Which AGP card? 4650 w/ HDMI, or 3850?

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RobotChild

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The 4650: http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=38504
The 3850: http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=28711

I recently upgraded from my Viewsonic a70 (Hells ya, beige 17" CRT) to a HP w2408h LCD. I was just planning on picking up whatever AGP card the shop had laying around that could run this, but alas they had nothing. My video card died a fair while ago, and I've just been running on the crappy SiS 740GX integrated.. Which doesnt support 1920x1200 resolution.

My setup is pretty crappy, but it's what I've got and I can't complain it was given free to me years ago.
Athlon XP 2800+ OC'd
1gb of RAM
Asrock k741gx

Will both cards be bottlenecked so much that I will not see a perfomance difference? This monitor only has HDMI, and VGA. Will the HDMI look good enough to warrant the weaker card?
 
128 bit GDDR2 is going to SUCK on a 24" compared to the 3850's 256 bit GDDR3.

If you're not playing games (other than old ones or 2D stuff) get the 4650.
 
Since no one has asked, what is your budget? You can probably score a 6800gt or ultra on ebay for pretty cheap.
 
My budget is as high as any AGP card will cost me, around 100$ CAD (Price match from Newegg to NCIX brings the price on the 3850 to 114$)

The main reason I would rather have a newer card than say a 6800 is due to the need of certain shaders and crap that newer cards will have.
 
Upgrade your damn PC to something more recent and then you won't be spending $100+ on video cards that cost the rest of us $50. :rolleyes:
 
100$ or less for a video card is more my budget than a full upgrade. The only thing I could keep out of my current build would be the PC v1000 case.

The monitor was a grad present from my parents.
 
Well you asked for an opinion so I'll give you mine. First let me answer some things you didn't ask.

http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php?card1=550&card2=611#

Both cards have the same amount of shaders, and both run on a 55nm fab process. The 4650 provides OpenGL 2.1 support while the 3850 only provides 2.0. Both provide DX 10.1 hardware support. So what's the primary difference?

The 4650 has half the memory bandwidth. The comparison shows it at 500mhz memory while most models actually have 800mhz so don’t worry.

The 4650 has HALF the power draw of the 3850. It’s 95w for the 3850 and only 48w for the 4650. The 4650 also provides better HD video decoding and I’m assuming internal tweaks in the shaders make them a tad faster. The 4650 has HALF the raster operators, but DOUBLE the texture units of the 3850.

IMO I say go for the 3850 for raw power, but if you are more environmentally conscious i say go for the 4650. Both will suit your needs admirably, BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE

WANT 4670 SPEED FOR LESS THAN THE PRICE OF THE 4650? CHECK OUT http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814103080 (amended http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814103080&Tpk=diamond 4650 )

CLOCKED AT STOCK 4670 SPEEDS FOR OVER $10 LESS. ORDER NOW AND THE DIAMOND 4650 WILL HAVE GDDR3 MEMORY INSTEAD OF THE GIGABYTE'S LAME DDR2!

THAT'S INCREASED SPEED, BETTER HD DECODING, AND LOW POWER CONSUMPTION ALL FOR ONE EASY PAYMENT OF $92.99! CALL NOW!

*Ahem* I still like the 3850 more, but for a good price to performance/future proofing I say go with the Diamond 4650 (clocked at 4670 speeds), if not then get the 3850.
 
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Dude, that was a nice long and informative post but the guy lives in Canada and Newegg doesn't ship up there.
 
novadaemon said:
correct. i was on the canadian newegg site and it switched over to the US HOWEVER, http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814103080&Tpk=diamond 4650

its still CHEAPER and has the same 4670 speeds, I have amended my above post to reflect that. it is not $79.99 its $92.99
Click to expand...

Odd they named it a HD4650 which DDR3 and 750 core clock. Doesn't that make it a HD4670.

Anyways i think the HD4650 (@HD4670 speeds?) is a better buy, since its cheaper and uses less power. Its a tad slower, but with new games I bet your CPU will start to become a problem and the HD4650 will run older games well and todays games ok.
 
