x1950pro or x1950xt or x1900xt or other

synbios

Weaksauce
Joined
Oct 6, 2005
Messages
102
Well, Im still on the lookout for card to upgrade from my x800gto for gaming.
The x800gto is still amazing but some game are noticably on the crawl.

I had the opportunity to use an x1800xt which was fantastic but I RMA'd it due to some artifacting.

I was hoping to get some advice on which of the following is best:

x1950pro (512mb) - this is at a decent price ~ US$230/£115

X1950xt (256mb) - around US$290/£145

X1900xt (256mb) - around US$280/£140

Mostly used for gaming on
Oblivion
C&C3
Company of Heroes
FPShooters

I know the xt is better than the pro but how much better and can the price be justified? Reason is at X1950xt price I could slap on another US$60/£30 and it's really into 8800gts 320mb teritory (They're around US$380£190 here in UK). I'd like to spend as little as possible but also would like to have a card that'll last for a couple of years.
Shame they didn't have any more X1800xt's - the price was fantastic @ US$120/£60.
 
If I were you, I'd wait until the R600 lineup and the new Nvidia mid-range cards show up. Even if you don't get them, they'll bring the current cards' prices way down. Prices for the ATi cards are horrible right now and don't reflect on their performance.
 
When will the R600 be out? I thought it was within the 1st Quarter of this year, but looks like it's been pushed back again. I also read elsewhere the current GPU prices will hold their value within the first 6 months of when the R600 is released, at most a 10%-15% fall in prices.

On another note, it seems AMD and Intel are reducing prices of their CPUs at up to 40% to pave the way for Quad core CPUs in a couple of months or so.
 
When will the R600 be out? I thought it was within the 1st Quarter of this year, but looks like it's been pushed back again. I also read elsewhere the current GPU prices will hold their value within the first 6 months of when the R600 is released, at most a 10%-15% fall in prices.

On another note, it seems AMD and Intel are reducing prices of their CPUs at up to 40% to pave the way for Quad core CPUs in a couple of months or so.

The prices will come down by a bit but I believe it's worth the wait.
 
i'm searching the forums and there are some great prices on the radeon 19xx right now.
but yeah, these guys are right, on April 17 when nvidia launches 8600s, then prices might fall in the days after.
 
Yeah, Im holding out at the moment. Seems the next month or so the 8600s and R600 will hit the shops. Not sure how much of an effect they will have on the current range, but the more I read about the 8800GTs Im very tempted to whip out the card :rolleyes:

Mind you if I see a good buy on the X1800Xt or X1900 series then I think I'll go for that (My CPU will be a bottleneck I reckon - upgraded recently from 3200 to 3700).
 
Yeah, Im holding out at the moment. Seems the next month or so the 8600s and R600 will hit the shops. Not sure how much of an effect they will have on the current range, but the more I read about the 8800GTs Im very tempted to whip out the card :rolleyes:

Mind you if I see a good buy on the X1800Xt or X1900 series then I think I'll go for that (My CPU will be a bottleneck I reckon - upgraded recently from 3200 to 3700).

I'm running an 8800GTS 640 on a 3700+ and they play together quite while although there probably is some bottleneck. I'd grab one right now if I were you.
 
As much as I'd like to upgrade my GPU, if it's the 8800gts I think I'll hold out for a month or two as there should be some big shifts in the Graphics market from what I can see (as long as Nvidia and ATI release their long awaited lines)

The 8800GTS is pretty expensive here in the UK. The cheapest GTS 320mb is around £190 (US$375 - I think almost the price of an 8800GTS 640mb..
 
x1950pro (512mb) - this is at a decent price ~ US$230/£115
X1950xt (256mb) - around US$290/£145
X1900xt (256mb) - around US$280/£140

Mostly used for gaming on
Oblivion
C&C3
Company of Heroes
FPShooters

Well, 'Company of Heroes' benefits a bit from a 512mb card, but I doubt its enough to matter. Most games are designed to "work" on 128mb cards, with 256mb the ideal target...as that's what the market reflects. Very, VERY few benefit much from 512mb.

That said, I had an X1950Pro-256mb and tried 'Oblivion' with Qarl's Texture Pack 3. It was COMPLETELY unplayable. Looked gorgeous, but was a freaking slideshow. Sold it and bought a X1950Pro-512mb (single-slot system, so this was the fastest card money can buy that allows HDR+FSAA at the moment), which handled QTP3 just fine. So, if you know you really ARE going to use 512mb (mostly unlikely), then the X1950Pro is the better buy.

Otherwise, for that price point, the X1950XT-256mb is really the best buy by a very long shot.

However, that said, we are about to get a bunch more cards dropped on us from nVidia I'm interested in (again, single-slot limitation, and must have HDR+FSAA), and ATI's next gen to be released over the summer, so...things to consider.
 
Well, 'Company of Heroes' benefits a bit from a 512mb card, but I doubt its enough to matter. Most games are designed to "work" on 128mb cards, with 256mb the ideal target...as that's what the market reflects. Very, VERY few benefit much from 512mb.

That said, I had an X1950Pro-256mb and tried 'Oblivion' with Qarl's Texture Pack 3. It was COMPLETELY unplayable. Looked gorgeous, but was a freaking slideshow. Sold it and bought a X1950Pro-512mb (single-slot system, so this was the fastest card money can buy that allows HDR+FSAA at the moment), which handled QTP3 just fine. So, if you know you really ARE going to use 512mb (mostly unlikely), then the X1950Pro is the better buy.

Otherwise, for that price point, the X1950XT-256mb is really the best buy by a very long shot.

However, that said, we are about to get a bunch more cards dropped on us from nVidia I'm interested in (again, single-slot limitation, and must have HDR+FSAA), and ATI's next gen to be released over the summer, so...things to consider.

Running Oblivion at full settings (HDR, 16x Anistropic filtering, 16xQ FSAA, etc. Very beautiful looking at a decent FPS rate...) on one 8800GTS 640 with an athlon 3700+. I am not however running QTP.
 
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