Replacement AGP Card

R

rzr

Weaksauce
Joined
Feb 11, 2006
Messages
75
Hi All,

It looks like my trusty old 6800GT is on its way out and I am looking for advice on a replacement AGP card.

I will be building a completely new system in the next month or two, but I wish to keep this computer up and running for the immediate future perhaps as secondary gaming box or a home media center so please refrain from comments like "OMG AGP, GO BUY A NEW COMPUTER, K THX"

I am looking at getting a card that will provide similar or better performance than my 6800GT. These are the cards that are currently available to me in AGP:
ATI:
XpertVision ATI X800 AGP 256MB 256bit DDR3
XpertVision ATI X800GTO AGP 256MB 256-bit DDR3
MSI ATI 2600Pro AGP 512MB 128-bit DDR2, 600/800MHz
Hightech ATI X1650Pro AGP 512MB IceQ 128-bit DDR2
Hightech ATI 2600Pro AGP 512MB IceQ Turbo 128-bit DDR2, 650MHz/1000MHz
Hightech ATI X1650Pro AGP 512MB IceQ 128-bit DDR2
Hightech ATI X1650Pro AGP 256MB IceQ 128-bit DDR2

NVIDIA:
MSI GF 7600GT AGP 512MB DDR2
eVGA GF 7600GT SUPERCLOCKED AGP 8X, DDR2, 512 MB
Inno3D GF 7600GS AGP 512MB, 128-bit DDR2
Inno3D GF 7600GS AGP 256MB, 128-bit DDR2
eVGA GF 7300GT AGP 8X, DDR2, 512 MB, 128-bit DDR2, 380Mhz/ 533Mhz
Inno3D GF 7300GT AGP 512MB, 128-bit DDR2

Just looking for advice on what would be the best replacement card to get, as cost is not an issue I wont bother with showing the prices.

Thanks
 
As for an ATI card anything from a x1650pro and above should do fine for most casual gaming
 
I know the performance rankings for the Nvidia cards, but what are the best to worst cards under the ATI range in that list?
 
whats your price range??

im sure you could find a nice x1950 used for not to much money

my agp system has x850pro and i can play a lot of newer games still.... COD4 @ medium-high settings

i might be wrong on this but i think the x800 is still faster than the x1650's
 
I would take an X800 or X850 over any of the newer X16XX cards...
they have 256 bit memory and use DDR3...

They are faster cards...
 
Unfortunately these are the only cards available to me. Im not really keen on trawling around for used cards and would prefer something with a bit of a warranty on it. Im located in Australia as well so the market for used graphics card might not be as big here as it is in the States.

Basically what I am looking for is an overall ranking across both the ATI and Nvidia lists from best to worst performers overall. As said in my opening post cost of the card isnt an issue to me. I just want the best card out of the list I posted.

Atherton213 said:
whats your price range??

im sure you could find a nice x1950 used for not to much money

my agp system has x850pro and i can play a lot of newer games still.... COD4 @ medium-high settings

i might be wrong on this but i think the x800 is still faster than the x1650's
Click to expand...
 
I have an Sapphire ATI X1600 512 ddr2 I think. It has served me well although I never overclocked it. I don't game much, I just wanted to know that I could if I chose to.
 
rzr said:
Unfortunately these are the only cards available to me. Im not really keen on trawling around for used cards and would prefer something with a bit of a warranty on it. Im located in Australia as well so the market for used graphics card might not be as big here as it is in the States.

Basically what I am looking for is an overall ranking across both the ATI and Nvidia lists from best to worst performers overall. As said in my opening post cost of the card isnt an issue to me. I just want the best card out of the list I posted.
Click to expand...

in that case.... im gonna say the x800 is very close to the 7600gt for the top

1. XpertVision ATI X800 AGP 256MB 256bit DDR3
2. eVGA GF 7600GT SUPERCLOCKED AGP 8X, DDR2, 512 MB
(evga only cause its superclocked... dont know the exact specs of that vs the other 7600gt)
3. MSI GF 7600GT AGP 512MB DDR2
4. XpertVision ATI X800GTO AGP 256MB 256-bit DDR3

those should be the main 4 to look at i would say....

if thats not correct someone jump in and say other wise
 
I was in a similar dilemna when my 6800GT crapped out. Here's how I would rank the cards you have listed:

7600GT > x800 > 2600pro > x1650 > 7600gs >7300gt

With the exception of the 7300gt, if your'e only going to be using this rig for another month I would just buy which ever one is the cheapest of the ones you listed. The margin of difference between them is very minimal.

Good luck. :)
 
Is it possible for you to find one of the HD 3850 AGPs? Most of them use GDDR3 and 256-bit memory. They are also under $200 in the U.S.
 
TheGardenTool said:
Is it possible for you to find one of the HD 3850 AGPs? Most of them use GDDR3 and 256-bit memory. They are also under $200 in the U.S.
Click to expand...

if you keep reading all the posts not just the first one is he is in AU and those are the ONLY cards availible to him...

i suggested some as well and he posted that those are the only ones he can get
 
if you want this rig to become a HTPC, i would DEFINITLY go for the 2600 Pro. its good for that DVD decoding and stuff.
 
