Radeon 9700 Pro OR AthlonXP 2600+ which would you choose???

[Caveman2001]

Hey guys,

I am going to get either a Radeon 9700 Pro OR a AthlonXP 2600+ for Christmas.

I can't decide which one to buy. Below is the system it will be on and the parts that will remain depending on which item I'll buy.



motherboard: Asus A7N8X motherboard (nforce2 chipset for those that don't know)

Ram: 512MB of XMS PC3500 C2 ram (2 256mb sticks)

CPU: 1800+ ---------->> If I don't buy the 2600+

Video Card: GF3 Ti 200 ----------->> If I don't buy the Radeon 9700 Pro


I'm trying to figure out what would be the best investment at this time. I'm going to overclock the system, so I know the 2600+ will let me do that nicely. However, the Radeon will kick but even with an 1800+ in the system.

Please vote as to what you think the system

 

[Necrolezbeast]

If you're going to be gaming, which I'm sure you are, you'd see more of an improvement with the 9700...but if that's not important or every game runs fine as it, is the processor will give you a nice improvement. Just depend what is more important to you right now; faster overall system or faster gaming?

 

[Challenger]

Go for the Radeon

 

[Caveman2001]

I was leaning to the Radeon, but I know I can overclock that 2600+.

If I get the CPU I'll still have adequate performance from the Gf3 ti200, it's just that Radeon will be so much better initially.

 

[BlvdKing]

I think you will see the biggest improvement getting the 9700. You will be able to use alot of features on that card that make the Ti 200 crawl.

 

[pillage2001]

Radeon. Going from 1800+ to 2600+ wouldn't be anything huge.

 

[John]

[*]Get the 9700 Pro
[*]Sell your 1800+ and get a Tbred 1800+ instead.

 

[ChampionAtTufshop]

Originally posted by: John
[*]Get the 9700 Pro
[*]Sell your 1800+ and get a Tbred 1800+ instead.

exactly
tbred 1800+ usually overclocks to tbred xp2200+ levels, so go for that

have you overclocked current xp1800+ yet?

 

[Caveman2001]

Yes, I have overclocked my current chip.

It's at 1.65 ghz (basically a 2000+) at the moment.

I'm pretty sure that's all I'm going to get out of it.


This decision is hard because I can't figure out which is the better investment. I know NV30 is only a few months away, but it's hard to tell how much the price will be on the NV30. It would seem that the AthlonXP chips are still going to be around for much longer.

Also, what games are coming out that I really need the Radeon for? I know Doom 3 will be here, but when? What other games next year will need that horsepower?

These questions keep floating in my mind, so it's hard to make a decision.

Any other comments would be helpful.

 

[HappyNic]

So I'm guessing you have around $350 to spend on this upgrade, right?

You should only upgrade your cpu now if you do mostly cpu intensive work like video encoding. if it's just for gaming ,your xp1800 at 2000+ is very good already,, no need to waste money on cpu upgrade yet. What kind of game do you play mostly, if you're into FPS then getting a Geforce 4 ti4200 should be good enough. I'm not sure of the price of a geforce4 videocard so I'm guess around $120?
$350-$120=$230 left

You can just save the $230 left over amount for future system upgrades instead. because you know in 3 months the xp2600+ will be around $150 ( that's almost a 50% price drop) and the Radeon 9700pro will lower to around $250. You don't want to get a videocard for future gamings cause by the time the game is released a better videocard will out. Try to spend under $200 for a videocard.

 

[kimber]

get the 1600+ instead of the 1800+
way more overclockable.
and ofcoarse the 9700pro

 

[PliotronX]

Going either route would give you a slightly unbalanced system, so here's my proposal (sorry, no diamond ring ):

• ATI Radeon 9500 128Meg or 9500 Pro - $160 for 128Meg or $180 for the Pro OEM
• Athlon XP 2400+ - $170
  Sub. - $330 to $350

This would give you a well balanced system that will likely breeze through any game next year including Doom 3. The 2400+ chips have been routinely overclocking to the 2.3GHz range which would give you 2700+ to 2800+ or even 3000+ performance (depending on FSB speed).

The 9500 Pro includes 128Megs of RAM and has all of its pipelines intact so it is merely an underclocked 9700 (bump the speed up and you've got a cheaper 9700). The 9500 64 and 128Meg "amateur" models have half of their pipelines castrated and are also underclocked so they will not be as fast as a 9700 even if overclocked. It's all about choices though, and I like to iron bottlenecks out of systems so that's how I would do it. I voted in the poll for the 9700 Pro though because the GF3 is already maxed out by your current CPU so a 2600+ wouldn't do much good. Good luck in whatever you take

 

[CrazySaint]

9x00/Pro (if you go for the 9500, make sure you get the Pro as the 9500 non-pro basically sucks, otherwise, you might get the 9700 non-pro and OC it to 9700 Pro) + $55 1600 @ 1.8GHz

 

[acid16]

Get the 9500 Pro and maybe a Athlon 2200+ T-Bred. But if you have your heart set on the 2600+, just get a 1700+ t-bred now (they are only like $55) and then buy the 2600+ when it drops in price. I believe the 2600+ is around $300 right now. Give it 3 months and it will easily be cut in half and you'll save $100 and like other said, the 1700+ can easily be overclocked to atleast 2000+.

