Athlon and 256 meg of RAM I assume
the
slowdown I get in GTA3 is because of a lack of video card performance.
Anyway I'm debating the need for a DX9 video card. If there is not real
need
for a Directx9 video card for another year or 2 then I might as well
upgrade
to a GF4 ti 200. I'm still a little worried about ATI's drivers and the
stuttering problems I have heard about. I could get an ATI 9700 non pro
for
$200 or a nice ti200 for $100.


The slowdown in GTA3 is cos it's a ****e conversion. I have an XP2100 and
Radeon 8500 and still get stutters. I've heard of people with the latest
geforce and Radeons getting stutters. I've also heard of people with
older
systems than yours that have no problems at all. I played it on a P3 867
(GF2 also) for a few weeks with no problems. It just suddenly started
getting funny about the time I reached the second island (I'm sure it's
cos
I changed Detonators- I was using version mid-20-something when it was
working).

Anyway, my Radeon 8500 was a big difference to my GF2 TI (except on
GTA3!),
and I picked it up cheap on ebay. And despite it's number, it's much
better
than a 9000 and 9100, and *possibly* (if not probably) the new 9200. I
reckon the 8500 is about equivalent to that GF4 ti200 you mentioned (but
cheaper). You could find a 9500 for a little over the price you
mentioned.

GTA3 Vice city is a better conversion- I just don't like it much!
Half-life
is ancient- a TNT2 will do that! Half-life 2 will need a meaty card, and
it
looks like Doom 3 will need something the size of a small house from the
early benchmarks I've seen.