New card...

[PaulTa]

I just ordered a eVga 7900 KO from newegg, and am going to replace my X800 GTO with it. My question was, what sort of a performance boost in MTW2 should I expect to gain?

The main differences are about 150 core clock speeds, 256 bit interface for memory instead of 128, and around 500 boost on memory clock speeds.

I think that my old X800 GTO only supported shader level 2, and the 7900 obviously supports shader 3.


So what kind of a boost should I expect to see? Any replies will be most appreciated.

Thanks in advance guys,
Paul

[antisocialmunky]

Good card, would have saved up for a GTS.. much better. It'll increase it a good deal, the 7900 KO edition comes out of the factory overclocked and the 7900s can play Oblivion at a good FPS below 1600X1200.

www.anandtech.com for reviews.

[sapi]

You should see an increase, although personally i wouldn't have bought a card until amd/ati brings out its dx10 range.

@antisocialmunky, oblivion isn't a good game to test on as it's heavily cpu dependant

[Skott]

I'm running the game with a E6400, 2Gb RAM, 7600GT KO, and 1280x1024 res with everything is set to high. Runs and looks beautiful too. I imagine the 7900 KO would be an improvement. Nice thing about M2TW is that you dont need a high end video card to play it in all its glory.

[OMGLAZERS]

I'm running the game with a E6400, 2Gb RAM, 7600GT KO, and 1280x1024 res with everything is set to high. Runs and looks beautiful too. I imagine the 7900 KO would be an improvement. Nice thing about M2TW is that you dont need a high end video card to play it in all its glory.

Except for a better video card this is pretty much my setup.

Got it new for myself for a year well done at the Uni.

To give you an idea of how badass it is, i've run R6Vegas, MTW2 and a burner all at the same time and it did fine.

Oblivion runs everything maxed without a flinch. So, you should expect a massive jump. Seriously.

[PaulTa]

Thanks guys.

My current bottleneck is my RAM, which is only at one gig. That will change when I get together enough money for the two gigs of kingston RAM going for 217 USD on newegg.

Then I'll be on the lower end of the high scale.

[PaulTa]

You should see an increase, although personally i wouldn't have bought a card until amd/ati brings out its dx10 range.

@antisocialmunky, oblivion isn't a good game to test on as it's heavily cpu dependant

No way in heaven right now. I've read so many articles about how the latest drivers for Dx10 are crap right now, that it is hardly supported, and the current low end scale of the dx10 cards retails for about four hundred and fifty bucks.

[sapi]

That's not the point - each new genaration of cards brings with it a massive price drop for the last genaration (oh, and the 8800 can smash the 1950 crossfire in dx9 so there's no need to worry about dx10 drivers yet)

[PaulTa]

You are right about that. The significant price drop is why I was able to purchase a 7900 instead of a 7600.

I recommend the eVga 7900 GS to any budget gamer on this board who needs an upgrade. On paper at least, the card looks beautiful. The reviews give it great raves too.

[sapi]

...And i reccomend holding off the upgrade :P

dx10 is the way to go, and its not that far off...

[Barry Fitzgerald]

It makes sense to hold off maybe till the DX10 cards are out...

The unfortunate part here is that you are going to have to have Vista to run it. And that will dent your RAM significantly.

We can but hope more developers go the open GL route....

MS made a bit of a mistake here being honest.

[sapi]

You're misreading the market.

dx10 won't be in use for over a year, so it's not practical to buy a card specifically to run it.

However, the nvidia dx10 series gives fantastic dx9 performance on xp as well as giving some form of dx10 for the future.

You don't have to get vista that quickly (a good thing, because it's going to cost a ton)

And xp doesn't get anywhere near the amount of ram used in computers these days, so vista won't be that bad (after 9 hours uptime playing games/working i've peaked at 75%)

[Barry Fitzgerald]

Well I can only speak from a system builders point of view.

Sure DX 9 wont go away for a long time....

However with the next new batch of cards out soon....it may be wise to hold off...as the 8600GS will likely beat the 7600GT in performance..if history serves correctly.

With regards vista there are issues with DRM, ram use, and well it looks very nice...and has some good stuff...but currently not a great choice for the gamer..you get a 10% performance hit!

Hmmm maybe CA will do a linux version! lol

[antisocialmunky]

I'm waiting for the of R600s. Those things have a good chance of spanking Nvidia.

[katank]

And it shall make X1900 crossfire systems affordable. Yay!