Okay so my motherboard died a few weeks ago and new parts have been ordered (its time for an upgrade). So i order a ASRock 775Dual-880Pro, which not only has an AGP 4/8x slot, but a 16x PCI-E slot. Kind of weird. Its a socket 775 board, support for Dual-core and Core duo processors alike. I get to ordering a video card and i pick the cheapest option (something until i can afford a DX10 card) The card is a Geforce 6200 (PCI-E). The one i have now is a Geforce FX 5700 Ultra (AGP). The question I'm asking is which one is better? I mean the 5700 delivers twice the memory bandwidth, has a 128 bit memory interface (hence twice the memory bandwidth) but doesn't support shader model 3, or OpenGL 2 like the 6200 does.(opengl2 is important to me for PSX emulation and the such) I've been looking for a sort of benchmark comparing the two but theres quite an age gap between the two cards so I don't think I'll get anywhere from looking. If anyone knows which card would perform better in general or in a more specific way, i'd like to know which would be better for a little gaming. Something like CS: source perhaps. If anyone can find a benchmark or present some kind of documentation, you'll have my thanks I could always resell one of the cards or trade it away to a friend for something of equal value so the 50 USD I spent on it doesn't bother me too much.
I think the 5700U will proberbly have better performance in games. Also about the motherboard your getting, the PCI-E slot is only 4X, i belive to run DX10 cards you MUST have a X16 PCI-E slot, this applys to cards like the 8800GTS and GTX, so when you upgrade your Graphics card, your going to have to upgrade your Motherboard too. I notice some say its a PCI 16X slot, but it appears like it actually is a 4X. Yea i just looked on another forum, this guy has emailed Asrock and got this reply: "Dear Sir, Sorry! 775Dual-880Pro does not support 8800GTX. BR, ASRock" Sure the motherboard will run your 5700U or 6200 whiever you concider to get, but for DX10 cards in the future, your motherboard is not going to cut it, if posible i would highly reccommend cancelling the mobo order, buy a mobo with a PCI-E slot and get a PCI-E 6200. Maybe even concider a cheap 7300?
Thanks for the reply willz, the order has already been placed, so i don't want to cancel it. I've also thought after i do a benchmark of both cards when they arrive, i'll just place the 6200 in my dads computer since he could fit it (if the 5700 is faster, maybe just because). My little sister and i like to play dungeon siege via network, so that would work out. As for the motherboard only supporting 4x, thats a real shame. I guess i'll just replace it with something more appropriate when the time comes for me to purchase a DX10 card (the cards should be more diverse by then so i'll have a better selection to choose from) Everything i play now runs just fine with the 5700U i have right now, so the faster processor and more ram are good enough for me for now. ... all i wanted to do was play CS source when my mobo fried to start this whole charade anyways. Money wont be as big an issue later on, so i think i'll be fine by then. Thanks for the input also, and for letting me know that boards is PCI-E 4x only. I dont think i would have caught on to that until it arrived :-\ [all of the parts were ordered as one, and will be shipped as one package, so i dont want to cancel because all i want to do is play CS: source... its forever it seems since my mobo fried, i'm beyond not caring anymore] A further correction, I've just found this: QUOTE: "I bought this as a cheap way of upgrading to Socket 775. It has an 8X AGP slot, which is handy if you want to keep your old graphics card. It has a pair of DDR slots and a pair of DDRII slots (only one type at once). The PCI-E slot is 4X, as far as I can tell. There is a 775DUAL-880PRO version with 16x. It overclocks easily. No onboard graphics. Onboard sound decent. Manual not bad. Tight fit in case – have to remove memory to fit DVD cables. Tip: enable LAN in BIOS, then disable in Windows (XP boots up much quicker)."
I think though, when you want to buy a DX10 card, you may want to upgrade the motherboard anyway, i think there are disadvantages of a mobo with PCI-E and AGP on one board, something due to PCI-E using something that is to do with AGP, allthough i aint sure on this, someone else might know.
