I have an athlon xp-m 2600+ at 2300mhz with a 9600xt and 1024 mb ram running at 2-5-5-5. I was looking to upgrade to an x800xt AIW and I was wondering how much if any it will bottleneck me. Is there anyway of looking or calculating bottlenecks or just run and gun?s
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Video Card CPU Bottleneck
- Thread starter Patman
- Start date
My brother in law has an AXP 2800 and I have an A64 3000. We both use radeon 9800 pros, and there is a bit of a bottleneck on his comp, whereas my video card seems to run free.
I'm sure a next gen card would boost your performance, esp over a 4 pipe card. Maybe get a card now and upgrade your cpu etc later?
I'm sure a next gen card would boost your performance, esp over a 4 pipe card. Maybe get a card now and upgrade your cpu etc later?
MetalStorm
Limp Gawd
- Joined
- Jun 7, 2004
- Messages
- 144
Remember if you do upgrade your video card that the PCI-E standard will be the only thing for high end cards reasonably soon, so if you are planning on upgrading your CPU then you might want to do that first and get on the PCI-E bandwaggon with a new motherboard then you won't be limited by card choice in the future.
I also mention this because if you get a new card X800 or something, and then decide to upgrade your CPU - to an A64 most likely then you might find that your card is redundant due to nforce 4 boards being PCI-E for example.
I also mention this because if you get a new card X800 or something, and then decide to upgrade your CPU - to an A64 most likely then you might find that your card is redundant due to nforce 4 boards being PCI-E for example.
Lord_Hadronous
n00b
- Joined
- Apr 12, 2005
- Messages
- 23
The conclusion that I reached in a similar situation is that the cpu will become a bottle neck in some situations and over time, even if you set your card to the max settings. To arrive at this conclusion I posted on countless forums, asked most every geek I know, and read as many articles online as I could. After doing all that I detirmined that an xp2500+ clocked at 2.4 could be matched with a 6800gt, 6800ultra, x800pro,x800xt. As long as the video settings were maxed I could be confident that the computer was giving me everything she had.
I looked everywhere but could not find a way to calculate bottle necks. Everyone has their opinions but I couldnt find a simple nonbiased equation like I had hoped(if you find one OMFG let me know). However, the're a few things that might help you with this. Keep in mind that the 2600+ will show its age over the next year and an x800xt AIW is some serious bling. With the move to pci-ex thats a serious comitment to agp. That card could give you more on a faster system with the settings toned down a little but if you buy a new system you would be limited to a new board with an agp slot.
I would get an AIW if I hadn't owned 3 AIWs in the past and they all sucked
. I had the AIW radeon, AIW 8500, and the AIW 9600. I thought it was such a great idea to have a good graphics card and the ability to tivo and stuff but, the tivo sucked major(the video wouldn't match the sound, and there was no way to fix it. I know this because I tried everything and when a new AIW would come out some flamer would tell me"oh they got that fixed" and it wouldn't be(moral: don't listen to fan boys)). I bought a seperate video tuner card from hauggpage and it works much better and ends up being cheaper in the long run. The hauggpage card does the encoding "by itself" and right into mpeg2. The cards also come with superior software(beyond tv). You have probably thought this all out but from my own experience I would not go with the AIW but buy the tuner card and video card seperate. If the system after this will be all new then upgrade paths wont be a factor.
So in short, the 2600+ will be a bottle neck on normal settings and resolutions but with the settings maxed she'll perform admirably. Upgrade paths for the card are limited thoght.
Oh yeah, if this is the last upgrade for a system and she has been good to me I always go all out for that last upgrade just so that she has the chance to shine for one last time.
I looked everywhere but could not find a way to calculate bottle necks. Everyone has their opinions but I couldnt find a simple nonbiased equation like I had hoped(if you find one OMFG let me know). However, the're a few things that might help you with this. Keep in mind that the 2600+ will show its age over the next year and an x800xt AIW is some serious bling. With the move to pci-ex thats a serious comitment to agp. That card could give you more on a faster system with the settings toned down a little but if you buy a new system you would be limited to a new board with an agp slot.
I would get an AIW if I hadn't owned 3 AIWs in the past and they all sucked
. I had the AIW radeon, AIW 8500, and the AIW 9600. I thought it was such a great idea to have a good graphics card and the ability to tivo and stuff but, the tivo sucked major(the video wouldn't match the sound, and there was no way to fix it. I know this because I tried everything and when a new AIW would come out some flamer would tell me"oh they got that fixed" and it wouldn't be(moral: don't listen to fan boys)). I bought a seperate video tuner card from hauggpage and it works much better and ends up being cheaper in the long run. The hauggpage card does the encoding "by itself" and right into mpeg2. The cards also come with superior software(beyond tv). You have probably thought this all out but from my own experience I would not go with the AIW but buy the tuner card and video card seperate. If the system after this will be all new then upgrade paths wont be a factor. So in short, the 2600+ will be a bottle neck on normal settings and resolutions but with the settings maxed she'll perform admirably. Upgrade paths for the card are limited thoght.
Oh yeah, if this is the last upgrade for a system and she has been good to me I always go all out for that last upgrade just so that she has the chance to shine for one last time.