Derf, in the next few months or maybe a year there will be much better cpus and cards, he shouldn't waste his money now.. especially since once a new video card comes out, the geforce 6800 will drop 200 dollars.. New multi core cpus should be out soon.. new motherboard and then buy a cpu and tada.. why I am not upgrading my cpu, would rather have a 9 ghz cpu thing then a 3.2 :O When xbox 2 comes out it will be a better computer then anything out atm, and probably only be like 600 dollars since its going to be mass produced, mod chip it atfer ones made and you have yourself a awesome computer for less then the price of a crappy one. gfar
As for ATi and NVidia, my experience over them is that ATi looks good, NVidia proforms good. Meaning NVidia has higher frame rate (effectivly) but looks poor compared to ATi's stunning visuals but poor frame rate. But thats just me, maby my pc just sux ^_^
It all depends on what you want and what you can afford, also look into what alot of reveiwers have said and look into different benchmark results before you make your choice. But please remember there are alot of biast people out there
Every Human is bias in one way or another and that is a known fact in the world. You are making a bias saying ATI has bad frames. Go look a http://www.anandtech.com/ or pcgamer, the ati most of the time has better frames/sec then nvidia.
Monkey-
Let me put it this way, you get your 9ghz system and guess what! 6 months later they'll have a 15ghz system. No matter what technology you get, it is outdated the day you buy it. Multi-core will not be out for at least late 2005 and the new crystal in 2006 or later(for the normal folk). EQ2, Half-life2 and doom 3 will all have been out for awhile then. Either way, if your getting over 50 fps(lets say with the AMD64+Geforce 6800) and compare it to your "9 ghz"(around 100fps+) you will not see a difference. Xbox 2 will not be 9ghz, that will cost a hell of alot more than the standard 300 dollars for a console. The XBOX is a cheap PC and will never have better tech then its superior(the PC).They are already having problems with 90mm tech, 9 ghz is not a foreseeable future. By the way, monkey is english your first language?
Xbox 2 will not be a 9GHz machine. It will probably be a multi processor machine (and maybe multi-core, multi-processor), and they 'might' be 3GHz each. But in parrallel processing you don't add up the GHz to get your overall speed, other factors come in to the equation...
Second. As Derf said, there's always something better just around the corner. So there's never a good time to buy.
My original post (and I apologise for hijacking this thread) was basically... Am I wasting money by purchasing a 64bit 3200 processor, and a top of the line AGP graphics card?
The pro's and cons as I see it are (and thanks to the other posters who gave info)
Pros: - It's gonna be a very quick machine for playing EQ2, Half Life 2 and Doom 3 (and future games) - If I upgrade the CPU then it should also help the GPU performance - When Windows 64bit is released (and 64bit graphics drivers, and games are optimised for 64bit code!) then it will improve a bit more - The 6800 will take advantage of Direct X 9c features (if devs start using those features) - which I'm sure they will when ATI release a 9c compliant card. - I won't have to upgrade again for quite a long time
Cons: - Limited CPU upgrading - No PCIe support - Even if I want to upgarde I am very limited
Now I don't see a lack of PCIe a problem as it's gonna take a long time for graphics cards to take advantage of it AND an even longer time until CPU's are fast enough not to create a bottleneck between CPU and GPU.
My budget is about £1100 (1700dollars approx) and I'd like to buy before any of the above games are released, but if there was justifiable reasons to hold off then I would (chipping an XBox 2 to make a good PC is not a good reason - a) because the next XBox will not share any sort of PC architecture, and b) it's not released for over a year and c) are you smoking something?)
Now to get back on to the original post...
Before the Nvidia 6800 / ATI X800 series of cards ATI was definitely the way to go (and many will argue they still are). Their cards generally gave better visuals.
As a general rule of thumb buy whatever you can afford, and spend every penny of what you can afford, and any change you have left over, start putting it towards the next upgrade! So the Radeon 9600 is probably a better option.
As for the DDR SDRAM question.
