PCI-E or AGP?

[MuseOD]

Hi. I'm a 15 year old buying his first PC. I can't stand this 750mhz and geforce 3 clunker. I have Counter-Strike: Source on lowest settings, and get 9 fps in fire fights. I get banned for a -20 score.


I desperately need a new computer. I'm going to have it be medium-high end. Not mega high end, that's what my dad did, and look where it is now. He could not afford to keep it up. I will with my set up. But My set up is not done. I've heard about these PCI-E cards, and did research on them. PCI-E By theory, can have twice the speeds of a AGP card, but all the benchmarks show its SLOWER than the AGP's.


So, my question is, should I get a $540 x800-XT PCI-E or a $470 x800-xt AGP? The current FPS benchmarks are only 10 fps slower, max, with the AGP winning. But with the new technology, I heard PCI-E cards can blow the crap out of AGP cards with proper optimizing. Now for games that do it.

I'll also post a question on 939 pin AMD Athlon 64 3500's vr the 3400. Same benchmarks, but people say it can be taken control and have much better performance, in the other forums....z.

AGP Setup: $1370
PCI-E w/939pin: $1450-$1550

I'm not going with the x700 or x600, because I want to run the Source engine at max settings. I plan to be a modder, i need to be able to see what the good cards get. I also want to make sure I can easy upgrade and keep the same performance ratio. I might get the AMD Athlon 4000 down the line.

EDIT: Yeah, the x800 xt is high end, but it's the only high ended thing in the configuation. That's for you, Dashui <3

 

[imported_Bleh]

PCI-E isnt twice as fast as AGP it has twice the bandwith of AGP. If your going to upgrade your whole setup (motherboard, cpu, etc) go with PCI-E because it will replace AGP as the standard in a couple of years.

 

[mechwarrior1989]

There really is little difference between the speed of AGP x8 and PCI-E x16. It has twice the bandwidth but it really doesn't do much performance wise. By the way the PCI-E cards are being pushed now, you can expect AGP cards to stop being made sometime in the near future. But if you can get some good AGP cards right now so if you can live with one AGP card with maybe another one a little down the line before you get a new comp you should be fine with AGP. Not sure if that made any sense.