[agp graphics] x1950pro or 7900gs?

[joll69]

a good friend of mine has an older system, and wants to upgrade the graphics card so he can play cnc3 with me

his current setup:

biostar m7ncg 400 nforce2 igp (socket a)

athlon xp 3200+ barton

corsair xms 2gb (2x1gb) ddr @ 400mhz 2-3-2-5

ati radeon 9600xt 256mb vivo (powercolor brand)

sound blaster live! 5.1

wdc 250gb ata100 (system)

samsung 16x dvd burner

he's fallen on hard times, so a new system isn't possible, but i found these on newegg...

xfx geforce 7900gs agp

his radeon x1950pro agp

i did some googling, and it seems that the radeon takes the lead at stock speeds, though not by much; and it handles eye candy better...

either of these would work i'm sure, but which of the two is better?

thanx for any and all input

also, he would overclock the cpu/ram, but it seems the jumper that allows for overclocking has been soldered in the 'off' setting...there are overclocking options in the bios, and they do save..they just don't apply at all...he wants to desolder it to enable oc'ing, but doesnt want to break his mobo either...anybody else done this with a revision 7.2 of this mobo?

Edited May 2, 2007 by joll69

[nmX.Memnoch]

If you're already looking at spending $210 on the video card I'd recommend just putting in another ~$60 and get the XFX GeForce 7950GT 512MB. The performance will be much better than either of those cards. My machine (although Core 2 Xtreme X6800 based) is capable of playing CNC3 on a 7900GT at 1920x1200 with everything on.

[joll69]

If you're already looking at spending $210 on the video card I'd recommend just putting in another ~$60 and get the XFX GeForce 7950GT 512MB. The performance will be much better than either of those cards. My machine (although Core 2 Xtreme X6800 based) is capable of playing CNC3 on a 7900GT at 1920x1200 with everything on.

because of the extra 60$...the object here is to spend less, as money isn't growing on trees...

i do agree, a 7950gt 512mb is better, but i'm not sure it would actually perform as well as you claim...bear in mind that this isn't an athlon64 or core2 system...it's a socket A, so i doubt it will see any benefit of the 7950 over the x1950...

i'm leaning toward the x1950pro, so i'll recommend that one unless i'm convinced otherwise...

[nmX.Memnoch]

Actually you would notice the difference in CNC3 even with the CPU he has. But since you already knew what you wanted to recommend before you even started the thread...

[Stead]

does cnc not work on the 9600xt? I would of thought it should be able to run it easily just not on full settings!, my poorly x1600xt runs cnc 3 fine on full settings and AA in 1280x1024, er without shadows on full tho, have to turn then down one notch, or turn off AA...so almost full settings!

(i just put in the x1600xt handles it easily as both those cards have an huge performance benifit over mine)

incidently i've seen the x1800gto very cheap!

Edited May 3, 2007 by Stead

[joll69]

Actually you would notice the difference in CNC3 even with the CPU he has. But since you already knew what you wanted to recommend before you even started the thread...

i hadn't made up my mind, actually...just wanted a bit of guidance...i make mistakes too