I'm not sure why this would matter. DDR is better, but I'm almost sure you won't be able to mix and match memory. You'll really need to find out from your hardware vendor.
Also, I dunno how much of a performance gain you would see by using one type of RAM over another in your existing system as I've generally found that PC systems are about balancing every aspect, from CPU to RAM to graphics card. But again, rule of thumb... more is better... more RAM in your machine (of any type), more RAM on your graphics card... As a general PC user I doubt you'd see much difference between SD and DDR.
actually, xbox2 or ps3 will both be out b4 you can get tech in your pc that equals them, they might even be 1 thousand dollars, still cheap for their quality, and both of them are going to be more pc like, probably wont even need to mod em, english is my first language, I jsut dont want to take more then 2 minutes to reply to silly posts and I have fatter then average fingers :P...
If we're talking about playing games (which I hope we are!), then whether XBox or PS3 have a 'PC like architecture' is irelevant. It's like comparing apples to oranges. Sure, they are both fruit...
If you're talking about functionality (which I assume you are by mentioning mod'ing them), then they will never be anything like PC's.
The Xbox has many standard PC components which can be used to take on 'some' PC functionality, but not all. But can you do the same with a PS2? Nope. Can an XBox be mod'ed to take on the functionality of a PS2? Nope. Will you be able to mod an XBox 2 to do the same things as a mod'ed XBox can? Nope.
Anyway, I'm talking about the here and now. Not a year down the line for the XBox2 or two years for the PS3. Plus, I love consoles, so I'm gonna sure to get an XBox 2, PS3 and Nintendo Revolution, as soon as I can afford them, regardless of the power of my PC at the time - each has it's benefits.
Also, from what I've heard the graphics power of the XBox 2 will be slightly better than the current top of the line PC graphics cards we have now.
Originally posted by NoisyMonkey actually, xbox2 or ps3 will both be out b4 you can get tech in your pc that equals them, they might even be 1 thousand dollars, still cheap for their quality, and both of them are going to be more pc like, probably wont even need to mod em, english is my first language, I jsut dont want to take more then 2 minutes to reply to silly posts and I have fatter then average fingers :P...
They will never never make a console that is a thousand dollars. That just would not sell, as most console gamers play console for the sole fact that their cheap. Xbox 2 and PS3 will not be anywhere near 9ghz, and far slower than the top pcs(Xbox1 is only 733mhz!).
To the folks asking about ram- You can get DDR graphics cards with SDRAM ram, but you cannot mix and match ddr and sdram sticks. The rule with memory is that you always get the ram that runs at the same speed as your memory bus. DDR400 is for a 200mhz(although it runs at 400mhz) memory bus, SDRAM133 is for 133mhz memory bus. You would see a big difference if you got a new cpu, motherboard with ddr memory vs. your old P3's.
Originally posted by DerfelCadarn You can still use an ATI card, but are more likely to run into problems, outside of the regular problems you will most likely have with one of their cards. He claims that you will run into problems and then the smart ass statement " besides the regular problems you will most likely have with one of their cards". That is total being a closed-minded fanboy. He hasn't done any research, he just talks. If ATI cards have so many problems, then why do PC Gamer and Computer Gaming World recommend ATI cards over Nvidia Cards. I'm trying to be fair, but this guy come and tells me i'm wrong and nvidia will only work well for this game. Look earlier in the article, I recommed ATI cards for Ati fans and Nvidia cards for Nvidia fans. All I'm saying is that Nvidia likes to hype up the games its supporting and doesn't follow through. To folks like diegofrgc, just because nvidia says there card is "optimized" for EQ2, doesn't mean it is true. Even if it turns out to be true, it doen't mean ATI cards will work badly. I doubt very much that the FX5200-5900("optimized for EQ2") will able to kill Ati 9600-9800 in ATI playing field DirectX 9. By the way, the NV04 is going to be a 600 dollar card, we are talking about cards in the 100 dollar price range. Im talking about FX5200-5900 vs. 9600-9800, most folks dont have 600 dollars for computer crap. If i got the X800 XT and compared with the 68000, the graphics are so good I doubt there is a noticable difference.