I think I'm gonna just scrounge up for a full upgrade. I think I could keep things under 400$ if I buy used. I have a 7300GT PCI-e I could use for a while as well.
 
you could still keep things under $400 if you bought new actually. If you are on a budget then starting off with a dual core system and 2gb of ram is a good way to go. The integrated graphics of the AMD 790GX chipset is the radeon HD 3300 and it will blow the pants off that 7300gt. Here is a quick recomendation for a cheap ultra-budgety dual core setup:

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157162

with the HD 3300 and Built-In 128mb DDR3 memory it wont eat away at your systems RAM. And allows for good framerates in even some newer games.

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227189

2gb of PC 800 if you need decent ram on the cheap, or....

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227362

for 4gb and even higher speed.

For your CPU if you just want dual core get a
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103686

and for triple core goodness shoot for a
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103252&Tpk=8750


for a dual core CPU thats Phenom I based, with 2gb of DDR2-800 memory, and onboard graphics that can handle all your needs and give you an excellent upgrade path, that's a good combo for $189 CAD and you can continue to use your current drives or replace them at a later date.
 
Thanks for the links! I kinda wanted to get away from mATX though. Are there any other similar priced/spec'd ATX mobos?

Edit: Found it
 
IMO, you'd be spending money on an upgrade that won't have an appreciable life in the long-run, it may be more prudent to just save your money and invest in a more modern system with PCI Express.
 
AMD Phenom X3 8750 - 89.99$
Gigabyte GA-MA770-UD3 - 79.99$ after 10$ rebate
Kingston HyperX 2GB PC2-8500 - 39.99$
Corsair CMPSU-400CX 400CX PSU - 59.99$

278.44$ for an entire upgrade (Minus video card, and HDD for now) is waayyy less than I was expecting to spend.

What video card should throw in that order?
 
You would be golden either way, they appear to have about the same power circuitry, and the Gigabyte does appear to have a more robust cooler, with the heat pipes.

I might pay the 10 extra bucks for a little cooler running video card, just both of them will dump heat in the case however.
 
If you don't mind the extra cash, get the xfx. You also get the nice lifetime warrantee, which considering how long you held onto your previous system, might not be a bad thing
 
The 3850 can play most games at 24" with no AA well in my experience (TF2, Cod4, L4D, etc). An XP 2800+ will bottleneck it greatly though.
 
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RobotChild said:
AMD Phenom X3 8750 - 89.99$
Gigabyte GA-MA770-UD3 - 79.99$ after 10$ rebate
Kingston HyperX 2GB PC2-8500 - 39.99$
Corsair CMPSU-400CX 400CX PSU - 59.99$

278.44$ for an entire upgrade (Minus video card, and HDD for now) is waayyy less than I was expecting to spend.

What video card should throw in that order?
Click to expand...
Myself I would recommend that you shell out an extra $12 USD for the Phenom II 550; current reports indicates it has a very high probability (9 to 2) of unlocking to quad.
 
I slightly agree with dorkbert on the 550. The Gigabyte GA-MA770-UD3 is one of the lowest end (but not really low end) motherboards you can buy that support ACC to unlock the cores. Plus 3.1ghz on 2 cores in many cases is going to get you more performance in games than 2.4ghz on 3 cores. Getting an ACC board and then not unlocking would be a shame :-P. As far as video cards is concerned, Gigabyte provides a 3 year warranty most of the time, and MSI usually only provides 1. I would seriously opt for XFX since I've heard so many good things about their service, and IMO thats truly worth the extra cash. Either way you go your processor most likely wont be bottlenecking your card.
 
CruisD64 said:
Since no one has asked, what is your budget? You can probably score a 6800gt or ultra on ebay for pretty cheap.
Click to expand...

lol, an AGP HD3850 is about 3-4x as powerful as a 6800Ultra, just fyi. ;)
 
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