Should I stay or upgrade?

[Jimmah]

I'm interested in getting this XFX Geforce 6200 and watercooling it (9500's WC'd already), but is it a worthwhile upgrade? Also, can I softmod it to a 6600? I'm very interested in ugrading lately, I need to get DC final running at near perfect quality (I play in a clan, I need quality for accuracy) thus I have upgraded most everything, overclocking most as well.

Should I sell the 9500 Pro and opt for this little gem, or shy away and get something else?

Thanks for the help, whomever renders it.

 

[SrGuapo]

I have heard that the 6200s are pretty easy softmodders and great OCers. That is just heresay though, so it may be better to hear from some people who have actually done it...

 

[dug777]

i'd aim a little higher if you can, or ideally wait a while, especially since the new nvidia cards are just around the corner.

 

[blckgrffn]

Wait...or get a 9800 Pro and WC it. It will perform better and can be had for less.

Nat

 

[RussianSensation]

I'd be looking at 6600GT at least at this point. 9800Pro will put you 3 generations behind 1 month from today (and same generation as 9500Pro). 6200 will softmod to 6600 speeds but thats still slow.

 

[nemesismk2]

Originally posted by: Jimmah
I'm interested in getting this XFX Geforce 6200 and watercooling it (9500's WC'd already), but is it a worthwhile upgrade? Also, can I softmod it to a 6600? I'm very interested in ugrading lately, I need to get DC final running at near perfect quality (I play in a clan, I need quality for accuracy) thus I have upgraded most everything, overclocking most as well.

Should I sell the 9500 Pro and opt for this little gem, or shy away and get something else?

Thanks for the help, whomever renders it.

The 9500 Pro is a good video card and imo you would be wasting your money if you replaced it with a 6200. I would wait to see what new video cards nvidia is going to release next month, if you can't wait then a 6600 gt would be a very good upgrade for you.

 

[blckgrffn]

Well, the 9800 Pro might be old, but what does the 6600GT have that the 9800 Pro doesn't besides shader 3.0 (which sucks performance wise)? Less bandwidth than the 9800Pro, purevideo is a wash as with cat 5.6 you can do the same thing with any dx9 ATI card, anything else? Both are 8 pipe cards, and if you can get a 9800 pro up to 450-ish on the core, no 6200 or 6600 will be able to touch it, and a 6600GT will be better in some cases and worse in others.

The way I see it, if you want a midrange AGP card right now, a 9800 Pro or 6800 is the way to go, if you want PCIe then by all means get the 6600GT.

The reason that I would get the 6800 over the 6600GT is that the 6800 at stock is about 5% faster if I remember Anands benches right, and has the the strong possiblity of an awesome oc or a nice likelyhood of unlocking to full 16 pipes and thus blowing the 6600GT out of the water.

Anyway, if you want a shot in the arm, especially for an older game like DC, a 9800 Pro under water will do very nicely. Or go for a 6800, that would really rock

 

[selfbuilt]

Ahh ... at stock speeds a 9500pro would be faster than a 6200 (except maybe Doom3, where they both suck . O/c, I'd still expect it to be the better performer.

If you check out this X-bit review, you'll see the R9500pro typically matches (or beats) the regular 6600, except at highest res or with max AA/AF (at which point neither card is playable on current games). I don't see why you'd want to go for what is frankly more of a downgrade.

 

[RussianSensation]

Order this card when it is back in stock - 6800NU $165

 

[Leper Messiah]

lol. def. a downgrade. Have you unlocked the extra pipes in your 9500? I would say a 9800np or pro would be your best bet, 450/400 is pretty easy with an Arctic silencer, with water, 500/400 would be a safe bet. A 9800 at 500/400 would destroy a 6600gt.

 

[blckgrffn]

That's what I was tryin' to say

 

[narcotic]

anything less than a 6600GT or maybe a 9800pro will be a waste of money, since you notice hardly any difference.
I would personaly go with 6600GT, since its the best bang for the buck. 9800pro is ok, but its old, and as new cards features are used more, the 9800pro will suffer.

