Upgrade from a g4 ti 4400 or wait?

[DeadSmiley]

What about an ATI 9600 PRO? You should be able to pick one up from Ebay reasonable. I know you want an nVidia solution, but the ATI's are hard to beat compared to what's available in your price range from nVidia.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=80184&item=5167681268&rd=1

Heck, here is even a 9700 Pro that is currently going for under $100 with shipping.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=40158&item=5166831310&rd=1
If you get one of these, beware of the ones labeled "PAL" as I don't think they work in the US. Can anyone confirm this?

Just for grins, I looked for a 9800 Pro and came up with this one for around $60, shipped. Of course the pice always goes up in the last 2 minutes of the auction...
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=40158&item=5170012533&rd=1
There are several more in that price range.

If you aren't comfortable with the Ebay route you can always pick up a new MSI 9600 PRO from Newegg for $106 including shipping.
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-127-152&depa=0

Note that the only ATI card I have ever owned is in my Dell server (ATI Rage 8MB AGP). I don't think you can go wrong with the 9600/9700/9800 Pro's as they are proven cards.

 

[SunRedRX7]

What exactly is the pci-express too that I see with the 6600

pci-express is the new slot to replace AGP slots for graphics cards.
Google

Since you have a Ti4400 thats AGP based, you can only upgrade to another AGP card, unless you replace your motherboard to one that supports PCI-express.

My recomendation would be to save that money till you can get a Geforce 6600GT thats agp based.

 

[PingSpike]

I'm in the same boat as you with my ti4600. There really isn't anything for $100 that'll give you a worthwhile increase. a 9600pro would bump IQ but wouldn't give you any more speed really. And the fx cards just aren't a good buy, especially when compared against the gf4ti cards which were great for their time.

My advice is to save your dollars for a 6600gt (~$170?) or look at a 9800pro 256bit 128mb. Those are both decent cards for the money and you'll actually see an improvement for your money.

But I'd consider a new cpu if the money is burning a hole in your pocket. 2400+ isn't bad, but I saw a signifigant improvement in most of my games when I went from a ~2100+ tbred to a ~3200+ barton. Its hard to justify spending more money on socket A right now with the A64s out though.

 

[RyanJohn2.7t]

Another in the boat here with a ti4400 (winfast). I've been fighting with either staying AGP and doing the 6800 for $240 deal in the deals forum, or waiting and going PCI-E.

One thing to consider - if you have any friends who want a pretty good card for really cheap you may be able to get a few $ for the ti that you can put towards the new card. Seems a lot of ppl like having a spare comp around, and the ti still seems playable to me in hl2 with settings turned down.

ryan

 

[LmpPns]

Larva offers good advice. I've owned an overclocked Ti-4200 and a Gainward FX5900 with the Gigabyte 5950 BIOS. It wasn't that huge of an improvement. In some older games I could knock up the resolution a notch and what not. Most of the cards' power was being pushed by my 3.4GHz Northwood at the time. If you have $100 I would spend it this way:
1. Look on eBay for a pre-modded 9500 to 9700 Pro. (I think they go for around $~60 USD, by a seller with decent feedback of course.. even then, though...
2. Look for a used 9700/9800 for $100, although last time I looked they were still going over $100 with the usual ridiculous ~$15 S&H fee.
3. Get a 9800 SE "C3" (Powercolor) with the 256bit memory bus, which can utilize a software mod that forces the use of 4 pixel pipelines on the core, turning it into a 9800 Pro. If you do this make sure you get a C3 model with appropriate clock settings that are comparable to a 9800 Pro. Powercolor has some other models out with slower clock speeds.
4. Save your money.

I would probably consider the first three options a bit too risky and unsatisfactory, and I would probably go with #4. There just isn't a whole lot you can upgrade to with $100.