Upgrading my graphics card.

[Spawn_Retard]

So yesterday i popped down my local computer shop for a new head set and began chatting to the sales assistant about my new computer that i bought recently.

He assured me that he could have got the pc for cheaper, which i know is true, since the shop i went to is known for building any spec computer for a fairly cheap price

I bought this new computer PC-WORLD, which i know is an over priced company, but i had unlimited money to spend on this computer, and at the time i didn't want to be to cheeky and buy everything possible, so i settled for something high quality only.

I got myself a quad core with a nvidia 9800 gtx graphics card.

Now don't get me wrong, its a brilliant graphics card, especially since my last PC had a built in graphics card that struggled to play spring.

Anyway, i knew this sales assistant personally anyway, but i'm not trust of computer sales men anyway they are slippery people. He offered to go through all his contacts because he was shocked at how poor my graphics card was. He then went on to tell me about upgrading my card.


So after a while, he quoted me for NVIDIA Geforce GTX 280 for £330 with free fitting and a years warranty.

Now i know you can get graphics cards cheaper on-line, but i don't want to void the warranty already on my computer from PC World to not open it ect. but appearntly because the shop is microsoft licenced they can do it and it will not void my warranty with PC World. Now if i asked PC-World to install it, it would cost between £40-£50 so anything i can get online cheaper would end up just about the same price.


TL;DR

Should i upgrade my Nvidia 9800 gtx to a NVIDIA Geforce GTX 280 for £330?

Also, for any of you who want to check out graphics card power check this out --> http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/charts/ga ... s,795.html




COMPARING MY NVIDIA 9800 GTX to NVIDIA Geforce GTX 280 ----> http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/charts/ga ... d[2065]=on

[smoth]

not sure what they are going for. I have one and I like it. That thing is fucking huge like a foot.

[Spawn_Retard]

I edited my post smoth so you can see the diffrence.

[smoth]

links are borked.

[Spawn_Retard]

try now, i hate this fourm sometimes

[smoth]

300eu might be a bit much link is my card

[Spawn_Retard]

NOTE: like i said in my original post, if i buy from the net, i void my warranty if i do it myself, and its up to PC-World if they will fit it, and if they do, they slap on £50

Also, i dont use euros Smoth, sterling is stronger. Not a lot stronger at this time, but still.

[smoth]

oh so it is a warranty thing.

well to be honest I am not sure. If you have a lot of money I would say to a striped raid or solid state for speed and go ahead and sli a pair of whatever.

[Wisse]

Wow, those cards are bout 15 times stronger than my. Does spring look 15 times nicer?

You could sell me ur rig in few years Spawn_Retard.

[Spawn_Retard]

my budget is about £400 maximum. Im out of work, and that's from my savings .

[Wisse]

Why are you upgrading anyway? I couldn't spot any reason for upgrade in ur posts.

[Spawn_Retard]

Wow, those cards are bout 15 times stronger than my. Does spring look 15 times nicer?

You could sell me ur rig in few years Spawn_Retard.

Spring with high water rez made me drool a bit, because its on par, if not more with supcom.

I get 150 fps in a average game if i host.


This new card should have a inbuilt physics engine in it, so it takes a load off my quad. That's what i was told anywaaaaaaaaaay.

If i play Crysis at the moment, i can only play it on high for a few hours before it gets too hot and starts lagging and the graphics start to go.

I'd like to be able to get a graphics card that will last me for atleast a few years and will run any new gen games on very high without them burning out.

[Wisse]

This new card should have a inbuilt physics engine in it, so it takes a load off my quad. That's what i was told anywaaaaaaaaaay.

LOL
You still need game (+drivers) to support that and even than it won't help your FPS because you just stuck some more shit down ur bottleneck.

I'd like to be able to get a graphics card that will last me for atleast a few years and will run any new gen games on very high without them burning out.

Maybe it's because I'm poor (at least compared to you), but I can't see any reasonable logic in buying fastest card in it's generation. If I bought that back than, I would end up saying ur card is 13x faster than my altho I would spend 2x more than I did. Do you see my point?

Ur card overheats because hardware became crap. How the fuck can they make rig that only works few hours? Wtf. How would you like Ferrari that only does 100km at full throttle?
If your current card vents into box you need to do something with box. If it uses rear exhaust than you need to speed up it's fan. I'm not sure if it's possible tho. Maybe with some software hacks.

[imbaczek]

i'd swap it while it works, but i've become somewhat of an ati fanboy recently. i'd go for a 4870 (no idea what it costs in pounds, though).

[BaNa]

Sadly if it's a prebuilt PC then modifying the cooling systems will also void the warranty.

In any other case I would have advised on getting an aftermarket cooler for your current GPU and getting more case cooling.

If your out of a job currently you might want to think about a purchase with such little returns (atm the only return would be being able to play crysis on high for >5 hours, how often does that happen?) and a higher upkeep cost - the tests ive been seeing about these new gpus and their energy needs, meh. I've seen cards that eat more power on idle than my whole pc with monitor speakers and everything together.

Then again, your money, your choice. I'm sure you will have fun with whichever card you go for...


(edit: I've recently been looking into a system upgrade and checked out the GPU front and what held me back was the power needed for these monsters... I no longer play 24/7 but my pc is on a LOT and I cannot justify adding ~100EU to my yearly electricity bill for moar pixels in like 1/100th of my pc time)

[BigSteve]

LOL you deserve a kick in the nuts for even considering this Spawn



I mean no offence though.

I like people to be blunt with me too when I have stupid ideas, like dropping 400 quid of my savings for a few extra frames per second when I'm unemployed.

[Spawn_Retard]

I have a pretty rich family and i'm only between jobs due to the economy being like it is.

I have a massive case for my computer at the moment, because i wanted to make sure it does not over heat. 2intake fans and 2 output fans.

I'm using a program called SpeedFan, which can tell you your fan speed, cpu gpu and other hard ware temps. You can also check the power usage ect.

You can config the fans to run at any speed to make customise how you want the fans to react to a certain thing your doing.

I have yet to fiddle with anything but clear up the actual app so i can see clearly what's what. I didn't know using this would void my warranty?(If this is what you meant)

I know the drivers would have to be installed also, and i think its generally a waste, because at the moment my quad could probably play a lot of stuff without my gpu its that powerful .

I need a kick in the nuts?

Also, i'd be selling this card if any of you are interested, thats IF im selling it.

The more i think about it, the more i feel like i should wait until this card gets a little cheaper.

Standalone this new card is powerful, i may just SLI the card i have now, because that seems to be quite powerful also.



EDIT: from reading posts, i was quoted a ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 for about half the price of this Nvidia, but i'm a strong believer in buying what's compatible, and ATI has a history of being fail with some games. That's why i have a PC with vista, rather than linux or Mac.

[Gota]

Sounds like the only thing that would be MORE useless ,for you to buy, is a golden A.K .

[imbaczek]

re ati: read this http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3501

[Sabutai]

even rich people get caught by the economic crisis. save your money cuz the few more fps arent worth it.