Atherton213 said:
if you keep reading all the posts not just the first one is he is in AU and those are the ONLY cards availible to him...

i suggested some as well and he posted that those are the only ones he can get
Click to expand...

I know he is in AU and I read all the posts. I didn't know if he was willing to import or just buy locally.

But in that list, I'd probably go with the 7600 unless you need DX10 then the 2600.
 
Cheezor722 said:
7600GT > x800 > 2600pro > x1650 > 7600gs >7300gt
Good luck. :)
Click to expand...

QFT

The X800XL is the closest ATI card to your 6800GT. Of your choices, the closest ATI card is the X800GTO.
http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php?card1=356&card2=202

I've owned an X800GTO, X800XL and 6800GS OC'ed. All were very similar in performance. The GTO and GS could be unlocked and or overclocked to match the XL. I'd pretty much avoid the X1600 and HD2600 series ATI cards.

Of all the cards that you've listed, I think you'd be happiest with either of the 7600GT's. I have a friend that still uses an EVGA 7600GT in his rig and I am constantly amazed how well it runs. As for benchmarks, his 7600GT was pretty close to my X850XT in performance... but that was in the AGP days. And if you stay with Nvidia, you can avoid any driver conflicts that might occur going from Nvidia to ATI if you do not completely remove all the Nvidia drivers and files.
 
Ok I may have lied about money not being a problem, 200 USD is definately way more than I would want to spend on an aging system. My price range is around 100 USD and below, and no I would rather not have to resort to importing a card from overseas.

So from what I can tell, its a toss up between the 2600, X800 and the 7600GT?

So for raw gaming performance I would be looking at either the X800 or 7600GT,

If I go for the HTPC build then a 2600 seems to be the way to go?

Please keep the advice flowing as I appreciate any comments and recommendations people can make.

Atherton213 said:
if you keep reading all the posts not just the first one is he is in AU and those are the ONLY cards availible to him...

i suggested some as well and he posted that those are the only ones he can get
Click to expand...
 
Crosshairs said:
I would take an X800 or X850 over any of the newer X16XX cards...
they have 256 bit memory and use DDR3...

They are faster cards...
Click to expand...

The X1650GT/XT is the exception of the rule above, the're based on the X1950PRO/GT chip with locked pixel/shader pipelines, and are as fast or slighly faster than the X800XT, specially on shader intensive games.
 
rzr said:
Ok I may have lied about money not being a problem, 200 USD is definately way more than I would want to spend on an aging system. My price range is around 100 USD and below, and no I would rather not have to resort to importing a card from overseas.

So from what I can tell, its a toss up between the 2600, X800 and the 7600GT?

So for raw gaming performance I would be looking at either the X800 or 7600GT,

If I go for the HTPC build then a 2600 seems to be the way to go?

Please keep the advice flowing as I appreciate any comments and recommendations people can make.
Click to expand...


If you can possibly find a 2600xt you'd have the best of both worlds. You'd get the highest level of gaming performance (compared to the listed cards) and also the High Def. Here in the US the 2600xt's go for around $90.
 
For future gaming ( on mid to low detail with games like Crysis and beyond ) the HD2600 will fare better than all the other listed cards. Games like CoD4, BioShock, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and Company of Heroes will all perform waaaaay better on the HD2600 than the other cards you have listed. Given in some relatively newer titles like F.E.A.R. and stuff from that period will fare better on the X800 or 7600GT. Guess it depends on what games you play, the newer the game the newer the card tech should be.
 
Dazed and Confused said:
For future gaming ( on mid to low detail with games like Crysis and beyond ) the HD2600 will fare better than all the other listed cards. Games like CoD4, BioShock, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and Company of Heroes will all perform waaaaay better on the HD2600 than the other cards you have listed. Given in some relatively newer titles like F.E.A.R. and stuff from that period will fare better on the X800 or 7600GT. Guess it depends on what games you play, the newer the game the newer the card tech should be.
Click to expand...

Even though your reasoning is sound, you couldn't be more wrong in your statements. Just because the card has a newer chipset doesn't mean it performs ANY better in even newer games. It might support newer features but support for newer features doesn't always mean better performance. I know soneone who "upgraded" from the X800XL that I sold them, to a HD2600. They were disappointed and went back to the X800XL until they finally went to PCI-E.

Unless you're building a HTPC, I'd skip the HD2600 series all together. The X800's are the "closest" to what you already have, but I'd go with the 7600GT from the choices you've listed.
 
well all the PC's in my hosue ahve ATI cards in them, they all work fantastic.

both my old PC (now my moms, pentium 4 2.8 prescott) and my sisters opteron 146 PC have PCI Express X850 pro's.

My other sisters computer has a Celeron 331 with an X1650 PRO, and it runs Cal lof duty great, it works abouta s good as the X850 pro's, but the image quality is able to be cranked MUCH HIGHER than those.

the low end athlon XP system has a measly 9600XT OC'd, that runs COD4 at low settings decently.

