Building a new gaming rig, stumped on video cards

A

Avareyne

Limp Gawd
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Jun 5, 2008
Messages
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Hello, I was referred here from Yahoo! Answers.

I am fixing to build a new gaming rig in about a month or so. My primary use will be MMORPG's such as Age of Conan, Warhammer, and WotLK. Played in 1680 x 1050 on high detail ideally.

Currently I am using a laptop that does not run Age of Conan well at all. Specs are 2.4 ghz dual core Intel processor, 2gb ram, and 512 (registers 1gb in benchmarks though) video card run at 1680 x 1050 so I am obviously looking for something far better.

I'm planning to go with an overclocked 2.66ghz Quad Core Intel processor. I've got pretty much everything set in my mind aside from the video card, mobo (which is dependent on the video card for me right now), cooling and PSU (again dependent on the end result).

My original question on Yahoo was asking what card would be best for around the 400$ mark. My original plan was to use dual 8800 GT's which seemed like the best option and was $180 x 2. Then I was informed about the 9800 GX2 which I'd be fine going with if the performance was superior to the SLI'd 8800's.

Then I learned about the new GeForce GTX 280 coming out this month. I'm guessing when it hits newegg the discounted price will be similar to that of the 9800 GX2 in which case the GTX 280 would be the better option. But I cannot find out how much it will be exactly at newegg (can speculate though?)

Really what I need to know what is my best option to play this games on high detail with a high FPS. If I don't need an SLI video card config it looks like I can get a much better rated mobo which would make me happy.

Please help me.
 
For 1680 x 1050, you do not need SLI. A single 8800GTS 512MB card is more than enough for that resolution. If you have to buy now, a single 8800GTS 512MB is a good choice.

When the new ATI and Nvidia cards are released, there's a good chance that they'll be sold at highly inflated costs. So it'll be a month or two before you can get those new cards at good prices. This is all speculation on my part judging from the release of 9800GX2 and 8800GT.

Oh and 9800GX2 does outperform 8800GT SLI and on par with 8800GTS 512MB SLI. Personally, I think the cost of 9800GX2 is warranted since you don't have to go with an Nvidia SLI mobo. But like rennyf77 has said, wait and see what happens in the next few weeks. I might be wrong and the cards will be in stock and sold at MSRP or the new releases will drive the costs of the older cards down.
 
June 18th. GX280. Single card will thrash anything else on the market. Might wait for the reviews to confirm the speculation. But not waitng for this card to hit the shelves would be dumb.
 
you might also want to keep in mind that early adopters of these new gpu's will be more than willing to unload their current gear.
 
Buy an EVGA or BFG something (not from ebay) and step up with little hassle of over MSRP prices and OOS issues. Or am I backwords on that?
 
Thanks all. I'm going to probably save 150$ and get the Q6600 processer, OC it, and use the 150$ for the next gen vid card.

I'm gettin impatient. I want to see it already!
 
I feel that. I just got done waiting 4 years to see grid in full detail, and im pretty damn satisfied :) we have definitely reached the bubble of realism, its about to pop....
 
Avareyne said:
Thanks all. I'm going to probably save 150$ and get the Q6600 processer, OC it, and use the 150$ for the next gen vid card.
Click to expand...

Good idea. If u get a decent overclocker and hit 3.2Ghz+ and get the 280gtx, your rig will be smokin'!! :cool:
 
The best VideoCard for you would actually be the GTX-260, which will sell for a bit less maybe like $449 or so, and only be like 25% slower, which would still be a very fast card, compared to anything out today. Your rez of 1680 would be no problem for that card, it would destroy anything out there, will full AA/AF all options maxed.

AOC on that setup would be drool worthy, all maxed out :cool:
 
I'm making sure to get a g0 like everyone says, doesn't seem like it'd be a problem, even amazon says g0 stepping in their specs.

I'm planning to SLI the one I get after the price drops (maybe in sept? my birthday is then or christmas so I can request it) that's why I wanted the 280. But we'll see what happens when they come out.

I'm getting so dang impatient! haha.

I want all maxed out on all my mmo's. argh getting so impatient for warhammer too since they kept changing the date!!!
 
Avareyne said:
I'm making sure to get a g0 like everyone says, doesn't seem like it'd be a problem, even amazon says g0 stepping in their specs.

I'm planning to SLI the one I get after the price drops (maybe in sept? my birthday is then or christmas so I can request it) that's why I wanted the 280. But we'll see what happens when they come out.

I'm getting so dang impatient! haha.

I want all maxed out on all my mmo's. argh getting so impatient for warhammer too since they kept changing the date!!!
Click to expand...


