Author Topic: Need a new video card (Read 709 times)

Greebo · « **on:** September 13, 2006, 02:35:39 PM »

My Radeon 9800 Pro has recently begun acting up at random times. It fills the screen with alternate blocks of corrupted video. This effect sometimes disappears briefly when you close a window, at least in the area the window was on the screen. The effect comes and goes, it can work fine for hours.

Rebooting, even into safe mode, doesn't always fix the problem. I've tried reseating the card, cleaning the heatsinks, reinstalling the drivers, checking for malware etc. Also tried running at lower resolution and reducing the clock speed of the card (it wasn't overclocked to start with). All the fans in the PC are working OK.

So it looks like its new video card time, unless someone can think of something else I can try. My system is as follows:

P4 2.8GHz
Asus P4C800
2GB RAM
Antec 380W (18A on the 12V rail)

I'd like an AGP video card that is a bit better than the 9800 Pro, maybe a 6800 GS or a 7800 GS. Would either of these be OK on my PSU?

Would a much better video card give any real benefits with my setup, given that AH tends to be CPU dependent? Currently I get reasonable FPS at 1600 by 1200, but have to turn some of the eye candy off (animated water, no aliasing etc).

AH is pretty much the only program I run that puts big demands on the video card.

Thanks in advance for any advice you can offer.

Krusty · « **Reply #1 on:** September 13, 2006, 03:16:00 PM »

Most of the higher end cards require a 350W or 400+W psu. I'd say the 7000 series is definitely out, unless you get a PSU upgrade as well.

I have a similar system, myself. I've been looking at the cards. If you want to get a 6800, get a 6800GT series. It's basically the Ultra and if you get riva tuner chances are you can unlock 4 more pipelines and significantly increase the performance of the card (from 8 to 12 pipelines, depending on the card).

Avoid all 5000 series cards. The 6600 isn't so hot.

On the ATI side of things there's the cheaper x1600 or (probably better) the X800GTO, but the X800GTO requires 350W minimum. The X1300 is a step below the x1600, having only 4 pipelines, but decent MHz for ram and GPU.

Eagler · « **Reply #2 on:** September 13, 2006, 03:50:19 PM »

are you sure it not your monitor? have you tried another one?

Greebo · « **Reply #3 on:** September 13, 2006, 05:41:28 PM »

I did try another monitor and the corruption was still there, forgot to mention that.

Nvidia are recommending a good 350W PSU for the 6800 GS so I should be OK. The 7800 needs 400W minimum, so that is out though. Don't really want to get a another PSU as I'll probably be getting a new PC early next year and selling this one on.

The better ATI AGP cards are hard to find in the UK, the 1300 and 1600 seem worse than the 9800 Pro spec wise.

Blagard · « **Reply #4 on:** September 14, 2006, 04:24:31 AM »

Just a query.

Why are graphic cards suggesting a minimum size PSU ?

I thought the PSU was more related to the whole demand placed on it rather than individual items. So if you have just one HD, one DC/DVD drive and just a graphics card plugged in then a small PSU would be fine?

Schutt · « **Reply #5 on:** September 14, 2006, 05:16:39 AM »

Graphic card draws 30 to 150 Watt, cpu + mobo + ram draw 130 Watt, soundcard 20 Watt, harddisk draws 5 Watt, CDRom draws 10 Watt, Keyboard, USB devices, Mouse draw 30 Watt.

Fans draw 5 to 20 Watt, have 3 of em (2 on case, 1 on cpu) (30 Watt).

Now consider the whole comp without graphic board: 230 Watt.

You want the power supply to run at 60 - 85 percent of rated power & the comp to stay clean under rated power when switched on where it draws a bit extra.

Now with a mid sized graphic board which draws 75 Watt which is afaik the max it may take from the PCIe (PEG) slot , you have a power draw of about 305 Watt so need a powersupply with >360 Watt. That is a bare minimum computer, with a pretty fast cpu (we want it to play ah). Add 20 Watt for a top end cpu.

BUT if you put in a cheap graphic card, which has no fan and a low power GPU you need only 30 Watt there, also you dont need the 2 case fans then... puts you total to 250 Watt. Sounds like a >300 Watt power supply.

OR you take a super hot new top of the line graphic board, which takes 130 Watt, will put you at 360 Watt which needs a >420 Watt power supply. Plug in another one, youll need another case fan and a >550 Watt power supply.

WHEN you add a harddisk or a cd rom drive that doesnt change much to the total power consumption.

On top of that most cheap power supply cant give their rated power and have a hard time giving out 60 percent of it, the graphic card reccomendations are made to fit these power supplies.

So to anwser you question, a power supply which is high quality and really delivers the power it promises together with the power being on the right voltages can be a bit smaller than the graphic board suggestion if you have a bare minimum pc, but since you use USB devices, soundcard, 2nd harddrive (which will usually come in the lifetime of a comp) and cant be sure that the power supply really delivers what you want, it is usually better to stay at the reccomended size or bigger. I for example already have 3 USB devices permanently plugged in (2 Joysticks and pedals) and will add a 4th.
Or, to to be exact if you want to add anything extraordinary else but the usual it is necessary to get a bigger power supply than they reccomend.

