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"Once More Someone Asks..."

...does anyone have any suggestions for a suitable graphics card upgrade?

My system is;

2.6GHZ Intel P4 with HT
512MB RAMM @ 400mhz
Creative Soundblaster Live 5.1 Digital
80GB HD
ATI RADEON 9800 AGP card
19" LCD Flat Panel

The system is less than a year old and at the time it only cost £80 to upgrade it to the Radeon 9800 instead of onboard...I did wonder at the time why the only retail version of the card had PRO on the end of them, but I figured it would be a similar card. Big mistake, but because until recently I've only played older games like Raven Shield and Delta Force Blackhawk Down I haven't had a problem. Then Battlefield Vietnam and UT2004,along with Far Cry ,coupled with the mention of the Radeon 9800SE card in PCFormat and PC Gamer, exposed the card for the steaming pile of excrement it is...

Yup, my Radeon 9800 is an SE, or more aptly, crap and, with a core speed of 324 and a memory clock speed of 290, little better than the sub £50 cards in the Special Reserve Catalogue.

So I'm in search of a new card because I figure that, with the above system, my card is really holiding me back, right? Bit more memory would be nice but right now I'd wager the only thing holding me back from the high settings on most modern and future games is this silly Radeon card.

I'm looking to spend a max of £150-£200

I'm tempted to go to Nvidia for the first time in years (every PC I have had or card I have bought has been ATI but after this, and the fact most new games seem to be built around this Nvidia "Way it's meant to be played" thing).

Any suggestions? I'm guessing the best deals are online but I really want a boxed retail card. The XFX GEFORCE FX 5900 XT in SR at 149.99 looks good....is it?

And before anyone suggests this, I've scanned through pages and pages of guides and read magazine reviews of cards but there are so many to choose from :(

I like my Dell too, and I'll like it even more when I decide to properly O/C my Graphics Card.

I paid £1128 for:

P4 2.8GHz with HT (800FSB)
Free upgrade from 60Gb to 120Gb HD
Free upgrade from 256Mb to 512Mb DDR 400MHz (Since then upgraded to 768Mb)
Floppy Drive
48x CDRW drive
16X DVD drive
15" Ultrasharp TFT (Should have got 17" :()
128Mb Radeon 9800
Sound Blaster Audigy 2
Altec Lansing speakers


Not bad really, not bad at all. And I bought it at the time where I got the free upgrade on HD and Memory, and 3 years service for free. Also, my Dad works at Barclays, so we got it cheaper through his work.

Notorious Biggles wrote:
> For future reference, don't buy a Dell.

I would - pretty good value for money and the most trouble free PC I have ever had - not one single problem at all - as it turns out the cheap graphics card upgrade has paid dividends because I now have close to a Radeon 9800 Pro performance for nowhere near like the price.

When I bought it I used an offer in Pcformat to save £100 on the price, there was free delivery offer, double memory offer, extra 20GB of HD, and 10% off for students, and a free printer - and delivered in less than a week (ordered Sunday evening, received Thursday morning). I think I paid £1140 for:

P4 2.6GHZ with HT
DVD Drive
CD Writer driver
Floppy (I still use them)
56K Modem (useful for backup, like now)
512MB RAM @ 400MHZ
Radeon 9800
Creative Soundblaster 5.1 Live
19 inch LCD Flat Panel Digital monitor (I used to have 14 inch CRT....)
5.1 Speaker set
Cordless Logitech keyboard/mouse
Windows XP Home Edition (with original disc so you can reinstall)
Norton Antivirus with 2 years of free upgrades + sundry other software

Don't have a clue what the motherboard is except it's an intel branded one by the looks of it - it's easy to use 'cause there are no screws - it's all clips - even the case opens with two push things, and inside, again, it's the neatest PC I've seen.

They aren't that bad.. better computers than alot of other companies altough there might be a few things you need to do yourself like I did it's not that hard to rectify it.

For future reference, don't buy a Dell.

The green clip is easy to removed... the problem i had is that the soundcard was right against the Video card in PCI slot 1 so I could hardly hear the fan so I moved it to PCI 3.
The case is crappy though..

And...it works...

405 clock rate
337 memory

Ran 3DMark 2003 Demo 10 times last night with these settings and all is stable - I now score 5956 compared to my previous 5036 - very good for the £10 it cost me I think!

Fitting the cooler was not too bad, worst thing was that DELL had secured the card onto the motherboard with a funny clip which took some releasing. The fan/heatsink was on with thermal paste and that came off easily, the old paste easily wiped away, applying the new paste was simple and overall the whole thing was nowhere near as bad as the instructions looked.

A swith on the back of the card lets you switch fan speed - at high speed it is quieter than the standard fan, at low it's like stealth.

Finally decided. Went to PC World Derby this morning and noticed a new section (haven't looked around the store for ages - usually just go and get what I want and go) and I found they now have a "components" section, all mod stuff like SR sells (and similar prices too...) and amongst the stuff were the Revision 3 Arctic Cooling VGA Silencer's, for £9.99. Even better there was another guy there looking at cases and I got talking to him and he told me how he'd fitted one himself and it sounds like it's not as bad as the instructions makeout, so I'm trying it tonight after tea. Also bought a LED Cathode light for the outercase - a USB connection as well - for £8.97 - which I thought was cheap.

I'll post later how I get on, of course if I don't post then I've probably destroyed the card!

Just flash the Non-pro card with the pro bios.

Although i would only do that if you were completely comfortable with the procedure.

To be honest Stranger In Paradise I wouldnt bother upgrading. Get a GPU cooler like the one Cookie Monster suggested below and do a little overclock. I have a XP2800, 1024mb RAM running on the standard 333fsb and a 9800 Pro and get about 5700 on 3Dmark 03. Havent got it installed so dont know what it is with these drivers. Far Cry runs well on mine, can do 1280x960 with everything on high.

Far Cry has had some problems, people who have XP3200, 1024mb DDR400 and a 9800 XT get worst performance than I do.

The overclock speeds you did were nearly at 9800 Pro, as that runs at 380 core and 340(680) memory, so your not far off. With a better cooling system on the card you probably could overclock it to a 9800 Pro. I would suggest waiting until the next gen cards come out and then pick up one of those.

I thought it was an SE Cookie Monster, until a few days ago I thought the only versions of the 9800 were PRO and SE, but apparently there is this 9800 Non-pro as well - which, judging from the clock and core speeds, is what I have.

Still can't decide what to do.

The Geforce FX5900XT has a core speed of 400 and memory clock of 350, and 128MB RAM @400MHZ, and 8 of these pipeline things, and it's 256bit, so surely it will be better than my current card which has a core of 324 and memory clock of 290?

I managed to get Radclocker to run the card at core 370 and memory 324 and it remained stable long enough to get 3dMark2003 demo to run, and I'd jumped from around 5040 to close to 5800 - unfortunately the card was unstable at these speeds in the Far Cry demo - gradually more and more artifacts were thrown up until it was unplayable. I'm also guessing that adding additional cooling would make it more stable but, after looking at the instructions for one of those arctic coolers I just know I'll end up messing the whole card up...

BTW Anyone know what actual brand DABS Value is on the Dabs site?? They have a Dabsvalue version of the FX5900XT for just under £130 but no information on it.