Video Card or processor upgrade?

[wpmegee]

Hi guys,

I'm thinking about upgrading my rig, and I've got about 3 options to choose from:

a) Upgrade video card now, either X800XL, X800Pro, or 6800GT (leaning toward 6800gt)
b) Upgrade motherboard/processor now, get a Venice, Socket 939 AGP board
c) Upgrade everything - DFI Nforce4 board,Venice, and PCI-E video card

If I do a), i'm worried about cpu limiting. If I do b), then can I get high enough HTT clocks to hit 2.7-2.8 with say a MSI or Asus board, and c) seems too rich for my blood - ~$600 instead of closer to $300. If i choose to upgrade my processor and mobo, I've got good ram, so no worries there. I've not been happy at all with my K8VSE and 3200, god i *hate* this motherboard. My video card's feeling the burn in WoW, CS: Source, and Underground 2. Also looking at Battlefield 2 as a video card breaker. Thanks in advance.

[Know Nuttin]

I guess a good question would be how soon would you do upgrade B if you did upgrade A?

If you're fine with how your computer is running in applications and just concerned about gaming, i'd go with option A. However, if you do more real work compared to gaming, Option B may be the one to look for, especially if you intend to overclock high.

Personally, I think you're fine with your current motherboard/CPU in terms of speed, it won't be a huge bottleneck for those cards.

[wpmegee]

I don't do too much real work. Dreamweaver/Frontpage, Photoshop, occasionally some Xvid encoding, and of course stuff with Office 2k. I'm pretty sure I could get 2.7ghz at least with a venice, so would that or an X800XL help me more is the question. Thanks for the reply.

[stang8118]

Honestly i would save up your money and go with C. Your current system should keep up with games now and in the near future, maybe not a max settings but it should play them at good FPS.

PCI-E is going to be the mainstream either this upcoming generation of video cards or the next. I would just upgrade them all now and get a few years out of it, plus less to upgrade later on.

[kiljaden5]

if you eventually will do both, you might actually save money by going C, which is what I am going to do sometime this summer

B specifically will be tough to pull off because the best overclocking mobos are PCI-E, also A, AGP versions of those cards are a bit more expensive..

[Mr.Guvernment]

C is best option.

[qwertyuiop]

If you upgrade the video card you will have to get a new one whenever you do make the move to 939 so that's a reason to wait and go with the last option. Your CPU and motherboard should be able to hold up for a while other than that, so I think you can afford to wait until you can do the last option.

[CeeDeeJay]

Unless you are planning on using your current system for awhile I agree that your best long term bet would be to go with "C"

[winterhavok]

It would all depend on what you are wanting to use the upgrade for (what is more important to you), if its gaming or heavy graphic applications then I would invest into a video card first. If you are noticing that your system has slowed down, overall, then you will want to upgrade the mobo/proc. It will help somewhat in the framerate of the games if you upgraded the speed, but to get the nice pretty pictures and smooth details, the video card is where that comes from.

[Dead__Man]

C is best bet.

if you're going for A, i'd take the X800XL.

B is a near braindead technology way...

[KillrBuckeye]

Your CPU/mobo are just fine. It's very doubtful that you'll be CPU-limited with a new video card. Therefore, I recommend option (a) to improve your gaming experience.

I'm also in a bind, because I recently got this AGP 6800GT which is WAY more than I usually spend on a video card. My system is now CPU-limited so I need to upgrade to an Athlon 64 system. My problem is that I'll need to go with a socket 939 AGP solution, which constrains me much more than a PCI-e solution. Everyone says that it's stupid to buy a socket 939 AGP board at this time, but for some of us budget-conscious people who recently purchased an expensive AGP card it absolutely makes sense, especially for those of us who don't upgrade often. Sure, the AGP boards might not overclock quite as well as the PCI-e boards, but is it really worth spending all that extra money for an extra 200-300 MHz??? To me, it's not. I expect my AGP card to handle games just fine for at least a couple years. Sure, I won't be able to play future games at the highest resolution and quality settings, but by no means will I have poor performance. By the time I'm desparately in need of a new video card, it'll be time for a full upgrade anyway.

[GunnerMan]

Go for C, look in my sig, almost same cpu, and same motherboard. I was going to ditch the cpu and motherboard this month but decided I would wait it out untill I could spend cash on a new PCI-E video card not the same 6800 Ultra. I do hate the board too, the voltage regulating sucksss and no locks so you cant overclock for sht. 2.35 is max I have gotten on the stock V0Link volatges, so I run at 2.2, I am sure my cpu is a serious bottle neck to the rest of the system, so I am kind of in same situation I could buy a new cpu and agp motherboard and ride on that for a while but I decided to wait till Q4 when we see some Nvidia 70 series video cards, thats what got me to stick because reall theres not much games comming out in this year that have my attention besides Bf2 and Vietcong 2, I have a feeling Vietcong 2 wont be to hard on the computer. So I do want to run BF2 on max settings thats about it. I run HL2 and everything else maxed out so you or my proc should not have a problem, if you really want to be able to move some sliders up I would go for something like a 6600GT to hold you over. :cool: