graphics card question

Fri Feb 29, 2008 1:48 pm

now that 8800gt's are much more affordable i'm probably gonna be getting one pretty soon. the regular ones have the core clock of 600MHz and the other one that i was looking at from the same company is 650MHz and costs $20 more. i was just wondering whether it's worth it or is overclocking the regular one easy to do so i can save $20. i probably won't even need to overclock but it's always nice to save a bit of money.
edit: if i've read stuff correctly, the way they overclock is by raising the voltage...so do the overclocked versions come with the voltage already raised and that's pretty much all that it is?

Fri Feb 29, 2008 9:59 pm

What your paying for is an over clock that will have a warranty and is known to be stable. Most times over clocking will void the warrant (but how will they really know). Keep in mind that a decent over clock is not easy to do and can take a week or more to get it completely stable. And over clocking always has the chance of reducing the life a the hardware. I would save your 20 bucks b/c I doubt it will make that much of a difference anyway. You may end up with maybe 1-5 extra FPS.

Sat Mar 01, 2008 11:34 am

Dude, it's $20 bucks. If it were $50 then I'd agree with Namu, but I have the superclocked one from evga and I remember when reading the info as it came out it does a lot better than 1-5 fps. I love mine.

The main reason the extra $20 is worth it is from the extra performance (the extra fps can make your card last half a year longer the next time you need to upgrade), but for the added protection of a warranty that's good too. Although most research shows warranties on electronics are almost unneeded because most items fail within the first 60 days, it's good to have (although I am sure everyone has an exception to that rule).

Sun Mar 02, 2008 1:28 pm

Sorry Namu I agree with Damnidge on this one. I am looking at the 8800GT and I think I will be getting a factory overclock because then i do not have to mess with it and it is still under warrenty, and the extra performance is worth it. The specs I been looking at show the superclocks outperforming GTX's in some benchies.

Sun Mar 02, 2008 2:57 pm

so, looks like i'll be getting the superclocked. i was just wondering whether it would be an easy thing to overclock the regular 600MHz but it sounds like it'd be less trouble to just buy one that is already overclocked. kthx for the input. now if only they'd hurry it up with the q9450....

Mon Mar 03, 2008 3:59 am

I have to say for $20 with warranty I cant see a reason not too. Ok it may only add a few frames extra but id say its worth the money incase theres more to be squeezed out.

Mon Mar 24, 2008 11:25 pm

8800gt!!!
wheee! i finally bought an 8800gt! and also, i just bought an x3350 quad core xeon. they're basically the same thing as the Q9450 but they say they're for servers or whatever. anyway. that cost me $333 at some website i've never heard of. it was like $360-something but someone gave out a coupon code so that was like $30 off woohoo! watch, i'll get an email tomorrow saying they're on back order. i wouldn't be surprised but earlier today it said they were out of stock so i will punch them in the face if they say they don't have any again. thought i'd be paying more than that for the CPU so that was special.

Tue Mar 25, 2008 9:58 am

noxiousCaitSith wrote:8800gt!!!
wheee! i finally bought an 8800gt! and also, i just bought an x3350 quad core xeon. they're basically the same thing as the Q9450 but they say they're for servers or whatever. anyway. that cost me $333 at some website i've never heard of. it was like $360-something but someone gave out a coupon code so that was like $30 off woohoo! watch, i'll get an email tomorrow saying they're on back order. i wouldn't be surprised but earlier today it said they were out of stock so i will punch them in the face if they say they don't have any again. thought i'd be paying more than that for the CPU so that was special.

I'm waiting for the Q9450. The Q9300 is about equivalent to the Q6600 but with lower power and heat. The Q9450 is going to be one mean processor.

I know you already purchased your card but did you consider getting the 8800 GTS (G92)? It's about the same price as the 8800 GT

EVGA 8800 GTS (G92)

Plus this one from Newegg comes with Crysis. So you can "cry" when your newly built system still can't play the game on all high settings and high resolution. It's the same price as your card if you add the mail in rebate as well.

The 8800 GTS (G92) has been getting some very good reviews. Matching the 8800 GTX and Ultra in almost every category except in very high resolutions where the 8800 GTX/Ultra have a much higher memory bus.

I don't think you can beat the price/performance ratio with this card now. The prices have fallen tremendously over the last couple of weeks. Probably in anticipation of the 9800 GX2 and finally some competition from AMD/ATi.

A Q9450 and a 8800 GTS (G92) should hold you over until Intel releases Nehalem. that's when you really want to spend some cash on a truly righteous machine. That and NVidia's eventual G92 update for the GTX and Ultra lines.

I should have just been addicted to drugs rather than gaming. It's sort of the same thing.

Tue Mar 25, 2008 12:30 pm

Im in the market to change my graphics card to an 8800. I have right now a 8600 gt 512mb grphics card. Now my question would be is it worth it getting the 1gb 8800 or would the 512mb 8800 be good enough.

Tue Mar 25, 2008 12:31 pm

I can't really think of a reason why you would want to upgrade...