Actually, before getting a FX 5900 XT, I have had 2 9800 Pros. The first one caused my monitor to go into sleep mode every hour or two, necessitating a reboot. The second one I bought caused an error that prevented my comp from even booting. I eventually jury rigged the updated drivers into place,which solved the boot error, but still ended up with the problem with my monitor. In both cases I was using the most current drivers, and tried various settings. My emails to ATI customer service went unanswered, and sitting forever on a phone isn't about to happen, so I returned both.
I've had 2 errors while using an nvidia card, both related to using beta drivers. And frankly, there was a negligable difference in performance between the 9800 pro and the fx 5900 on my system, aside from one not shitting out every other hour.
So next time you feel like saying someone is making shit up, with no evidence, I would suggest having some of your own, Sparky.
------- I was never what you wanted, I could never never please. I swallowed all our sorrow in the midst of my disease. All my fortunes, all my gains, all the battles I have won... Now collapsing like the rain, I stand alone, your only son...
Take some solace in these words, take notice of this place. Hollow whispers that they are, like the wind upon my face. Sing softly in my ear and look at me with wonder. I will try to ease your fear as the darkness pulls you under.
------- I was never what you wanted, I could never never please. I swallowed all our sorrow in the midst of my disease. All my fortunes, all my gains, all the battles I have won... Now collapsing like the rain, I stand alone, your only son...
Take some solace in these words, take notice of this place. Hollow whispers that they are, like the wind upon my face. Sing softly in my ear and look at me with wonder. I will try to ease your fear as the darkness pulls you under.
You can only pre order dvd form.. and from my calculations, if the sound is crap quality, it alone will be like 5 gigs.. I think eq2 will be at least 10 gig installed, maybe compressed to 2 dvds and maybe like 6 -7 cds?
And for those of you who dont know, a xbox is just a pc with a console os... And when it came out, it was a pretty good computer option for its price. And the xbox 2 will have 2-3 cores.. that means if they use 3 ghz core things it will be 6-9 ghz.. the ps3 will use a different systm but much the same where they can link endless amounts, they just need to figure out heat probs. Who knows.. if they kill the heat the ps3 could be over 9 ghz.. and they will both likely have the same video card as a geforce 5 or 6...
Originally posted by DerfelCadarn You can still use an ATI card, but are more likely to run into problems, outside of the regular problems you will most likely have with one of their cards. He claims that you will run into problems and then the smart ass statement " besides the regular problems you will most likely have with one of their cards". That is total being a closed-minded fanboy. He hasn't done any research, he just talks. If ATI cards have so many problems, then why do PC Gamer and Computer Gaming World recommend ATI cards over Nvidia Cards. I'm trying to be fair, but this guy come and tells me i'm wrong and nvidia will only work well for this game. Look earlier in the article, I recommed ATI cards for Ati fans and Nvidia cards for Nvidia fans. All I'm saying is that Nvidia likes to hype up the games its supporting and doesn't follow through. To folks like diegofrgc, just because nvidia says there card is "optimized" for EQ2, doesn't mean it is true. Even if it turns out to be true, it doen't mean ATI cards will work badly. I doubt very much that the FX5200-5900("optimized for EQ2") will able to kill Ati 9600-9800 in ATI playing field DirectX 9. By the way, the NV04 is going to be a 600 dollar card, we are talking about cards in the 100 dollar price range. Im talking about FX5200-5900 vs. 9600-9800, most folks dont have 600 dollars for computer crap. If i got the X800 XT and compared with the 68000, the graphics are so good I doubt there is a noticable difference.
Actually, before getting a FX 5900 XT, I have had 2 9800 Pros. The first one caused my monitor to go into sleep mode every hour or two, necessitating a reboot. The second one I bought caused an error that prevented my comp from even booting. I eventually jury rigged the updated drivers into place,which solved the boot error, but still ended up with the problem with my monitor. In both cases I was using the most current drivers, and tried various settings. My emails to ATI customer service went unanswered, and sitting forever on a phone isn't about to happen, so I returned both.
