In need of your Wisdom.

[Mosad]

I have a Shuttle (in my sig) that HAD a 9800xt in it. The card died the other day and now I am in need of a replacement. My power supply is 250w, though the 9800xt ran well for 3 years and I have heard that the 250 SHOULD be sufficient for most anything (though, clearly, some of you may know better).

Anyways... regarding the new card: which one? My main concern is that I am hooked up to a 37 inch LCD TV. My 9800xt just wouldnt run DVI -> HMDI well on it at all (too much overscan) and no drivers could fix the issue. I would like the new card to have the capability to run High Def in this regard.

I am bound by price: less than $150. And well, as low as is possible.

Other than that... I don't know in which direction to head. I found an EVGA Nvidia 7800GS 256 MB for $99. And then I found some factory overclocked BFG Nvidias as well for great prices... but I am worried that the overclock would eat my power supply alive.

Lastly - I have AGP. No PCIe. Is PCIe backwards compatible?

Thank you all very much.

 

[aka1nas]

PCI-E and AGP are not compatible, you'll need to find an AGP model. You won't be able to fit any high-end GPU made in the last few years into that power budget, so you need to look at the mid-range models.

Something like a 7600GT should be a bit faster than your old card.

 

[Mosad]

Other than the 7600gt... any other recommendations? Models?
Any other insight?

Can I go no higher to... lets say... the x1300? x1500? Do they really consume more power than the 9800xt did? Keep in mind that the 9800xt ran on a 200w power supply as well even though ATI website recommends 300w or greater...

What kind of weight can I put on this?

 

[Dazed and Confused]

You won't see comparable speed till you get to the 6600GT / 7300GT on Nvidia side and the X1600 or higher on ATI's side. As far as thier HD series it'd have to be an HD 2600 to be as fast, the other fall well short of the performance of a 9800.

Heres a quick list of faster cards available in AGP that are relatively affordable.

Nvidia :

6600GS
7300GT
7600GS
7600GT

ATI :
X1600 series
X1650 Series
HD 2600 series

 

[biostud]

do you game?

 

[Mosad]

I don't seriously game... and I don't plan to. I would, however, at the very minimum like to maintain the speeds and quality I got with my 9800xt.

Also.. of paramount importance if possible is getting my LCD TV to run DVI or perhaps even go DVI to component cables through a transformer (anyone know how viable an option that is?)..

And so the card I'll end up getting will hopefully be able to deliver in spades...

Dazed and Confused - of the cards you listed - do you have a preference? Did you list them in order of quality? And should I go NVIDIA or ATI?

Where does the HD series fall into all of this?

As always, thank you.

 

[Denithor]

First off, this chart should give you a pretty good idea of the performance comparison among the different cards.

I would probably recommend this EVGA 7800gs for $125 ($155 - $30MIR) or this GeCube x1950pro for $160. These are the best cards out there in your price range and either one will be a significant upgrade in performance and features from your 9800xt.

The x1950pro is probably more HDTV friendly as it includes composite cables and also what they call an "HDTV cable" whatever that is. This card is also just about the most powerful you can get now for AGP.

And don't worry, the Shuttle power supplies are robust little guys that can power up to the newest 8800gts cards without breaking a sweat.

EDIT: I re-read your initial post and you found a 7800gs even cheaper than I did. That would be a great buy at that price, however the x1950pro is still a stronger card and appears to be more HDTV friendly. BTW, can you post a link to where you can get that 7800gs for that price? Thanks!

 

[bryanW1995]

are you using it as an htpc? if so, then the 2600 series or 8600 series would be much better for you.

 

[Dazed and Confused]

Originally posted by: Denithor
First off, this chart should give you a pretty good idea of the performance comparison among the different cards.

I would probably recommend this EVGA 7800gs for $125 ($155 - $30MIR) or this GeCube x1950pro for $160. These are the best cards out there in your price range and either one will be a significant upgrade in performance and features from your 9800xt.

The x1950pro is probably more HDTV friendly as it includes composite cables and also what they call an "HDTV cable" whatever that is. This card is also just about the most powerful you can get now for AGP.

And don't worry, the Shuttle power supplies are robust little guys that can power up to the newest 8800gts cards without breaking a sweat.

EDIT: I re-read your initial post and you found a 7800gs even cheaper than I did. That would be a great buy at that price, however the x1950pro is still a stronger card and appears to be more HDTV friendly. BTW, can you post a link to where you can get that 7800gs for that price? Thanks!

What part of "I don't really weant to game" did you not understand ? Both of those cards are overkill for his needs and the 7800GS is crap, it loses to the 6800 Ultra in a few cases for gods sake not to mention a 7600GT for the same price would bury it.

Go with this X1650Pro or this 7600GS If you want somethign a little more modern and a little faster than your 9800. The 7600GS is a little more but it's silent and will use less power, the extra memory on the X1650Pro is pointless but the card itself it a tiny bit faster than the 7600GS and it's ATI

 

[s44]

For HTPC-type apps, you'd want the HD2xxx series because it can do decoding of HD video.

 

[bryanW1995]

oops, uh, yeah, also you can't get nvidia 8xxx series in agp. I really think that 2600 is the way to go for you.

 

[PingSpike]

I think I was reading a chart on power consumption the other day, it was an older one. The 9800 was actually quite the pig power wise, and the XT particularly so. The chart tested the xX00 series cards against it and all the x800 series used a good deal less, particularly at idle.

Also, I think the x700XT was roughly the same performance level...might have been the pro though.

 

[Dazed and Confused]

What brand/model is your LCD TV ? Theres a chance it might not be compatible with the res u were trying to run on it.

 

[bryanW1995]

that reminds me of a quote: "I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody."