8800GTS or something better for £60 max?

witchy

witchy

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I'm looking to upgrade my GFX card, I currently have an ancient Geforce 6800GT 256mb AGP (new motherboard also).

I was looking at the Geforce 8800GTS 512mb PCIe, I know it's a few years old and is about 2 generations of GFX behind, but reading reviews it's still a shit-hot card and plays anything people throw at it with (IMO) pretty superb frame rates.

A few places have the 8800GTS for under £60 and I'm *very* tempted, but I thought I'd ask some of you more up to date PC gamer type dudes if there is anything out there that is better for the same price.

I'm on a tight budget and £60 really is my max.
 
The 8800 is a good card mate ,ive got 2 9800 gtx cards in my system (dont know why cause i'm not a gamer) but the card you are interested in is just fine
 
Ive got one in mine and runs just about anything you throw at it , with a good clump of ram to back it up you wont have any problems mate. Runs crysis very well and also cod5 runs seamlessly. Plus you can SLI it with another if you ever get some more spare $$$
 
Just get which ever you can find cheapest, but in terms of GPU; 8800GT = 8800GTS = 9800GT = 9800GTX = 9800GTX+ = GTS250. (And yes, they are supposed to be equals signs rather than less than!)

There was a slight clock speed increase from the 8800GTS and 9800GTX+ offered by the die shrink to 55nm, but you can do this yourself via an overclock. The GTS250 offers a 1GB DDR3 version but the 512Mb is exactly the same as the 9800GTX+.

Having had a 512Mb 9800GTX+ (and a 320Mb 8800GTS) I can say you should get at least medium settings out of Crysis at 1680x1050 with 2xAA.
 
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I reckon I've just got a bit of a bargain.

I've just ordered a XFX 8800GT 512MB 'Alpha Dog Edition' GFX card from Dabs for £34.99!

Pre-owned and repaired under warranty, boxed but no accessories.

I've also ordered a Hitachi Deskstar 1TB Sata300

:)
 
Nice.

The 'accessories' you'll be missing are the molex to 6pin adapter, DVI to VGA block (if it's dual DVI), S-video lead and a 9pin mini-DIN to YPbPr breakout lead.

Most modern PSUs have the 6pin connector these days and as you are upgrading the mobo (and presumably CPU) I'd recommend up grading to an '80+' PSU from the likes of corsair, enermax etc.
 
I bought a budget case with a 500w PSU, the thing doesn't have the 6 pin plug :(

I've ordered a molex to 6 pin adapter on eBay for £2 including delivery :)

My setup is now...

AMD X2 7850
XFX Geforce 8200 Mobo
XFX 8800GT 512MB GFX PCIe 2.0
4GB Kingston PC8500 1066Mhz DDR2 Ram (Setup in Dual Channel mode)
1TB Deskstar SataII HDD

Damn site better than what I had last week which as...

AMD 64 3200
MSI K8T Neo Mobo
Geforce 6600GT 128MB AGP
2GB PC3200 400Mhz DDR RAM
2 x 120Gb Maxtor IDE HDD
 
witchy2k1 said:
I bought a budget case with a 500w PSU, the thing doesn't have the 6 pin plug :(

I've ordered a molex to 6 pin adapter on eBay for £2 including delivery :)
Click to expand...
I've several of these lying around, you could have had one gratis (although it would have been more helpful if I'd posted that above).

I'm not a fan of budget PSUs. If you have any stability issues (e.g. random BSODs) I'd look there first.

My setup is now...

AMD X2 7850
XFX Geforce 8200 Mobo
XFX 8800GT 512MB GFX PCIe 2.0
4GB Kingston PC8500 1066Mhz DDR2 Ram (Setup in Dual Channel mode)
1TB Deskstar SataII HDD
Click to expand...
I always post this bit: Remember 4Gb needs a 64bit OS to see all of it.
Damn site better than what I had last week which as...

AMD 64 3200
MSI K8T Neo Mobo
Geforce 6600GT 128MB AGP
2GB PC3200 400Mhz DDR RAM
2 x 120Gb Maxtor IDE HDD
Click to expand...
Indeed it is ;)
 
Seems pretty good setup im thinking of building something similar as i want to start playing games on the pc wheres the best place to get all the stuff is there anywhere better than ebuyer?
 
Just out of curiosity, I can only find this around the £250 mark. Where abouts are you getting these cheap prices mate?
 
devil666x said:
Just out of curiosity, I can only find this around the £250 mark. Where abouts are you getting these cheap prices mate?
Click to expand...

Which card have you been looking for?

As stated above the 8800GT, 8800GTS, 9800GT, 9800GTX+, GTS250 all have the same GPU, the G92/G92b (G92b is the 55nm version in the 9800 and GTS250 cards).

Witchy got his 8800GT refurbed from dabs. And there are a few 9800GT cards about around the £75 mark.

However, unless you find a dirt cheap card like Witchy did, the best option seems to be the 1Gb GTS250 cards. 55nm process means the 9800 and 250 cards should run cooler than the 8800 cards, also the 1Gb GTS250 card had a redesign on the PCB so that it doesn't need as much power (as such it only has one power connector).

Overclockers have an Asus GTS250 512Mb for £85.99 + del: Asus GeForce GTS 250 512MB GDDR3 PCI-Express Graphics Card

Or ebuyer have one from Palit for £87.45 inc del: Palit GTS250 512MB DDR3 DVI VGA HDMI PhysX and Cuda ready PCI-E Graphics Card - Ebuyer

A 1Gb version is £15 more.
 
little_pob said:
Which card have you been looking for?

As stated above the 8800GT, 8800GTS, 9800GT, 9800GTX+, GTS250 all have the same GPU, the G92/G92b (G92b is the 55nm version in the 9800 and GTS250 cards).

Witchy got his 8800GT refurbed from dabs. And there are a few 9800GT cards about around the £75 mark.

However, unless you find a dirt cheap card like Witchy did, the best option seems to be the 1Gb GTS250 cards. 55nm process means the 9800 and 250 cards should run cooler than the 8800 cards, also the 1Gb GTS250 card had a redesign on the PCB so that it doesn't need as much power (as such it only has one power connector).

Overclockers have an Asus GTS250 512Mb for £85.99 + del: Asus GeForce GTS 250 512MB GDDR3 PCI-Express Graphics Card

Or ebuyer have one from Palit for £87.45 inc del: Palit GTS250 512MB DDR3 DVI VGA HDMI PhysX and Cuda ready PCI-E Graphics Card - Ebuyer

A 1Gb version is £15 more.
Click to expand...

Cheers mate. Although I think spending 85 pounds on a graphics card for me would be very silly as the only games I play are the ons in arcade section this site, (and thats the actual truth). I'll keep looking around from time to time for a reduction in price or even a bargain like witchy. Currently im running a 6200 lol although its actually more than i need. on the laptop got the 8400 which aint too bad for video editing.
 
It arrived today :)

It came with all the accesories, 2 VGA<>DVI adapters, Molex to 6 pin adapter, S-video to Composite adapter and standard S-Video lead, some leaflets, a quickstart guide, install CD and manual, so fook knows why DABS said it didn't. :err:

(it even came with the little 'Do Not Disturb' door hanger, lol)

My PC has went from a lovelly quiet little thing to a jet engine, the noise is terrible, lol, I think I'll look for a passive cooling solution as this really is a noisey card.

I'm installing 3DMark06, I'll get a benchmark then start overclocking from there.
 
You might find some software on the cd that throttles back the fan speed.

If looking at aftermarket coolers the Arctic Cooler Accelero AC-S1 and ThermalRight HR-03 Plus are popular for the 8800 cards, though I've not used either.
 
The fan does go a bit radio rental when you first power on but it should slow down and when you get the software installed it controls the fan speed. If its not working speedfan will do the job until you get it sorted. Only time mines goes in to jet engine mode is when its overclocked and running a high end game.
Enjoy !! A very good card
 
The stock heatsink on my CPU is fooking garbage.

The fastest stable OC I've managed so far is 3,100Mhz (stock 2.8Ghz), that's by changing the multiplier from 14 to 15.5 @ 1.45v (probably voltage too high for such a low multiplier?) and leaving the FSB locked at 200Mhz, if I so much as look at the FSB Windows BSOD's :(

Should I drop the speed om my ram from 533mhz to 400Mhz and start increasing the FSB and multiplier, I've got my ram running at 1.8v + 0.3 to give me 2.1v, is this correct for 533/1066Mhz?

It's been yonks since I was into OC'ing, any advice welcome.

Last time I overclocked, I had to fiddle with mobo jumpers ;)
 
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little_pob said:
Most modern PSUs have the 6pin connector these days and as you are upgrading the mobo (and presumably CPU) I'd recommend up grading to an '80+' PSU from the likes of corsair, enermax etc.
Click to expand...

Well.....

I've just blown my brand new 500w PSU that came in the budget case.

I got the PSU replaced this afternoon but I'm sure that this replacement will pop within a day or two as they are cheap shit.

I reckon the 8800 is drawing far too much from it, the PSU bit the dust as I was playing Crysis @ 1280x1024 (shitty monitors highest resolution), 8xAA and everything set to Very High ;)

When this one goes, I'll have about £40 to spend on a PSU, what do you recommend?
 
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On Ebay at the mo;

600W Enermax Noisetaker Surplus stock
£45 incl p&p

Just bought 2. Brilliant deal - cheapest I've seen them is £80-£90.
 
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