Best GPU to pair with my old Q6600?

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Buztafen

Limp Gawd
Joined
May 19, 2005
Messages
238
Afternoon,

Im currently running the pc in my sig and im thinking of changing out the 8800GTX. Question is, whats the best GPU i can go for that wont be bottlenecked by my Q6600?

Its currently happily running at 3.4ghz but im actively trying to squeeze some more out of it and hope to get upto 3.6.

I've searched around and people have mentioned the 560Ti or 570 might be a good match, or an equivalent ATI card (5870 or 6970?).

My current 8800GTX does a good job but im thinking while i save for a proper upgrade which will either later on this year or 2013 depending on funds i may aswell squeeze the best performance out of my current setup.

So what does everyone think...

Go for a 560Ti/570/5870/6970 or something else?
Stick with my 8800GTX as i wont see much difference?

Cheers!

EDIT: Sorry forgot resolution. I'll be playing at a maximum of 1920x1080 (Plasma tv)...
 
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well you left out the resolution which is one of the most important things we need to know.
 
Get a modern card. You'll notice a huge increase. That cpu may be old, but not as slow as you think. I have a buddy that was running a 6950 on his s939 rig... it worked fine, and he saw a huge performance increase over the nvidia 68xx he had in there.
 
pheonix991 said:
Get a modern card. You'll notice a huge increase. That cpu may be old, but not as slow as you think. I have a buddy that was running a 6950 on his s939 rig... it worked fine, and he saw a huge performance increase over the nvidia 68xx he had in there.
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a 6950 with an Athlon 64 X2? wow, what a waste of money. lol, of course he saw an increase over a 6800 as even an 8600gt is twice as fast as that.
 
cannondale06 said:
a 6950 with an Athlon 64? wow, what a waste of money. lol, of course he saw an increase over a 6800 as even an 8600gt is twice as fast as that.
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how is a 6950 a waste of money...

its not like the video card is garbage.. In a year or so he can just replace the motherboard/cpu/ram and it will bring new life again!
 
mjz_5 said:
how is a 6950 a waste of money...

its not like the video card is garbage.. In a year or so he can just replace the motherboard/cpu/ram and it will bring new life again!
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use some common sense. a 6950 would not even be 50% utilized with the fastest A64 X2. by the time he upgrades to a modern cpu, there will cards faster than the 6950 for less money and newer features. someone with an A64 X2 accomplishes nothing by having a 6950 over a 6850 during that time. even a 6850 would be severally held back especially if thats a lower end A64 X2. the lower end A64 X2 cpus do not even meet the requirements to play some newer games.
 
...sooooo...Q6600 at 3.4...1920x1080 resolution...keep the 8800GTX or change it?

Cheers.
 
Buztafen said:
...sooooo...Q6600 at 3.4...1920x1080 resolution...keep the 8800GTX or change it?

Cheers.
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I do not understand exactly why you have to ask if you should upgrade though? you are the one playing games so you are the one that would know best if the 8800gtx is getting the job done. personally an 8800gtx would be way too slow for me to play the games I want to play.

if you want to start cranking the settings in more modern games then I would probably grab a gtx560ti 448sp or a 6950.
 
Ok cheers mjz_5. Looking at my budget after i sell the 8800GTX and other bits and bats i'll enough for a 560Ti or 6950...maybe stretching to a 570/6950 2GB/6970. Any ideas on what might be a good pairing. Its hard to google benchmarks for an older cpu with a newer gpu.

Cheers.
 
cannondale06 said:
I do not understand exactly why you have to ask if you should upgrade though? you are the one playing games so you are the one that would know best if the 8800gtx is getting the job done. personally an 8800gtx would be way too slow for me to play the games I want to play.

if you want to start cranking the settings in more modern games then I would probably grab a gtx560ti 448sp or a 6950.
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His question was, is it worth upgrading or will the Q6600 keep him from seeing appropriate gains when he upgrades the GPU.

My personal opinion, that OC'ed 6600 is plenty, you won't bottleneck most modern GPUs that much, and yes, an upgrade from an 800 gtx would be worth it.
 
Buztafen said:
Ok cheers mjz_5. Looking at my budget after i sell the 8800GTX and other bits and bats i'll enough for a 560Ti or 6950...maybe stretching to a 570/6950 2GB/6970. Any ideas on what might be a good pairing. Its hard to google benchmarks for an older cpu with a newer gpu.

Cheers.
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a 6950 or gtx560ti 448sp would be the highest I would go. you seem somewhat happy with your 8800gtx and either of those would be a massive increase. and your cpu would be okay for those cards too.
 
FranklyShankly said:
His question was, is it worth upgrading or will the Q6600 keep him from seeing appropriate gains when he upgrades the GPU.