I had a 3870, 2900XT, and now an X1900XT (Crossfire edition).

they are ALL VERY STABLE, OC very well, and honestly my 8800GT experience was the only good Nvidia card I ever owned. when i first built my PC i went for an Nvidia PCX 5750, the card crapped out 6 months later. thats when i got the X850 Pro :D
 
that 7600GT with 512 MB RAM is a 7600GS in disguise . I have a XFX 7600GT 256MB DDR3, factory overclocked version for sale.
 
I'd stay away from from the 2600xt/pro lines. AGP driver issues are very common.
 
i was in a similar situation, i got out of it by scoring a XFX 7600GT DDR3 for 40 used on ebay. its served me well for over 6 months now
 
I've got an agp BFG 7800gs OC for sale if you're interested...
 
Hmm get a 7600GT OC edition from nvidia if your going nvidia. If your going ATI theres an 3850 AGP and also the 2900XT there about 100-150 each.
 
If you don't mind you can get the X1950GT/PRO used in many places, it's performance is better against the GeForce 7, the HD 2600PRO/XT have issues with drivers because they don't recognize the card, doing a force install didn't have any issues with my card, so they should work also for those cards.
 
evolucion8 said:
If you don't mind you can get the X1950GT/PRO used in many places, it's performance is better against the GeForce 7, the HD 2600PRO/XT have issues with drivers because they don't recognize the card, doing a force install didn't have any issues with my card, so they should work also for those cards.
Click to expand...

was already said.... he said he can ONLY get the ones listed
 
jxaznxk said:
Hmm get a 7600GT OC edition from nvidia if your going nvidia. If your going ATI theres an 3850 AGP and also the 2900XT there about 100-150 each.
Click to expand...

From the list, 7600GT hands down if gaming performance is main concern. Out of the list, you won't find the 3850 AGP for $100. But Newegg seems to have the Powercolor one for $145 AR, which is the lowest I've seen it. Then again, OP has already stated that anything above $100 is out of his price range.
 
fluke420 said:
I'd stay away from from the 2600xt/pro lines. AGP driver issues are very common.
Click to expand...


Unless you use the direct from ATI Catalyst 8.46 AGP Hotfix driver which solves all issues with the cards o_O

And despite the people that haven't had personal experience. I get better FPS in Crysis than a guy with a system similar to mine who is using a 7800GS OC'd to 480/1300 . Its amazing just how wrong some people are when they say how wrong I am :) I stated those "facts" about BioShock, STALKER and Crysis because they are just that, facts. Google can be your friend if you look or it can be the ally of ignorance when you don't. Look on the net and you'll see that for one, the X850XT PE can't even play BioShock, so the HD2600's win hands down there. The HD2600's stomp the dog piss out of the 7600's in CoD4, BioShock and Crysis. Well, they even stomp other previosuly mentioned cards in those games as well :)

I'll say no more as I've already done the research before I bought my HD260 and I know better ;) You guys can be ignorant or you can do the same and realize that I just might know what I'm talking about here. The choice is yours.
 
If you can find one, the AGP Radeon 3850 would really walk all over the other cards. If that's impossible to find, go with a Radeon 2600.

It also depends on what the rest of your system consists of. If it's outdated and you're building a new one in a few months, then just get a really cheap card like the 7300 for now and save the money for when you buy a fast PCI-E card for your new system... Unless you plan on keeping the old system as some kind of backup gaming rig or something, of course.
 
Dazed has alot of anger issues.

I've done alot of LAN gaming over the years and I've had some experience with most videocards, cpu's, boards, ram etc. Some cards play some games better than others. Likewise, some cards benchmark better than they perform. What games do you play? What games do you want to play ? Did I miss where the OP mentioned Bioshock, Crysis, Stalker or CoD 4 ?

To the OP, got to www.tomshardware.com , www.newegg.com , and www.gpuview.com

Read the product reviews, look at the VGA charts, add whatever benchmarks you want and make your own decision.

Or you can listen to Mr. Angry, because we all know... the more angry a person is, the more correct they are.

Good luck to you.
 
The X850XT PE had the power to run Bioshock, but the lack of SM3.0 support on the card is what that makes the game unplayable on that card (There's a patch around that allows to play the game through the SM2.0b model, but takes up to 5 minutes to load a level, I tested it and I was able to run it with everything on high with my old X800XT PE at 1,024x768).

The Radeon HD 2600XT performance is a bit weak on old games were the pixel/texture fillrate matters, but in games launched after 2006, it even rivals and outperforms the X1950PRO, specially on games like STALKER, etc

The Tom's Hardware VGA chart is a bit misleading, it states that the HD 3850 is just a slight upgrade in performance over the X1950XTX which is not true, even though they tie in some games at ultra high resolutions with Anti Aliasing on, thanks to the X1950XTX strong FSAA performance, most of the time the HD 3850 is faster, sometimes twice as fast.
 
I have an AGP BFG 6800 GT OC.

Ended up getting an ASRock motherboard that supported AGP and PCI-E, old memory and new memory, and new CPUs.

Ended up with a Q6600 using my old memory and old video card. I've since upgraded the video card to a PCI-E one, but I still use the old RAM.

There's no need to do the switch over all at once.
 
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