Upgrade for an Older Comp

[master_xtreme]

I've had my comp for about 2 1/2 years now and while it's still a decent gaming PC, I feel its time for some upgrading, especially my Ti4600 which is in a system using an XP 1700+ and a mobo that only goes up to AGP 4X. Now the question is, what can I upgrade to? My aim is for something higher-end such as a Geforce 6600 (The AGP version, just to clarify), as I'd like my card to last another two years or so, but at the same time, I realize most of them are AGP 8x and might get bottlenecked at the CPU. So, my questions are, can a card that runs on AGP 8x run at 4x, and if so, how bad would the CPU bottlenecking be (In other words, would a higher end card provide enough of a boost to keep me happy for a few months until I had the cash for a new mobo and cpu)? Furthermore, is it even worth upgrading my videocard right now for games like Doom 3 and HL2, or can they be run at decent frame rates with what I have already? I have a pretty good idea what the answers are gonna be, but I just thought I'd get a little confirmation before resigning myself to ripping my motherboard out.

 

[Avengeance]

I would say spend the extra money for a 6800GT, it will probably last you a bit longer. As far as bottlenecking goes, yes it will, but dont worry about it, if you are gonna be upgrading anyways later. Also with the AGP, if you run an 8x AGP card at 4x, you wont notice a diff, I think people say its like a 3-5% diff from 8x.

 

[sculelos]

Actually, it's only half the bandwidth, so in theary it will reduce your cards performance up to 50% in highly demanding games. (Doom3, Half-Life2, Farcry, Call of Duty).

 

[Hal|9k]

Actually, it's only half the bandwidth, so in theary it will reduce your cards performance up to 50% in highly demanding games. (Doom3, Half-Life2, Farcry, Call of Duty).

Yeah, but only IF those games are actually using all that bandwidth. From what I've seen, they don't.

A 6600GT would be a nice upgrade for that rig. A 6800 would be even better, of course, but it's for you to decide how much money you want to spend.

 

[The Superlative]

If you can swing it, 6800 vanilla.

 

[{NcsO}ReichstaG]

I would say spend the extra money for a 6800GT, it will probably last you a bit longer. As far as bottlenecking goes, yes it will, but dont worry about it, if you are gonna be upgrading anyways later. Also with the AGP, if you run an 8x AGP card at 4x, you wont notice a diff, I think people say its like a 3-5% diff from 8x.

Its funny that you can still run games well on a 4x AGP bus (only losing 3-8 %) and the whole industry is moving to PCI-E. I just wish they would have sticked with the 8x a bit ( 6-12 months) longer.

 

[BossNoodleKaboodle]

Actually, it's only half the bandwidth, so in theary it will reduce your cards performance up to 50% in highly demanding games. (Doom3, Half-Life2, Farcry, Call of Duty).

Thats not true at all. I've used my 6800 on an AGP 4X board and I got the exact same 3dmark scores and the games play with the SAME FPS. Only way you'll see an improvement is with the newer chipset that comes on AGP 8x boards. If I were you I'd get a 6800nu. It'll be 150-200 dollars cheaper than a GT which will allow you to buy a completely new PC more quickly. The BFG's are going for 250 after rebate at Best Buy. I've got mine OC'ed as per my sig and it runs no hotter than 72 under maximum load. It idles at 52. The 6600GT is way underpowered compared to the 6800nu, and its only 20 dollars less.

 

[LoneWolf]

First off, AGP 4x vs. 8x is largely irrelevant. There's at absolute best a 3-5% difference between an AGP 4x and an 8x card; most cards do their work in onboard RAM, so as long as a new card has 128MB of RAM on it you will be fine. An 8x AGP card can run at 4x just fine.

My first recommendation though, is to consider both a CPU upgrade and a graphics card upgrade. You're at the point where buying a super high-end graphics card will provide you with some performance gain, but will be limited by the CPU under the heavy stuff. I'd look at getting an Athlon XP Mobile processor, probably the 2500+ model, and then clocking it at a 333MHz or 400MHz front-side bus (depending on what your mainboard can support) up to 2.3GHz speed. This will give you a reasonable boost even with your GeForce 4600, and if you feel the need for more speed, then I'd consider either a GeForce 6800 vanilla if you have the budget (which is around the same price as a 6600GT but will let you turn on a few more features such as AA/AF), or if this looks pricey, look for a used Radeon 9700/9800 class graphics card. Between the both of them, you'll get quite a performance gain which should last you awhile until your next upgrade. I'd even go as far as to say upgrading the CPU and going with the used Radeon as a better choice if you were on a budget, than just buying the high-end GeForce, if it came down to that.