X850xt on a 2500+?

[goob3r]

Lots of great info, thanks!

I still haven't opened the box yet, if you all must know... been tyding the inside of the case a bit all day. From the comments, it seems like my CPU won't be that much of an issue, and I'll look into OCing the Barton to get a bit more juice out of it. So far I have no real need to move on to A64, PCIe, etc... since I haven't played FPS for a few years. FFXI is an MMORPG so it's not the most graphically taxing of games.

As it turns out, my motherboard may be slightly wonky so a full upgrade MAY be the better choice at this point. Originally I thought it was my CPU or video card.

I bought it from Futureshop, Canadian retailer, and they have hassle free returns, so returning it won't be an issue if I do decide to play with the new card a bit to help make up my mind...

Decisions, decisions.

 

[Killrose]

Here is a good article by FS that shows A64 CPU scaling with 7800GTX and 6800GT in various game apps at settings normally used by a gammer. A Barton 2500+@stock speed (although not represented in this article) would definately limmit these cards in several of these games and needs to be overclocked at least to a level comparable to the A64 3000+ whicjh would probably be close to 2.2+gig.

Of couse we are discussing an ATi card here but it no doubt would be somewhat of an indication of an app benifitting CPU as opposed to GPU power. But It does show that many of us with a good overclocked Barton could hold out probably longer than we may think >>> me

LINK

 

[VIAN]

At tomshardware.com, it shows, in the CPU charts, that a 2500+ would be capable of showing about 60fps in DoomIII without a GPU limitation. Meaning, the 2500+ could possibly last you another year or so before it starts killing your game.