BTW the power consumption i assumed for the devices are verry rough estimates, can read on tons of websites which are better ones to use.

NOT · « **Reply #6 on:** September 14, 2006, 06:58:59 AM »

thats why i got a 700w psu.

Krusty · « **Reply #7 on:** September 14, 2006, 09:48:41 AM »

Greebo: I wouldn't believe it. The 9800 is at least 2 generations older than the x1600. The x1600 is like the Ge 7600GS, it's a lighter version of a faster chip. It's got 128-bit RAM, but so do 7600GS's. It's not the fastest, not the best, but it's better than the old generation of cards, that's for sure.

Schutt: Newer cards draw directly from the power plugs now. They have 1 (some have 2!) power plugs that need to be plugged into them before they will run. They need far more than the AGP/PCIe slot can provide.

Greebo · « **Reply #8 on:** September 14, 2006, 02:43:27 PM »

Krusty, I'm using _this site to get a handle on current video cards. The X1600 seems better in some respects to the 9800 Pro, but worse in others. The 6800 GS gets better stats across the board than either card.

Of course you can only get so much from stats, but seems likely the 6800 is the better card.The 6800 GS is also a lot dearer than the X1600 which I reckon lends weight to the figures.

Krusty · « **Reply #9 on:** September 14, 2006, 02:57:22 PM »

9800 core: 380
x1600 core: 500
9800 ram: 128MB DDR
x1600 ram: 256MB DDR2
9800 memory type: 256 bit
x600 memory type: 128 bit
9800 process: 150nm
x1600 process: 90nm
9800 pipelines: 8 & 4
x1600 pipelines: 12 & 5

The x1600 is a big jump ahead. 50% more pipelines (can move data 50% faster), a processor that's 1/3 smaller (meaning it can house more transistors in the same space) yet runs nearly 160% as fast as the 9800, has twice the ram (albeit at a lower bit rate, it's still a faster type of ram).

I think the x1600 blows the 9800 away from those stats.

Just trying to shed some light on it

the 9800 is akin to my Ge4400. It's 2 generations old. Okay mine is 3. But the x1600 is the same bracket as the Ge6000 series. Not the GT series, but the rest of them are its main competition. A Ge6000 is probably better than the x1600 if you can find the right type.

P.S. I say go with the Ge6800, just because the drivers in the past year have been "bad" for ATI cards. Confusing and muddlesome. Nvidia has had less of this, despite introducing a new interface that I hate very much.

Greebo · « **Reply #10 on:** September 15, 2006, 03:05:07 AM »

I see what you mean Krusty. I was looking at the X1600's memory bandwidth and fill rates, which are worse than the 9800.

The vertex and shader processing is much better on the X1600 but the memory bandwidth and fill rates are much better on the 6800. The X1600 is also cheaper with 512mb of RAM than the 6800 is with 256MB. This is an attraction because I like to run AH with skins enabled.

It's difficult to know how these figures relate to AH. I'd guess memory bandwidth would be more important at high resolutions, but processing would be handy for drawing all those trees and processing smoke etc. Would having twice the RAM make up for slower memory bandwidth?

Krusty · « **Reply #11 on:** September 15, 2006, 09:03:56 AM »

Well from what I understand, video memory doesn't store skins. That's what your motherboard RAM does. More RAM on your system helps with skin storage while in-game.

The memory on the x1600 is a bit misleading. It's 128-bit memory, so while there's more of it, it can only transfer data do and from the memory so fast. The 6800 has 256bit memory, but half as much. Well, that means it doesn't need as much memory because it has a faster transfer rate for that memory. Also consider that 256 is the standard memory for all top end cards including the Ge7800 and the X850.

There were some discussions about older cards being given 512MB VRAM to make them more appealing, but it really didn't help the card much. I think this is the case with the X1600 (only, it's new, not old -- they just want to sell more). I've been looking at these same cards for the past month now. I think I'm going to settle on a Ge7600GT. It's supposed to outperform the 7800GS, but is only $170 or so. Consequently, it has 128-bit RAM (probably why it costs less) and it costs about as much as the Ge6800s I've seen, only it blows them out of the water, and I won't be upgrading to another AGP card after this. Anything from now on is going to be PCIe, but that's not for many years.

Brenjen · « **Reply #12 on:** September 15, 2006, 12:47:25 PM »

Your PC will bottlenneck at the CPU, so any video card over about 6800GT speeds will be a waste of money imo.

Krusty · « **Reply #13 on:** September 15, 2006, 12:49:30 PM »

Yes, but the lovely thing is that I built my PC with maximum upgradability. I was on a budget so I got one of the cheaper CPUs. I fully intend to get a 800mhz FBS P4 at around 3.2GHz when I can afford it. For the moment, the graphics card is the worst bottleneck. I'll deal with the other bottlenecks later

P.S. I'm assuming you were referring to me, and not Greebo?

Brenjen · « **Reply #14 on:** September 15, 2006, 01:46:45 PM »

No I was refering to the OP (Greebo) and his 2.8ghz P-4. I never noticed what you had going on, I just basically skimmed the other posts, good info provided but I didn't see where anyone had mentioned the CPU bottleneck. Todays GPU's will flood a CPU with more than it can handle. I have no experience with Conroe but I would assume a high end video card will still bottleneck it.