Radeon 9800 Pro or nVidia FX5900XT

[Vitalix]

Since many of you here have both types of cards, which would you recommend that I get. My choices are between the Radeon 9800 Pro and the nVidia FX5900 XT. The nVidia is supposed to overclock well enough to run with the 9800 Pro, but I'd rather not risk overclocking heat and reduced lifespan if the 9800 is a better product stock. I've read that the 9800XT is just a stock overclocked 9800 Pro. Whether that's true or not, I don't really know. It looks like the price differnce between the 5900XT and 9800Pro is about $45.

I got about $225 to spend, and those are really the only 2 cards that seem worth it for the $$. The system I will be putting in will be a dual xeon 2.4 workstation with an AGP slot. I've read alot about PCIe, but I think it will be a good year before the memory and bus bottlenecks are worked out to notice a significant difference from AGP and the new 4GB/s throughput.

Most of the games I play are like Halo, Neverwinter nights, and Deus Ex. I'm not a big first person shooter guy, don't play much of Unreal or Doom. The reason for the duallie is b/c I have an FTP and web server running in the background, and I noticed that some of my games can get choppy if I get hit with a couple requests while playing.

Should I stick to one of these cards, or is there something on the horizon from one of these companies that would make it worthwhile to wait?

Which card would you guys pick for the $225? Has anyone here had any problems running games or had problems with video cards and Xeons?

Thanks in advance

[Overclocker550]

the 9800 pro will eat any fx5900 alive, youd not match a stock 9800 pro with even a highly overclocked fx. however seeing you are bottlenecking it with 2.4GHz of cpu and you dont run the latest games, would you care to save lots of $$$$$$ and get a cheaper, slightly slower card?

[glock19owner]

Get the 9800 Pro...Just went from Nivida to a 9800 Pro...you wont be sorry :D...

PCIe will call for a new motherboard...so instead of just upgrading to a PCIe VC, you will also have to update to a PCIe supported motherboard...

[Vitalix]

Originally posted by Overclocker550
the 9800 pro will eat any fx5900 alive, youd not match a stock 9800 pro with even a highly overclocked fx. however seeing you are bottlenecking it with 2.4GHz of cpu and you dont run the latest games, would you care to save lots of $$$$$$ and get a cheaper, slightly slower card?

From what I've read (from a game point of view at least) is that the processor is only about 10% of the equation. The graphics card does the bulk of the work and memory/bus comprise what's left. Would there be a sginificant difference in gaming from a 2.4Xeon to a 3.2P4?
What are some cards you might recommend, and is there a noticeable dropoff in performance for the games I generally play with a cheaper card? My thinking is the 9800Pro would last me a while until DX11 or whatever other versions in the future come out, whereas if I get something cheaper, I'm not sure if it might play those types of games in a year or 2.

[devilscow22]

i would get, actually i did get this 9800 pro it would be MUCH better than that FX

you can get a saphire radeon 9800Pro 128mb from www.newegg.com for 210 OEM oem will come with everything exept manual(dont really need it just ask here if u need help) the box and some old games that are worthless

linky http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-102-268&depa=0

also has free shipping :)

[tongtong]

9800 pro, way better

[Jognt]

Go for the radeon card, though your CPU will indeed be the bottleneck then, ive got a 2.4ghz p4 and ingames i can notice that im gettin low FPS because of the CPU (i know this because i know the games' engine ;))
Originally posted by Vitalix


From what I've read (from a game point of view at least) is that the processor is only about 10% of the equation. The graphics card does the bulk of the work and memory/bus comprise what's left. Would there be a sginificant difference in gaming from a 2.4Xeon to a 3.2P4?

every game engine handles it all in a different way, my favourite engine (the UT tech engine) counts on the CPU a lot more than some other games out there, so yes, gaming would be A LOT smoother on a 3.2P4...

[Overclocker550]

id try to get a faster cpu first. also like I said if you dont game much, why not grab a cheaper card? see my sig

[Vitalix]

Originally posted by Overclocker550
id try to get a faster cpu first. also like I said if you dont game much, why not grab a cheaper card? see my sig

Actually, the card I have now is a Ti4200. I have no complaints about it, done me great for 1.5 years, but on DeusEx (the new one) and NWN (with lots of characters on the screen), it can get choppy. My current rig is a 2.0P4(533). My friend has a 2.2P4(533) and a Radeon 9700Pro, and it doesn't hiccup at all!
The reason I am sticking with the dual 2.4/1MB/533 Xeons is because they were FREE(!) and I can run my sql/web/ftp stuff on one PC without having a second PC running. Permits me to get a nice graphix card.
I'd love to have a separate gaming machine, but unfortunately, the funding gods have not been in my court of late.
Is a Xeon (or 2) overclockable?

[skinnychicken]

Actually, the card I have now is a Ti4200. I have no complaints about it, done me great for 1.5 years

I'm going to have to jump on the bandwagon and recommend the 9800 pro. I had a Ti4200 that served me well for almost two years! That's a long time in computer terms! But now it's time for a change, so I got a 9800 pro from Newegg. I'm fairly happy with it, games run smoothly and everything seems 'crisper' than my Ti4200.

But who knows what the future holds. In 6 months Nvidia may have the 'card to buy'.

Just buy what will make you happy.:)
You can always change you mind later.