Request for Speculation on CPU GPU balance

[zoost]

Do you guys think it is profitable to buy a NV30 when I have a Athlon 1.2 T-Bird? Or will I not see a real improvement compared with a Geforce4Ti4400? Or to put it differntly. What are the minimum CPU specs to get everything out of the NV30?

[StealthHawk]

no CPU available will be able to take full advantage of NV30 most likely, just the same with the R9700Pro. that's the short answer anyway.

a little longer answer is this: you're not getting the max out of your GF4 either, and th NV30 would make some improvement on your CPU as well :p not so much in raw performance, but with AF/FSAA

[ReDeeMeR]

Um I was also thinkin, I dont have AGPx8, just typical 4x and 333hmz fsb mobo + XP2200, is it worth getting either r300 or nv30?

[Bigus Dickus]

I think with an XP2200+ an R9700 or NV30 would do quite nicely. ;)

Even with a 1.2 Tbird, there would be a marked improvement. Here's the low down: your maximum framerates might not be as high as a blazing fast system, but the video card would have the power to let you turn up the resolution, and apply as much AA and AF as possible without losing further framerates. In other words, the max framerates might not go up much from the GF4, but it would look a hell of a lot better. ;)

[Megatron]

Originally posted by ReDeeMeR
Um I was also thinkin, I dont have AGPx8, just typical 4x and 333hmz fsb mobo + XP2200, is it worth getting either r300 or nv30?

Yes definitely.
1 or 2 of the reviews Ive seen on 8X claim its more of marketing feature than it is really a performance boost.

[ReDeeMeR]

Ok thanks

[RipItup]

If I had a 1.2 Athlon I think I'd try for a cheap XP1900 and get it up to roundabout XP2100 speads, assuming your motherboard / BIOS supports it.

Then I'd get either a cheap version of the nv30, the ti4200 equivalent or say the Ati 9500 pro.

Then with the money I saved I'd get a NF 22 inch monitor.


My Mitsubishi 22inch NF monitor is the best thing I ever bought, if it came as a choice between the video card or the monitor I'd go for the monitor all the time. I'd be dragged back screaming to a tiny 19 inch monitor. They just don't take up enough angle of vision on the eye so you don;t feel part of the game.

[pelly]

You'll be able to see how buying a top of the line card won't gain you any increase over some less-expensive cards in my Sapphire 9700 review....it should be coming online this weekend...just polishing some things up...

Testing was done on a purposely non-overclocked XP1600+ to illustrate this point...

:D

[odin20]

Biggus dickus put i t almost perfectly. There really is no bottleneck with the cpu and the video card if like me, you want the highest af and aa possible with high resolution. At this point we are still vid card limited with high degrees of aa and af. If you are someone who simply wants higher framrates without the higher aa and af then a new cpu would be better than a newer video card. I my self have not seen a situation where my cpu (t/b @ 1540) has been my limiting facor because i play at 1280 * 1024 and i still can't turn up the aa and af(video limits) with my 4600, so i will upgrade to nv30 then maybe later get a hammer.

[odin20]

Just wanted to add that there have been a couple articles about this at hard ocp and various other websites. Basically they used a 2.53 intel machine against a 1600+ xp and at 1600 * 1200 or @ 1280 * 1024 with aa and af the difference in frames between the two processors was 2 frames ( 60 vs 58 @ 1600 * 1200)

[borntosoul]

biggus dickus is right on the money ,ive got a tbird 1333 and will be upgrading to something good real soon :) http://www6.tomshardware.com/graphic/02q3/020819/radeon9700-25.html and anyway you could always get a better cpu later ,cause cpu do not improve as fast as video cards do, eg a top end cpu wont be 2 times faster than your tbird at high res but a top end card will be