 

[blckgrffn]

That is where I would disagree, I think that the $127 9800 Pro offers the best bang for the buck. At least $30 cheaper than the 6600GT, under water it will definitely offer basically the same performance due to its greater mem bandwidth, the downfall of the 6600GT in my opinion.

Nat

 

[Leper Messiah]

Originally posted by: blckgrffn
That is where I would disagree, I think that the $127 9800 Pro offers the best bang for the buck. At least $30 cheaper than the 6600GT, under water it will definitely offer basically the same performance due to its greater mem bandwidth, the downfall of the 6600GT in my opinion.

Nat

for real. Running AA and AF with a 128bit data bus very hard. SM 3.0 is pretty much a non-issue, this card is not going to last for more than a year or so.

 

[blckgrffn]

Well, lets look at some fun memory bandwidth comparisons between the two:

6600GT 1ghz mem = 1000 * 16 bytes = 16 GB\s
9800 Pro 340 (680 DDR) Mhz mem = 680 * 32 = 21.76 GB\s

That is a pretty large difference, and although most of us have experienced that fill rate increases are better than bandwidth increases, this amount will be noticeable. The divide stays about the same OC'ed.

6600GT 1.15ghz mem = 1.15 * 16 bytes = 18.4 GB\s
9800 Pro 400 (800 DDR) Mhz mem = 800 * 32 = 25.6 GB\s

This increased bandwidth makes light AA/AF possible in the newer games, DC looks much better with this stuff enabled!

What about fill rate? Well, that is even easier to look at:

6600GT 500 Mhz Core = 500*8 = 4 Gigapixels - giga or mega? I guess it doesn't matter much, I'll just continue with mega, the numbers are what matter...
9800 Pro 380 = 380*8 = 3.04 Gigapixles

This is important for actually drawing the tanks, people etc, and in my experience the 9800 Pro @ stock was good enough for DC. Since you have water and all, lets oc these guys then!

6600GT 600 Mhz Core = 600*8 = 4800 gigapixels - this would be a really good OC on this type of card in my experience
9800Pro 475 Mhz Core = 475*8 = 3800 gigapixels - Under water this could be possible, I don't know.

What you have in this situation is nearly the fill rate of the 6600GT with much more bandwidth. DC will fly on the 9800 Pro and you get at least 2xAA/8xAF, which you may or may not get on the 6600GT. In all reality either of these cards are fine choice. Let us know what you decide on!

Nat

 

[Jimmah]

Wow, I go to bed for the afternoon and bam! 14 replies! Thanks everyone!

I'm still trying to decide on which card to buy, as it seems no one recomends the 6200, be it unlocked or not, so I will shy away from its lack of glory. My 9500 Pro will not unlock, as its the 'I' shaped memory one, but will OC to 330/300 (its very very very hot in here, something like 32 degree C + humidity) but still cannot keep up.

I think the pro's of the 6600gt outweigh the pro's of the 9800, cept in the price aspect. Both would do rather well, I'm only worried about the 9800 playing BF2 well, even though I doubt my hardware will be acceptabe anyways.


So, anyone have an idea where I can get either a cheap 9800 Pro or a 6600GT?

 

[Fardringle]

I've been looking at upgrading into a similar price range (9800 Pro or 6600GT) and the best prices I've found so far from reliable sources are:

Sapphire Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB - $122 shipped at Monarch
http://www.monarchcomputer.com/Merchant...=PROD&Store_Code=M&Product_Code=190675

and

eVGA GeForce 6600GT 128MB - $153 shipped (after $15 rebate) at NewEgg
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814130220

 

[andy nowotny]

Surely 6200, if you are lucky, you can modify it to 6600

 

[PG]

Originally posted by: andy nowotny
Surely 6200, if you are lucky, you can modify it to 6600

You would have to be very, very, lucky. The latest A4 core 6200/6600/6600GT cards don't softmod at all. Nvidia put a stop to that and there are some 6200 chips that now don't have all 8 piplines in the first place so there isn't anything to mod on them at all.