 

[human2k]

Ill give you $50 for the XP1800 ...................ok?

 

[jaybee]

Go for the 9700 (Pro or not). The 9500 series only has a 128-bit memory interface. Can't recall the benchmarks, but the extra memory bandwidth should help greatly in AA. Don't wait for the NV30 -- I don't think the non-dustbuster version is going to be much faster than the 9700P.

jaybee

 

[mrman3k]

Wait and get a Barton Athlon in a few months. You really won't see a real world difference between an XP1800 and XP2600 in most applications.

 

[eplebnista]

ATI Radeon 9700 Pro

 

[Lonyo]

Bullsh*t you won't see a difference. It may be a synthetic benchmark, but a 5.3% OC on my 1900+ gave a 5.3% improvement in my 3D Mark scores. That means that up to about 40% improvement could be gained with a 2600+. In games, the extra 800MHz (well, equivelant) will provide a fair boost and I'm guessing this is gonna be a partly gaming system, especially as some games are CPU bound. You will see an improvement with the 2600, but I would go for the Radeon, as the 1800 should still allow it to shine a fair bit and boost your games nicely.
I think the 2600 would provide a fairly good boost in games, but not as much as the Radeon will, so go for that.

 

[Caveman2001]

Wow, you guys are making it tougher for me.

Such good points are made about both choices.

I looked around at some benchmarks and basically found out that if I stick with my current video card and get a 2600+ (then overclock it hopeflully to 3000+) I probably will see between 10-20fps gain in gaming. This is due to the fact that the GF3 Ti200 won't scale all that well. If I go for the Radeon 9700 Pro I'll see immediatly a gain of like 30+ FPS for gaming. Obviously from a gaming standpoint the Radeon will be a better performance booster.

I really like the idea of splitting the difference between processor and video card, but I think I'd be better off getting a Ti 4600 than I would be getting a Radeon 9500 Pro. The Ti 4600 is faster by quit a bit and they are within $30-40 of each other at newegg. Here's a look at Tom's benchmarks.

Well, it seems that by the poll results that going with the Radeon is probably a better choice. I was leaning towards that choice in the beginning, and I thank you guys so much for the input. I think I'm going to get the Radeon.

Oh, someone asked what games I play now, and at the moment the only game I play is BF1942 and a little Wolfenstein 3D. I'm totally burnt on CS, and there doesn't seem to be much else around at the moment that tickles my fancy.

Looking foward to Doom 3. Doom was the very first game I played multiplayer on back when we did a direct connect with 28.8 modems. Before that was Wolfenstein 3d off a floppy, but no multiplayer. LOL!

 

[Jen]

as another person said Radeon and 1800+ thoroughbred.




i'm still useing a GF3 Ti200 myself but i dont game.




Jen

 

[BigJ]

Why not go with the 9700 normal card and the Tbred 1800+/1700+? On Newegg, its about $11 more then the Ti4600s (267 opposed to 256), provides better performance normally then the 4600, and provides better AA performance.

 

[Caveman2001]

Why not go with the 9700 normal card and the Tbred 1800+/1700+? On Newegg, its about $11 more then the Ti4600s (267 opposed to 256), provides better performance normally then the 4600, and provides better AA performance.

Well, the performance gain over keeping my current 1800+ Oclocked to 2000+ and getting a Radeon 9700 Pro instead of your scenerio I think would result in more performance. If I take a 1800+ that gets to 2200+ instead of what I get now, that gain isn't really very big and then I'm sacrificing a ton more gaming performance.


Thanks again for all the responses. Based on the feedback it's easy understand why the decision was difficult.

I went ahead and ordered the 9700 Pro.

My decision is based on the below items:

1. I believe the Radeon will retain it's value much longer than the 2600+ (that's good for when I want to upgrade someday again)

2. I won't need to upgrade my video card for another year, probably longer.

3. The prices of CPU's drop at a quicker pace than video cards, based on what I have seen this year. So, in a few months I'll upgrade the CPU anyway.

4. The quality of my game play will improve much more dramatically with the video card than with a CPU upgrade considering I'm already at 2000+.

5. The Poll and responses. Thanks for the input!!

Lastly,

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year Everyone!

 

[CaptnKirk]

Yea! Cheers! Right Decision! The Forum wins in a Cage-DeathMatch!

 

[PliotronX]

Nice choice, man

I recommend if you haven't already done so, download the latest Catalyst 2.5 drivers and use those with your new Radeon (good place to get 'em, excellent resource site especially the forums for Radeon cards). Before unplugging 'er to remove the old card, uninstall the drivers because sometimes traces of Nvidia cards seem to sabotage ATI cards (hmm, wouldn't know why ). Also pick up the Rage3D Tweaker because it's an invaluable program. Have fun d00d