Making the most out of a video card...

[Peck]

Something I've been wondering for a while now... why isn't there a compilation of resolutions, graphics cards, and processor limitations?

Perhaps that's a bit obscure...

A friend of mine recently upgraded his video card on his aging P4 system to a HD4850. He has no intention of upgrading his processor/mb anytime soon so I thought this to be a waste as the processor will (at least I think it will) hold back the video card and he would be better off with a cheaper card that would work on par with his setup since he's no plans to make any other changes to his system. I find that I run into this fairly often when a friend is looking to upgrade and comes to me with questions.

I don't really have the time or patience to compile a list, though I'm sure there is enough info out there to do so from different review/benchmarking sites to make this work. So here I am, admittedly lazy, tossing out this idea in hopes that someone might see this idea with the same merit I do.

Obviously if the owner of a system had plans on upgrading his processor this list might be tossed out... actually... even they may find it useful I'd imagine for choosing the best card for their later expected upgrade.

There may be factors that I haven't considered and some that would just need to be ignored, but the list might be broken down first by resolution then by processor (perhaps by overclocks, too, though this sounds far too time consuming) matched up with the lowest card/s that would just exceed the point where a more powerful card would have little/no benefit.

Just an idea. What do you guys think?

[Aynjell]

Because it varies from game to game. From what I know right now, 9800GTX+ is good for about 1440x900, 1680x1050 on most titles, and the whole GTX 200 range can handle 1680x1050, 1920x1200 without fault.

But that's over generalizing.

[ratbuddy]

Because it varies from game to game. From what I know right now, 9800GTX+ is good for about 1440x900, 1680x1050 on most titles, and the whole GTX 200 range can handle 1680x1050, 1920x1200 without fault.

But that's over generalizing.

He's asking how it relates to CPU though. At any given resolution with any given CPU, there is a point where buying a bigger video card will yield no improvement due to the CPU being unable to feed it fast enough. Of course, that means there is also a point where any given GPU would not perform any better even if the CPU was upgraded.

Where exactly this point lies is generally fuzzy, and indeed depends on the game. I think it's a good idea to do some testing of this sort, but it would be a lot of work.

In that example system, with a P4 and 4850, I would imagine the CPU would be an issue even at resolutions as high as 1680x1050 or 1920x1200. Testing is the only way to know for sure, of course.

[TheGame240]

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/cpu-gpu-upgrade,1928.html

Best I could do. It's kind of old, but you can see how CPU clock can affect frame-rates even with older generation cards.

It's really kind of hard to pick a modern GPU that wouldn't be limited by that CPU. I would look at it like this. You know that whatever game he tries to play, he'll be getting the most FPS possible with that CPU. If he decides that the performance is unacceptable, he'll be able to upgrade without worrying about a new GPU. And with prices the way they are now, it's not like he's out a ton of money and probably did get the best price/performance card available right now.

In situations like that I generally try to be as blunt as possible with them. For instance if someone wants to upgrade an old XP system for gaming and their budget is <$150 I'll basically tell them they can't. If they were on a PCIX P4 system I would convey everything I said above and emphasize that if they aren't willing to accept that they may not be happy with the performance after the upgrade (which will require additional spending to correct) they shouldn't bother. Basically I try to get them to realize that once a system reaches a certain age they're at an "all or nothing" stage where there is no one part that needs upgrading; because every part needs to be replaced.