Buying new PCI-E kit

Well, I'm upgrading my PC to PCI-E, and I could do with some guidance on what gfx card to go for.

Kit I've decided on so far is:
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Athlon64 3200 "Venice"
Abit AX8 S939 PCI-E K8T890
420W Tagan Whisper aPFC UltraQuiet 21db 12v
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The gfx card I've got my eye on is a Sapphire X850XT for only £280 at scan.co.uk, but this seems cheap compared even to some X800Pro's by other makes (ie. not Sapphire), let alone other X850XT's which are in the £320+ mark.

So I'm here to ask if anyone knows if this is a good card, or has it got lower clockspeeds than a normal X850XT? I dont know much about Sapphire you see...

Also, am I better off with this card than a 6800GT? That's the other card I've been looking at, and is about £20 cheaper.

Any comments welcome cause I'm having a hard time making up my mind

Also if the other kit I've decided on is... well, crap, please say

Cheers

EDIT: Found a PowerColor X850XT PE for the same price This Week Only at overclockers.co.uk! I'm extremely tempted to snatch one while I can... good buy?

That is a good card, and sapphire is a good company to. You should be happy with it. That sounds like a good price since it is so much cheaper then the other x850xt's. That powercolor one woulod also be a good buy. It's really just your preference of company they are both good.

As for the 6800gt it is pretty equal to the x850xt. I think it scores a little lower in most benchmarks, but either card would be great.

Saphire and Powercolor are both decent, definitely stick with the x850xt, 6800GT is nice but doesn't compare to the x850xt...i've owned both and a 6800U as well

why did you chose that mobo?

Thx for replies.

I cant really remember why i chose that mobo. It seemed to have all the features I need, and I wanted something no-to-pricey cause the total was adding up fast (over £500 now for all the bits, and thats just the bits im replacing, no hdd's, case etc).

Why do you ask, is it a bad choice?

And I based on what you've said I think I'll put in a quick order on the PowerColor to make sure I get it at that attractive price =P

the brand is fine, but the chipset... its a Via, though they are not as bad these days i'd still recommend an NF4-Ultra chipset mobo

bobmanfoo said:

the brand is fine, but the chipset... its a Via, though they are not as bad these days i'd still recommend an NF4-Ultra chipset mobo

Click to expand...

Yes i agree 100%, NF4 is the way forward!

Ah, ok, this is didn't know (first time AMD'er).

In that case I'll change it to an "Abit AN8 NForce4" for an extra £15. Thanks for the info =)

look at the specs again and make sure the standard nf4 chipset is what you need, nf4-ultra supports sataII and has some other features

i've used one regular nf4 board, msi neo4-f, it works fine but doesn't OC worth crap, i'd get the ultra's just to be safe, dfi nf4-u or msi neo4 plat would be my first and second choice or maybe the asus baord

I love Abit and I think they are a fine company and its a fine board.
Nice setup and good luck.

I choose to build my pc's for stability first, performance second. It seems you went the other way around. I start with a very solid power supply and a nice motherboard, then add other parts to price.