My personal opinion, that OC'ed 6600 is plenty, you won't bottleneck most modern GPUs that much, and yes, an upgrade from an 800 gtx would be worth it.
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well I guess that I read too much into the part where he said "My current 8800GTX does a good job".

but yes his cpu is plenty fast enough to go with a pretty high end card.
 
cannondale06 said:
I do not understand exactly why you have to ask if you should upgrade though? you are the one playing games so you are the one that would know best if the 8800gtx is getting the job done. personally an 8800gtx would be way too slow for me to play the games I want to play.

if you want to start cranking the settings in more modern games then I would probably grab a gtx560ti 448 or 6950.
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Ok. I want to upgrade. I feel the performance in some games (Skyrim, Batman Arkham City, Diablo III) could be better. What im asking is, if i do upgrade to one of the card i mentioned...or any others that may be suggested...would i see an improvement or will my Q6600 be holding any newer gpu back.

Its hard to find comparisons and benchmarks for that cpu and newer cards as i mentioned above. Maybe my Google skills are failing.

I'm not up on the currently available graphics cards so thought i'd ask on here for any helpful information.

Anyway thanks for the posts. I'll see what i can stretch too.

Cheers.
 
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FYI i may aswell say your query on if i actually want to upgrade is valid as im still impressed at the graphics the 8800gtx throws about. At 1080p im still seeing fps of 30-60 (and above) in Skyrim with high textures 16xAF but no AA.
 
Buztafen said:
FYI i may aswell say your query on if i actually want to upgrade is valid as im still impressed at the graphics the 8800gtx throws about. At 1080p im still seeing fps of 30-60 (and above) in Skyrim with high textures 16xAF but no AA.
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Just about any of the modern cards will give you very noticeable increases. You are definitely on the right track with the 6950 2GB. Another option is hit the used market for a 5870, its many times more powerful than your 8800 and could be had for around $130-$150. That's the last card I had in my last PC with a Q6600 @3.4 and it ran great.
 
q6600 is fine for running with any modern day $200 to $300 gpu.
 
Ok cheers, to throw a different spanner in the works i use my pc to watch alot of video content. Mainly 720p and full HD. Are both gpu manufacturers fairly equal when it comes to video playback? I am leaning towards Nvidia more as ive had a fairly positive experience with them for the past few years.
 
Buztafen said:
Ok cheers, to throw a different spanner in the works i use my pc to watch alot of video content. Mainly 720p and full HD. Are both gpu manufacturers fairly equal when it comes to video playback? I am leaning towards Nvidia more as ive had a fairly positive experience with them for the past few years.
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both brands will work fine..

I believe the AMD cards are the best bang for the buck right now
 
I have a Q6700 @ 3.3Ghz and went from a GTX280 to a GTX560Ti and it was a substantial improvement. Prior to the GTX280 I had an 8800GTS-640mb. Your CPU is fast enough to get the benefit of a mid-range card like a 560Ti or a 6950. $199 for a 560Ti less whatever you can sell your 8800GTX for ($50?) is a pretty good value proposition in my mind.
 
Cheers, im leaning towards a 560Ti or a Ti 448 if i can find a good deal.

Ok another question. Would the 8800GTX work well purely as a secondary Physx card?
 
Buztafen said:
Cheers, im leaning towards a 560Ti or a Ti 448 if i can find a good deal.

Ok another question. Would the 8800GTX work well purely as a secondary Physx card?
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yes it would work as a physx card but why would you want to fool with doing that? there has only been 4 or 5 decent games ever that even contain optional hardware physx. the gtx560ti 448 can handle graphics and physx at the same time too anyway.
 
Ok, fair enough i was just seeing it was worth using it instead of the £20-£30 i'll get from flogging it...

Cheers.
 
Buztafen said:
Cheers, im leaning towards a 560Ti or a Ti 448 if i can find a good deal.

Ok another question. Would the 8800GTX work well purely as a secondary Physx card?
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this is an idea i toyed with a few months back. specifically i was looking at hybrid PhysX with my AMD GPU and a cheap-ish nVidia card.
the reason i was considering it was b/c i've been a big Batman fan since i was a kid and yet to play any of the games (AA, AC). personally these were the only 2 games i'd be interested in ( and maybe Metro) that are PhysX enabled tho there is 'Mafia II', 'Alice Madness Return'. aside from these titles there is perhaps a another couple worth looking at. check wiki link for list
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PhysX#PhysX_in_video_games

suggest you hit up the 'Physics Processing' sub forum for more info, specifically these two threads (not that you could get lost in this forum, not like there is a hive of activity there...)
HD 6970 + Dedicated GT 430 Hybrid Physx Mini Review
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1645682

