MiST

I'm looking to upgrade my old Radeon 9600 to a 150$ price-range AGP card, because I'm not ready to make the step to PCIe yet. The review of the 7600GS really put it above Radeon's cards of the similar price range. However, there are many versions of that card, and I don't know how to differentiate between them.

1. A lot of cards seem to come in both 256 and 512 MB versions, does that mean the 512 MB is twice as fast? Or is the extra memory not add that much performance if the pixel pipelines or such are the same? In other words, what should I look for that determines the performance? Which is most important: pixel pipelines, amount of memory, or clock speed etc. Is it worth paying more for a 512 over a 256?

2. I'm not sure if my stock Dell powersupply can handle a video card that requires a direct connection to it. But I don't even know the wattage of my PSU right now, and I'm not sure how to figure out. I tried finding it in SSandra, but I couldn't find any information on PSU. I have no clue about rails and volts and the like @@. How do you get information on the powersupply? And how can I tell if I need a new one?

Mac Daddy

On the first question video ram is very fast and not quite sure on double the speed but quite a sizeable increase in performance. The more viddy ram you have the more that can virtually mapped if your into gaming and allow smoother transistion from screen too screen. In your price range I would say going 512MB would be well worth it !!

On the second question you have a Dell you also have a Service Tag number should be on the left side or back panel of your case. Go onto the Dell site using your service tag and you will find out more info. In my case it gave me model numbers which I could google for and find out the two rigs I have here the mobos were actually made by ASUS

Good luck and feedback ..... Welcome to NGOHQ nice to see you posting we are here too help

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IModIntel

yes indeed there are many good Nvidia choises in that price range.

but i've decided to boycott nvidia a long time ago...

Unixlord

That must have been around the same time I boycotted Intel.

Nvidia make the best Linux drivers out of all the them. ]

If you're going to try paying more for a 512MB 7600gs forget it. Just get the 7600GT and overclock it a tiny bit. Take it from someone that actually has one.

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MiST

The 7600GT actually looks like it costs more. The 7600GS seems to be about 150$ for 512 MB, and the 7600GT looks like it's near $200 for 256 MB. Also, I have no experience overclocking, but I'm thinking of trying with the next card I have. The videocard I have right now is old, bad even for its time, and it runs HOT. I'm afraid of trying with it.

I looked up my powersupply and it's a pathetic 250W pile of refuse, so I guess that will need an upgrade to at least 400W.

I'm almost tempted to get a new my motherboard while I'm at it, because I'm getting new RAM anyways, and PCI express would be nice. But I doubt that it would make much difference to me, because I'm not planning on paying more than 200$ for a videocard or RAM. I guess it'd be wisest just to stick with AGP, from the looks of it these cards are far beyond what I really need, and by the time I upgrade again an even newer protocol will probably replace PCIe.

I have never been an Nvidia fan either, but product loyalty in as volatile a market as video cards is crazy to say the least, and I figure I'd give it a try so I could have experience with both.

kYdizzle

there is alot more difference to the video card than just the amount of ram. on the 7600GS the ram is DDR2, while the 7600GT had GDDR3, which is alot faster.
the 7600GS runs at 400/800(or 540), which is very slow.
the speed of the core and ram are faster on the 7600GT at 560/1400 Mhz respectively.

you can compare and learn more about the differences between the two and others in this WIKI i found http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compari...ocessing_Units
the two cards are about 3/4 down the article

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fjutrackx

my GF 7900GS costs 200 euro (1 euro ~ 1.3 dollar)
256MB ddr3 ram... i took this card because if was not too expansive, and i want a x2800xtx later... otherwiise i had bought a x1950xtx

i think you can better take an upgade to a pci-e card
i had an ati 9600pro 256MB, later i did an upgrade to a ati x1300 256mb
that card is better than my 9600pro
BUT my cpu was a bottleneck...
i had a P4 s478 2.8GHz @ 3.2GHz, 1GB ddr 333
mainbord was a asus P4P800-E deluxe with a intel 865 chipset

buy yourself a cheap pc, (amd64 processor) and an pci-e card...
otherways you can upgrade and upgrade without any result

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