Would Fermi require a full system overhaul?

I will quite possibly upgrade my gtx285 to Fermi (whatever number they're going to give the highest end one, GTX380?? whatever) when it comes out next year; however, I currently have no plans of upgrading the rest of my system whatsoever. As far as I can tell, even when gaming is concerned, my system is still future proofed for quite a while. However, with high end graphics card needing increasingly powerful cpus to unleash their full potential, would Fermi on my current system be a huge bottleneck? Keep in mind, a new CPU would mean a new mobo, new ram, new everything. Also, I know it's impossible to say for sure as no one knows concretely what Fermi's specs are going to be (much less the real world gaming performance), but if we assume that it's going to be at least as fast as ATI's 5 series and use that as a foundation for comparison, would I need to upgrade? My current specs are in sig.

Originally Posted by MurderCityDevil

I will quite possibly upgrade my gtx285 to Fermi when it comes out next year.......

Looks like you asked this question a bit to early...

Originally Posted by criccio

Looks like you asked this question a bit to early...

Not necessarily, if I receive overwhelming replies that I won't get any noticeable difference from upgrading because of a bottleneck, then I'll disregard buying Fermi and instead spend the money on things that I need for Christmas, for instance.

No one knows at this point unless you work for nvidia. The only reason to upgrade is if you can't play the games you want to play at your preferred settings or if you want to take advantage of new features like DX11. "future proof" is very arbitrary to your needs. I'd say, let the card come out and compare people who have different machines with the card.

If your system is using fine threaded screws right now you might have to get a new one that will accept the course threaded wood screws.

Also no one knows because the card isn't out.

Since it's not out yet, waiting will save you some money.
Prices for the platform should drop some at least by the time the top end gaming Fermi is released.

If you think you need an overhaul then go get one. However I wouldn't bother until we actually know how well the cards perform. This will protect your wallet a little bit and then allow you to buy what is best at the time.

well DX11 is appealing...mainly I want to play AVP2 when that comes out, and doesn't crysis 2 have support for dx11 features?

Maybe I should rephrase my question a little bit - does a 5870 get bottlenecked by a Q6600 and DDR2? In other words, if I was to buy a 5870 or even a 5970 right now with my current hardware, would I notice a difference in gameplay or would the gain be lost because of a bottleneck?

There isn't a good way to answer you since anything I say will be completely based on speculation, but here goes:

There is a big difference in performance with my tri sli setup when I OC from 2.6 to 3.6. If Fermi comes out and is twice as fast as a gtx285 (pure guess), it stands to reason that you will need a very fast cpu to get the most out of it. If you compare benches between a qx9650 and i7 920 at 3.6 from this [H] article, you can see the i7 is faster by a small margin on the 4870x2.

http://hardocp.com/article/2009/05/1...cpu_scaling/11

They don't address a more powerful gpu setup, but from what I have seen on my system I think the faster the cpu the better. I am not talking about benches, but more my experience playing games being smoother while OC. You will also note that all of the really expensive botique systems with tri sli or 5970 crossfire x use super high OCs to feed the beasts.

Yes you need an overhaul.your system is not worthy of the mighty Fermi oh lowly one.

I think it's going to depend on how much this beast costs. I doubt it will be less than 500 bucks at launch, and I'd have to sell the 285 to get it...so we'll see I suppose.

Well if Fermi really is all about direct compute this that and the other then no one will have to upgrade any other part of their system since the new card should just do it all.

You can probably use the 5870 or the 5970 as a measuring stick.

Best case scenario would put it 10-20% faster than the 5870
and require no more than 300w TDP (PCIe Spec)

Worst case scenario is its exactly the same as the 5870 but will no doubt require more power.

if you use that you can guage if you need a system overhaul.

Originally Posted by H-street

You can probably use the 5870 or the 5970 as a measuring stick.

Best case scenario would put it 10-20% faster than the 5870
and require no more than 300w TDP (PCIe Spec)

Worst case scenario is its exactly the same as the 5870 but will no doubt require more power.

if you use that you can guage if you need a system overhaul.

That's pretty goddamn bad for a best case scenario. Why do you think that?

the [H] cpu evaluation wasn't based on the performance of one 4870x2 but two of them in crossfire x, so it should give you a good approximation of how your cpu will perform with a gpu setup as powerful as four r700 chips working together.

LegionHardware did a review of the 5970 with core i7 920 clocked from 2GHz to 4 GHz - under most circumstances the 920 @ 2GHz was not a bottleneck.

Your Q6600 @ 3.6 GHz is >= the 920 @ 2GHz - so it's likely you will be fine.

http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=869

legion hardware has nothing but averages. its the extreme highs and lows that you need to be concerned about with cpu clocks.

Originally Posted by rennyf77

legion hardware has nothing but averages. its the extreme highs and lows that you need to be concerned about with cpu clocks.

Better yet, a full blown Frames/Time line graph, that so few reviewers seem to do.

([H] does, though )

I also couldn't find the resolution they used, maybe I'm blind. Yeah, it's a lackluster review - but it's a decent enough answer to a silly question :-p

Originally Posted by spintroniX

I also couldn't find the resolution they used, maybe I'm blind. Yeah, it's a lackluster review - but it's a decent enough answer to a silly question :-p

silly or not, thanks for the effort to answer it. Looks like I'll be upgrading if the price is right.