I've had 2 errors while using an nvidia card, both related to using beta drivers. And frankly, there was a negligable difference in performance between the 9800 pro and the fx 5900 on my system, aside from one not shitting out every other hour.
So next time you feel like saying someone is making shit up, with no evidence, I would suggest having some of your own, Sparky.
------- I was never what you wanted, I could never never please. I swallowed all our sorrow in the midst of my disease. All my fortunes, all my gains, all the battles I have won... Now collapsing like the rain, I stand alone, your only son...
Take some solace in these words, take notice of this place. Hollow whispers that they are, like the wind upon my face. Sing softly in my ear and look at me with wonder. I will try to ease your fear as the darkness pulls you under.
LOL, just because you have no computer building skills, doesn't mean that everyone has problems like that. Go figure out how to make a computer, and then get back to me. I guess your logic is "I had a bad experience with a ATI card, therefore everything ATI is bad and only morons use it". I have many systems with ATI cards and have zero problems with them. ATI makes such bad cards that PC Gamer, Computer Gaming World and AnAndtech recommend Ati cards over nvidia cards. In debates you cannot use personal experience anyway.
By the way, FFXI is 6gb-everquest will be around 12gb.-"someone is making shit up"
Originally posted by diegofrgc How many GB do i need to install EQ2? Ive heard it will contain 10 installation CDs *gulp* BTW........confirmed hardware: 512 SD RAM--------------Ill Buy It 9600 Pro or XT (depends on price)--------Ill Buy It P3 , 1 GHz--------------I Have It Windows ME------------I Have It 40 GB HD ( iwont be able to install the CDs )---i have it How bad will my PC run EQ2?
What happened to the old template I gave you? I'm really have doubts that a P3 1ghz and 512sdram will run the game at very minimal or even at all. But if you do go through with this, make sure you have a mobo that supports 4x agp(better a 8x).
those are near minimum.. well 512 is min/ recomended... the card is definetly spiffy enough if ya buy it.. you should be able to run it on medium- high, definetly not maxed out, and in some cases might want to lwoer to low if your comps stuttering.. like in the cities or near tons of people..
Comments
As for ATi and NVidia, my experience over them is that ATi looks good, NVidia proforms good. Meaning NVidia has higher frame rate (effectivly) but looks poor compared to ATi's stunning visuals but poor frame rate. But thats just me, maby my pc just sux ^_^
It all depends on what you want and what you can afford, also look into what alot of reveiwers have said and look into different benchmark results before you make your choice. But please remember there are alot of biast people out there
Every Human is bias in one way or another and that is a known fact in the world. You are making a bias saying ATI has bad frames. Go look a http://www.anandtech.com/ or pcgamer, the ati most of the time has better frames/sec then nvidia.
Monkey-
Let me put it this way, you get your 9ghz system and guess what! 6 months later they'll have a 15ghz system. No matter what technology you get, it is outdated the day you buy it. Multi-core will not be out for at least late 2005 and the new crystal in 2006 or later(for the normal folk). EQ2, Half-life2 and doom 3 will all have been out for awhile then. Either way, if your getting over 50 fps(lets say with the AMD64+Geforce 6800) and compare it to your "9 ghz"(around 100fps+) you will not see a difference. Xbox 2 will not be 9ghz, that will cost a hell of alot more than the standard 300 dollars for a console. The XBOX is a cheap PC and will never have better tech then its superior(the PC).They are already having problems with 90mm tech, 9 ghz is not a foreseeable future. By the way, monkey is english your first language?
OK, first things first...
Xbox 2 will not be a 9GHz machine. It will probably be a multi processor machine (and maybe multi-core, multi-processor), and they 'might' be 3GHz each. But in parrallel processing you don't add up the GHz to get your overall speed, other factors come in to the equation...
Second. As Derf said, there's always something better just around the corner. So there's never a good time to buy.
My original post (and I apologise for hijacking this thread) was basically... Am I wasting money by purchasing a 64bit 3200 processor, and a top of the line AGP graphics card?
