What to do

[james1701]

Ok, I have 300.00 in my pocket. I currently have an 8800GT on an Intel 975 chipset with a Q6600. Should I pick up a 4870 or should I find an SLI mb and get another 8800GT? I have had trouble oc'ing this mb with the Q6600. I found last night, I get hugh performance gains if I leave it at stock speeds, and just up the memory speeds, its very strange. What does everyone think my best option is 8800GT in SLI with new mb, or a 4870 and maybe get a new mb and sli later. My monitor does 1440x900 and I dont plan to upgrade that for a long while.

 

[21]

Personally I would get a 4870 first and then upgrade your motherboard to a CrossFire capable one (X38/X48, P45?) later down the road once you have enough money. Are you sure you're going to go with a multiple GPU configuration in the future? Because if not you could probably live with a $130 P35 motherboard such as this http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16813136043. Sure, you might not be able to have two 4870s but your Q6600 with overclock much better. Just an idea.

 

[daveybrat]

Since your monitor only does 1440x900, you won't need SLI. A single 4870 will be more than sufficient and less issues than SLI. Sell your 8800GT and use that towards a better card.

 

[Denithor]

Sounds to me like you've got some issues with your motherboard. A Q6600 + 8800GT should be more than enough power for most games at 1440x900. I think you should consider a new motherboard (P45/X48 if you like ATI cards, 680i/750i/780i if you prefer nVidia cards) which may improve your performance considerably.

I know when I went from a P965-DS3 board to an IP35-E my whole perception of C2D changed. I had an e6400 that would do 2.66GHz with a small voltage increase on the P965 but it felt slower than my old A64-3200+ setup. When I upgraded the motherboard, I was able to push the cpu to 3GHz without a voltage increase and the whole thing felt much faster. Games got a lot smoother, even without changing video card or anything else. While the P965 setup never showed signs of instability I don't think it ever ran completely right.

 

[lifeblood]

As stated above, a Q6600 + 8800 GT at 1440x900 should be more than enough. Memory is also more than sufficient. Look at a better MB.

 

[taltamir]

before you do any selling and buying... try troubleshooting...
There are some possible SOLVEABLE bugs that could be making your video card run at PCIe 1x instead of 16x...

Cause an 8800GT + Q6600 should be plenty at that resolution...

Except for crysis, you aren't upgrading based on crysis are you?

 

[james1701]

Originally posted by: taltamir


Except for crysis, you aren't upgrading based on crysis are you?

Yep, I can get 39.9fps on all high after using the 177.35 drivers. But I just like to tinker, plus benchmark a lot. I am not sure why I get so many fps when all the benches get less.

 

[taltamir]

i am guessing your CPU... quad core oced to 3.2ghz...

Also, are you testing the snow level? during a firefight?

Does crysis use physx? do you?

I am getting the 4870x2 as soon as it comes out.

 

[james1701]

Originally posted by: taltamir
i am guessing your CPU... quad core oced to 3.2ghz...

Also, are you testing the snow level? during a firefight?

Does crysis use physx? do you?

I am getting the 4870x2 as soon as it comes out.

That is when I return my clocks back to stock. When I OC, I am getting in the 35-37 range. I have not tested the snow level yet with these settings. Give an hour, and I will see what happens.

Here is a couple screenshots of my bench marks. The first one is with a video OC and the second is without. You can see almost 37fps with the OC and almost 36 without.

http://i283.photobucket.com/al...is/CrysisBenchmark.jpg

http://i283.photobucket.com/al...ockcrysisbenchmark.jpg

 

[james1701]

In the ice levels, I average 28fps, but drop as low as 22 but high as 42 on all high.

Will any of the new cards give me much of a performance boost over what I am doing now?

 

[LOUISSSSS]

what are you not satisfied about with your 8800gt @ 1440x900. it should handle any game out there (yes, crysis is playable with that setup, but is a crappy game)

you said you like to do benchmarking? i dont see much fun in that, lol. which benchmarks are you favorite to run/play?

if u must upgrade, get the 4870 + a Cf capable MB down the road. and get a bigger monitor

 

[james1701]

I like the 3dmark series, geoforms, Crysis, Doom3, rthdribl, super pi, prime 95, Sandra, a little bit of everything really. Its more of a hobby. I thought about hooking my pc up to my JVC 42" 1080P lcd. That would be fun playing Realflight, and Doom3 on.

 

[nitromullet]

I have had trouble oc'ing this mb with the Q6600. I found last night, I get hugh performance gains if I leave it at stock speeds, and just up the memory speeds, its very strange.

Here is a couple screenshots of my bench marks. The first one is with a video OC and the second is without. You can see almost 37fps with the OC and almost 36 without.

...a bit confused by your posts here. Are you referring to these results when OCing the CPU/SysRAM, GPU/VideoRAM, or both?

 

[james1701]

Originally posted by: nitromullet

I have had trouble oc'ing this mb with the Q6600. I found last night, I get hugh performance gains if I leave it at stock speeds, and just up the memory speeds, its very strange.

Here is a couple screenshots of my bench marks. The first one is with a video OC and the second is without. You can see almost 37fps with the OC and almost 36 without.

...a bit confused by your posts here. Are you referring to these results when OCing the CPU/SysRAM, GPU/VideoRAM, or both?

Results are from just GPU. When I OC the system, I get a loss of about 5 fps. It goes down to about 32 fps.