System repair complete; now for upgrade options

[BaldEagl]

After my experience with the nvidia 8600 and falcon's experience I am shy about buy Nvidia products.

I've had 3 Nvidia video cards and an Nvidia motherboard.  All work/have worked flawlessly other than an early BIOS issue (since corrected) with the motherboard.

Fulmar's right... Ford vs Chevy.

[TilDeath]

I've had 3 Nvidia video cards and an Nvidia motherboard.  All work/have worked flawlessly other than an early BIOS issue (since corrected) with the motherboard.

Fulmar's right... Ford vs Chevy.

x2 except ASUS blahhhhhhh for me at the moment.  Still waiting on an RMAed board on the 4th of Dec to come back

[drdeathx]

No.  But for $65 after mail in rebate you could buy this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127333

and for another $33 get this to go with it:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817171028

1G OC'd card over 512..... Which is better???

[drdeathx]

That's like saying I've had better luck with Ford than Chevy or Dodge.  I've always driven a Ford and I've always owned an Nvidia product.

Fulmar, I owned both and eexc'd 2 ATI's and went Nvidea. This is not a Chevy or Ford prefer situation rather than on hand experience.

[BaldEagl]

1G OC'd card over 512..... Which is better???

Other than Sold Out and possibly needing even a larger more expensive PSU?

BTW, the Nvidia card is OC'd too.

[Hajo]

Oboe.....be carefulwhat you purchase for a vid card.  That 380 watt  PS might not be enough.
 Concerning another post in this topic.

I'm running 2 X 4850s Crossfire.  I love the performance.

I also have a 750 watt PS.  Check before purchasing a vid card the available power to operate it.

[drdeathx]

ATI 3650 1G  VIDEO CARD VS 9600GT (512). I Looked for comparisons but I think the 3650 1G is a better card Baldeagle. Prove me wrong..... I am Nvidea fan. Just would like to see!

[BaldEagl]

ATI 3650 1G  VIDEO CARD VS 9600GT (512). I Looked for comparisons but I think the 3650 1G is a better card Baldeagle. Prove me wrong..... I am Nvidea fan. Just would like to see!

In a side by side comparison the telling stats are:

Stream Processors; 64 9600 GT; 120 ATI 3650
Memory Size; 512MB  9600 GT; 1GB ATI 3650
Memory Interface; 256-bit 9600 GT; 128-bit ATI 3650
Memory Type; GDDR3 9600 GT; GDDR2 ATI 3650

While the 3650 has more memory and stream processors, the 9600 has faster memory with a higher bit rate which allows it to deal with instructions and output data faster than the ATI card.  From a review:  "The Radeon HD 3650 generates just 16.0GB/s of memory bandwidth using a 128-bit memory bus , which is considerably less than that of the old GeForce 7600 GT."  The 9600 GT outputs 57.6Gb/s which I found on the eVGA products pages.

In a 3D Mark comparison the 512 9600 GT scores a 10 (on a 1-10 scale) vs. the ATI 1Gb 3650's 1.4 at 1440x900 resolution:  http://www.techspot.com/review/98-diamond-viper-radeon-3650/page3.html (other resoltions included in chart).

You can continue through the comparisons at the site above (2008 comparison).

In another review I found:

"Given the performances of this GeForce 9600 GT, it’s hard not to be impressed. The card offers performances that enable you to really take advantage of the latest resource heavy games and this in satisfactory conditions.

To be sure, it was already the case with the Radeon HD 3850 although it is less consistent especially when anti-aliasing is active, a big black mark against the Radeon HD 2000 and 3000. In addition, Nvidia shows a real desire to offer high quality required for demanding gamers by regularly integrating anti-aliasing support in drivers for all games that don’t support it. Combined with slightly better performances compared to the Radeon HD 3850, this makes the GeForce 9600 GT the new reference in the mid-level.

Lower down the line and for demanding gamers, the Radeon HD 3650 unfortunately doesn’t add anything new and is just equal to the Radeon HD 2600 XT GDDR3."

All the memory in the world doesn't matter if you can't get it to the system.

Your recommendation would have actually been a step backward for the OP.

[drdeathx]

Nice. Thanx

[drdeathx]

Oboe.....be carefulwhat you purchase for a vid card.  That 380 watt  PS might not be enough.
 Concerning another post in this topic.

I'm running 2 X 4850s Crossfire.  I love the performance.

I also have a 750 watt PS.  Check before purchasing a vid card the available power to operate it.

Ati cards require much less power than Nvidea. 380W should be OK for the 3650 but probably not for the Nvidea 9600. 9600 recommends 400W PSU and 26AMPS. The card will work with less than 26 amps. I believe it really needs 18 to get rolling and uses less after it starts. manufacturers go high on min. amps cause there are poor PSU's out there.

3650 is min 300W power supply.

[BaldEagl]

I posted a PSU to go with the 9600 which was adequate to power it and together they were under the OP's $100 limit.

[oboe]

Checked AsRock's site for PCIe cards compatible with the board, and anything I'd consider would also require a new PSU.   I'm thinking now I'll just pop for 2 Gbs of faster memory, and save the $$ on new PSU and vidcard for the next build.   This box has been my AH unit for 5 yrs; I'll stretch it out a bit longer.   Getting 75fps (monitor refresh rate) in most situations, so can't complain.   Will have to wait longer to get a machine to support the eye-popping graphics settings I'd eventually like to run with...