The pro's and cons as I see it are (and thanks to the other posters who gave info)
Pros:
- It's gonna be a very quick machine for playing EQ2, Half Life 2 and Doom 3 (and future games)
- If I upgrade the CPU then it should also help the GPU performance
- When Windows 64bit is released (and 64bit graphics drivers, and games are optimised for 64bit code!) then it will improve a bit more
- The 6800 will take advantage of Direct X 9c features (if devs start using those features) - which I'm sure they will when ATI release a 9c compliant card.
- I won't have to upgrade again for quite a long time
Cons:
- Limited CPU upgrading
- No PCIe support
- Even if I want to upgarde I am very limited
Now I don't see a lack of PCIe a problem as it's gonna take a long time for graphics cards to take advantage of it AND an even longer time until CPU's are fast enough not to create a bottleneck between CPU and GPU.
My budget is about £1100 (1700dollars approx) and I'd like to buy before any of the above games are released, but if there was justifiable reasons to hold off then I would (chipping an XBox 2 to make a good PC is not a good reason - a) because the next XBox will not share any sort of PC architecture, and b) it's not released for over a year and c) are you smoking something?)
Now to get back on to the original post...
Before the Nvidia 6800 / ATI X800 series of cards ATI was definitely the way to go (and many will argue they still are). Their cards generally gave better visuals.
As a general rule of thumb buy whatever you can afford, and spend every penny of what you can afford, and any change you have left over, start putting it towards the next upgrade!
So the Radeon 9600 is probably a better option.
As for the DDR SDRAM question.
I'm not sure why this would matter. DDR is better, but I'm almost sure you won't be able to mix and match memory. You'll really need to find out from your hardware vendor.
Also, I dunno how much of a performance gain you would see by using one type of RAM over another in your existing system as I've generally found that PC systems are about balancing every aspect, from CPU to RAM to graphics card. But again, rule of thumb... more is better... more RAM in your machine (of any type), more RAM on your graphics card... As a general PC user I doubt you'd see much difference between SD and DDR.
If we're talking about playing games (which I hope we are!), then whether XBox or PS3 have a 'PC like architecture' is irelevant. It's like comparing apples to oranges. Sure, they are both fruit...
If you're talking about functionality (which I assume you are by mentioning mod'ing them), then they will never be anything like PC's.
The Xbox has many standard PC components which can be used to take on 'some' PC functionality, but not all. But can you do the same with a PS2? Nope. Can an XBox be mod'ed to take on the functionality of a PS2? Nope. Will you be able to mod an XBox 2 to do the same things as a mod'ed XBox can? Nope.
Anyway, I'm talking about the here and now. Not a year down the line for the XBox2 or two years for the PS3. Plus, I love consoles, so I'm gonna sure to get an XBox 2, PS3 and Nintendo Revolution, as soon as I can afford them, regardless of the power of my PC at the time - each has it's benefits.
Also, from what I've heard the graphics power of the XBox 2 will be slightly better than the current top of the line PC graphics cards we have now.
They will never never make a console that is a thousand dollars. That just would not sell, as most console gamers play console for the sole fact that their cheap. Xbox 2 and PS3 will not be anywhere near 9ghz, and far slower than the top pcs(Xbox1 is only 733mhz!).
To the folks asking about ram- You can get DDR graphics cards with SDRAM ram, but you cannot mix and match ddr and sdram sticks. The rule with memory is that you always get the ram that runs at the same speed as your memory bus. DDR400 is for a 200mhz(although it runs at 400mhz) memory bus, SDRAM133 is for 133mhz memory bus. You would see a big difference if you got a new cpu, motherboard with ddr memory vs. your old P3's.
Actually, before getting a FX 5900 XT, I have had 2 9800 Pros. The first one caused my monitor to go into sleep mode every hour or two, necessitating a reboot. The second one I bought caused an error that prevented my comp from even booting. I eventually jury rigged the updated drivers into place,which solved the boot error, but still ended up with the problem with my monitor. In both cases I was using the most current drivers, and tried various settings. My emails to ATI customer service went unanswered, and sitting forever on a phone isn't about to happen, so I returned both.