Some general questions about PhysX cards
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1660225

i eventually abandoned the idea, just a little too much trouble to setup + trying to manage the extra heat/electricity consumed. probably be a bit more enthused if i had a nVidia GPU and just processed both graphics & physics on the one card. as i prefer AMD video cards, this isn't going to happen (not going to get into why i prefer red over green).

what i don't get is why nvidia don't just licences their physics engine to work off your CPU. a 6/4 core processer should be able to handle some level of physic processing. as it stands it a bit of a gimmick till either nVidia opens it up for use on AMD/Intel hardware (GPU/CPU processing) otherwise i think the technology will just die off. shame, this is probably the only scenario i'd entertain using dual GPU's in my system. as i game at 2560x1600 there's no real reason to bother where a single high end GPU can handle this resolution just fine plus not having to manage the headaches associated with xfire (heat, power, buggy game profiles etc).
 
IMO the heat/noise/power draw from the 8800GTX make it not worth it to use for PhysX in your case. Maybe try it in Batman if you really want to see it, as that and Alice are the only worthwhile PhysX games.
 
560ti 448 cores would be the best dollar/performance for you. the evga classified 560ti 448 core is on sale at newegg today for $289.99... 10 bucks off. But it's still easily the best bang/buck. And at it's factory overclock, it basically performs like a 570.
 
I have a 560Ti and 260GTX, and the 260GTX as a Physix card is complete waste. It simply wastes constant energy and actually the 560Ti can do as much Pysix processing on itself and game than the 260GTX for Physix can do alone. At least in Batman AC. Metro 2033 ...I think it has a benchmark built in or not for Physix...I need to run that if there is one and check...but IMHO Pysix is coded worse than anything I have come across in the PC market. I'm thoroughly disappointed in its ability to actually push more min or max framerates, in Batman AC I get better performance just running everything on my 560Ti. Go figure.
 
Right thanks for all the help so far but i NEED MOAR! :D

I'm going down the 560 road...now bearing in mind my current cpu at 3.4GHZ...would a 560 be best...or should i go for the 560 Ti...or even a 560 Ti 448? In fact would a 570 be a worthy investment or will i just not see an difference in performance for the extra £20($30ish) between each card?

Why are there so many...:(

560 Vanilla £145 ($226ish)
560Ti 1gb £168 ($261ish)
560Ti 448 £210 ($327ish)
570 £240 ($373ish)
 
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I would go ahead with a gtx560ti 448sp. most of them are oced to begin with and match a gtx570 out of the box. heck I have to add more voltage to my gtx570 just to get to the clocks many gtx560ti 448sp cards. the regular gtx560ti has 1gb of vram and 1gb is borderline in some games. having the extra 256mb of vram on the gtx560ti 448sp card will come in handy right now as well as in some upcoming games
 
Right 560ti 448 it is.

There was a Palit 560ti 448 for sale at £190 ($296)...i should've jumped on it!

Are they all much the same from each manufacturer or is there one that could be recommended over others?

Appreciative of the help btw.
 
The EVGA Classified 560Ti 448 stands head and shoulders above the rest. The reason is it uses the GTX 480 PCB, with a 6 phase power supply. Every single other GTX 560Ti 448 has only a 4 phase.

Using the older 480 PCB also means that you can readily watercool the card with any GTX480 compatible parts.

It's a no brainer... The clocks on the EVGA are significantly higher than anyone else, too.
 
Ok, it looks like i might not be able to go for a 560 Ti/Ti 448. Money may be diverted to other things so im looking for other cheaper upgrade options if they're beneficial.

My current mobo supports Crossfire but not SLi. Would 2 x 5770's be a worthwhile step up from a single 8800gtx. Should be able to get 2 for around £80 ($125ish)?

To recap i play at 1920x1080. My Q6600 is at 3.4. I'll be playing Skyrim, Batman Arkham City, Diablo 3 (when it arrives), Crysis 1 & 2.

Cheers.
 
Just food for thought, I went from an 880gt with my C2D E8400 @ 3.0, to a Radeon HD 4870 and every game I play has more than doubled in performance at 1440x900 resolution. Your CPU will be fine, get any midrange GPU (Radeon 5800 series or GTX 460) and enjoy.

It'll cost half as much as that 560 and you'll be set.
 
hey man i feel your pain, i was in the same boat like 2-3 months ago, i was getting my pc ready for BF3 ...... and i decided to go with the msi 560ti hawk edition and u know what ? i dont regret it, my q6600 is oc'd to 3.0 ghz ( i may try to push it to 3.2...3.4 ghz but im too lazy and i dont like testing and tweaking) but back on topic, i can play BF3 on ultra settings at 1680 * 1050 real smooth, also skyrim, crysis 2 and the witcher 2....some ppl here suggested the 6950 2gb but plain and simple i dont like AMD/ATI... i actually hate them especially ATI's CCC....hope this helps ;-) CHEERS
 
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