If your only going to game at 1680x1050rez that is a medium rez for most people today. Alot of gamers use 1920x1200rez or even 2560x1600rez of 30" Monitors. My point is, a GTX-280 is supposed to good for even 1920x1200 gaming, so your rez would be super easy for a sinlge GTX-280 to run, really no need for GTX-280 SLI at 1650rez.

Also did WarHammer get delayed again ? I thought was coming out this Fall ?
 
Keep in mind that we are on the verge of completely new tech, here in the next 6 months.

First, ATI and Nvidia are releasing beastly GPUs (nvidia 280/260, ati 4870/4850)
then in the last quarter Intel's Nehalem CPU. With this it looks like the new x58 chipsets and onboard memory controllers will bring DDR3 memory to the front.

Stuff is going to be very,very fast.....faster than the games currently can support.

If you plan to wait a week or so....new GPUs will be out, but I think in short and very inflated supply.....everybody and his brother will want a 280 and will pay over $700 for them.....ouch.

I plan on waiting until September or October to see what's happening, and in the meantime picking up the cheap scraps on the 8800 GTs and 3870s for some SLi and Crossfire stuff I've been planning.
 
Yes, we do have completely new tech (on the Intel side) coming in ~6 months....But that doesn't mean we can buy it then, won't be a paper launch, it could be delayed, who knows. And in all likelyhood, will Nehalem be affordable right away? -- probably not (read: $1000-1500 EE's will come first certainly). I'd give it 2Q09 (or even early 2H09) before we see "good" prices (ie: sub ~$500 mainstream parts) .

And does anyone really think Nehalem will suddenly make all of us overclocked quad users think "awww shit, my CPU is useless now!!!!11!!!!" --? No way, they'll still kick ass (it's AMD that will have even more of an issue if they want to do anything other than low budget and CPU integrated graphics that will have [more of] a problem). Although, if they kick as much ass as recent reports (nay - BS speculation, but still :p) have said - 2009 will be interesting on the CPU front... AMD included, I could see them doing something interesting w/ Fusion if they do it right [irrespective of the whole "who's #1 performance" race].

Oh, and it's not "it looks like" for DDR3, there WILL be DDR3 required (triple channel no less, although for some reason a couple of X58s showing in Taipei have 4 memory slots, not 3 [wth?]) on X58/Nehalem - this has been on the roadmaps/known for quite some time. Hopefully by the end of the year/early '09, DDR3 will be in a good BFTB situation, certainly not like DDR2 is now, but better (and it has been dropping quite a bit in the last few months). I haven't seen anything that indicates that DDR2 will be in any way an option at all for Nehalem.

On graphics, IMHO the OP should get an 8800GTS G92/9800GTX *now* (EVGA, BFG for their upgrade programs), if all the other parts are ordered (or will be soon), and upgrade in a few weeks (90 days and 100 days for either company respectively post purchase to make up your mind FYI) after GTX 2x0 hits -- assuming the OP both likes the performance they give (real world testing!!) and the budget allows for it of course. The OP may find that a $450-$600 card is not needed, I don't think it should be for maxing out eye candy @ 1680x1050 on 99% of games.

[edit] To clarify on the games a bit..I don't think WotLK will be a big departure for WoW graphics wise - likely it will run great @ 16x10, with pretty high eye candy on an 8800/9800, single card - Blizzard isn't likely to get a total engine re-write for some time still.. Remember they make a boat load every month catering to everyone graphics wise from crappy laptop stuff to high end SLI rigs - and they aren't likely to cut off their bread and butter to *require* high end DX10+ hardware just for us graphics whores.. Conan should be OK from what I've seen (haven't actually tried it myself) @ native res, with decent eye candy on. Warhammer, TBH I know nothing about.
 
I'm not going to be able to afford the new intel chip for a while, especially assuming it'll be over 1k. I don't have a desktop right now and nothing to play my games on so I'm not waiting until 2009 for a chip either. And when that chip comes out, there will be something new in the works most likely. So I may as well wait forever since there will always be something new and better coming out.

I'm building early next month (when tax rebate comes to help pay for some) so I can get the new GPU. I just happen to be building when the new cards are coming out so I'm going to get that. I hate having to upgrade when the newest is there when I'm building. If it's in my price range, why the heck not?

I still don't know about a monitor yet, it all comes down to budget. It looked like to me that the majority of monitors are 1680 x 1050. I've been using laptops for years. I found the rez kinda sad since my 17" on my laptop is 1680 x 1050. I haven't really looked, probably the last thing I'll look at is monitors since everytime I've gone to best buy or nebraska furniture mart I've hated all of them. I really want a monitor that is as bright and crisp as my laptop display (it's on a dv9500). I plan to set up dual monitors down the line so keep that in mind. I'd also like to be able to hook it up to my plasma as well through hdmi if I can.

Warhammer is set for September now. But I remember before it was set for like May, then June or July and now September, so I don't exactly trust this date sticking either.
 
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