I've had 2 errors while using an nvidia card, both related to using beta drivers. And frankly, there was a negligable difference in performance between the 9800 pro and the fx 5900 on my system, aside from one not shitting out every other hour.
So next time you feel like saying someone is making shit up, with no evidence, I would suggest having some of your own, Sparky.
-------
I was never what you wanted, I could never never please.
I swallowed all our sorrow in the midst of my disease.
All my fortunes, all my gains, all the battles I have won...
Now collapsing like the rain, I stand alone, your only son...
Take some solace in these words, take notice of this place.
Hollow whispers that they are, like the wind upon my face.
Sing softly in my ear and look at me with wonder.
I will try to ease your fear as the darkness pulls you under.
How many GB do i need to install EQ2? Ive heard it will contain 10 installation CDs *gulp*
BTW........confirmed hardware:
512 SD RAM--------------Ill Buy It
9600 Pro or XT (depends on price)--------Ill Buy It
P3 , 1 GHz--------------I Have It
Windows ME------------I Have It
40 GB HD ( iwont be able to install the CDs
)---i have it
How bad will my PC run EQ2?
From what I've read, it will be a 6 gig install.
-------
I was never what you wanted, I could never never please.
I swallowed all our sorrow in the midst of my disease.
All my fortunes, all my gains, all the battles I have won...
Now collapsing like the rain, I stand alone, your only son...
Take some solace in these words, take notice of this place.
Hollow whispers that they are, like the wind upon my face.
Sing softly in my ear and look at me with wonder.
I will try to ease your fear as the darkness pulls you under.
The good news is that EQ2 will also be out in a DVD format, as well as CD.
Waiting to swap CD's is like watching paint dry...
And for those of you who dont know, a xbox is just a pc with a console os... And when it came out, it was a pretty good computer option for its price. And the xbox 2 will have 2-3 cores.. that means if they use 3 ghz core things it will be 6-9 ghz.. the ps3 will use a different systm but much the same where they can link endless amounts, they just need to figure out heat probs. Who knows.. if they kill the heat the ps3 could be over 9 ghz.. and they will both likely have the same video card as a geforce 5 or 6...
Actually, before getting a FX 5900 XT, I have had 2 9800 Pros. The first one caused my monitor to go into sleep mode every hour or two, necessitating a reboot. The second one I bought caused an error that prevented my comp from even booting. I eventually jury rigged the updated drivers into place,which solved the boot error, but still ended up with the problem with my monitor. In both cases I was using the most current drivers, and tried various settings. My emails to ATI customer service went unanswered, and sitting forever on a phone isn't about to happen, so I returned both.
I've had 2 errors while using an nvidia card, both related to using beta drivers. And frankly, there was a negligable difference in performance between the 9800 pro and the fx 5900 on my system, aside from one not shitting out every other hour.
So next time you feel like saying someone is making shit up, with no evidence, I would suggest having some of your own, Sparky.
-------
I was never what you wanted, I could never never please.
I swallowed all our sorrow in the midst of my disease.
All my fortunes, all my gains, all the battles I have won...
Now collapsing like the rain, I stand alone, your only son...
Take some solace in these words, take notice of this place.
Hollow whispers that they are, like the wind upon my face.
Sing softly in my ear and look at me with wonder.
I will try to ease your fear as the darkness pulls you under.
LOL, just because you have no computer building skills, doesn't mean that everyone has problems like that. Go figure out how to make a computer, and then get back to me. I guess your logic is "I had a bad experience with a ATI card, therefore everything ATI is bad and only morons use it". I have many systems with ATI cards and have zero problems with them. ATI makes such bad cards that PC Gamer, Computer Gaming World and AnAndtech recommend Ati cards over nvidia cards. In debates you cannot use personal experience anyway.
By the way, FFXI is 6gb-everquest will be around 12gb.-"someone is making shit up"