Quote:
Originally Posted by sweeper2  |
the main reason for that, is it has 3 times more stream processors as well, which makes up a lot of that performance increase.
also to freesalute, I agree with what Sweeper suggests, think about grabbing one of the 8800GS models, Newegg usually has one or two, that after rebates, is well with in the 8600GTS's price range, with 3 times the stream processors & more than double the performance, its a sweet deal.
the 8800GS & 9600GSO are similar in some specs to the 320MB 8800GTS I
WAS running, & suspect the performance was similar. I moved up from a Geforce 7800GT to that card, the 7800GT was one of the top of the line cards of the 7000 series, of which the 7600GT was part of (upper middle of the lineup, 8600GT replaced 7600GS, 8600GTS replaced 7600GT), the 8600GTS replaced the 7600GT, & performance was on par with it, only benefit to the 8600GTS was DirectX 10 support... & new architecture using the more "universal" Stream Processors design, instead of dedicated shaders/processors for specific functions.
but when I moved from my 7800GT to my 1st 8800GTS, I easily saw at least a 100% if not in some games a decent 150% increase in performance... so to sort of put that into perspective of what one could get with an 8800GS compared to an 8600GTS...
but depending on what your budget is, & how your Power Supply is standing, the deal eagle posted is a nice one as well, even MORE performance, at least a good 30-40% more from that card over the 8800GS. my NEW 8800GTS is one of those cards, different brand, but same GPU Core & Memory. also picked up mine dirt cheap on newegg, as an Open Box Item, that wasn't exactly open box per-say, it was an Opened Box & that was it, still new in bag/package, all accessories, manual, Driver CD, etc, for $129 vs new price of $200+ (no rebates with it either).
its also PCI-E 16x 2.0 & I & eagle both only run PCI-E 16x 1.0/1.1 slots with ours. so the backwards compatible thing is true.
as far as that one card, 8600GTS 512MB having a 256-bit interface? BS, as far as I know ALL 8600GT & GTS models are 128-bit memory... it could be their doing some sort of thing, with 2 instances of 256MB's of memory on 2x 128-bit bus's giving an "effective" 256-bit bus, but its most likely still 128-bit memory bus.
thats how the 8800 series got its insane bus bit rates... in fact if I'm not mistaken same with 8800GS, GTS 320MB/640MB/512MB & 1GB, 8800GTX/Ultra 768MB, etc etc... the insane bus widths exceeding beyond 256 bit is actually several bus's combined as one "effective" bus width... something sort of along the lines of system memory running in dual channel mode, 2x 64-bit memory sticks running together as a single 128-bit chunk of RAM... not exactly same thing, but the principal's/fundamentals are similar...
if I remember right, one company did something similar with the 7600GT's or 6600GT's one time, ran double the amount of what used to be the max amount for the card, & it was more or less a marketing thing to say it had 256bit memory bus, when it didn't really.
but this model could be something different too, just not sure.
as far as which games your running, what resolutions are you running at, that can be a deciding factor too... me personally if I was running fairly high resolutions, & that card truly does have a 256-bit memory interface, I'd go for that one, but if I was running at say 1024x768 or 1280x1024, I'd go for the faster clocked card with 256MB...
but then again, if it was truly me doing this, I'd go for niether, I'd end up grabbing the 8800GS, or opting for a top of the line card from the previous DirectX 9 series cards out there (many can be found now days on certain sites for well under the $100 range, even as low as $60-80
), Radeon X1900/1950 series or a Geforce 7900/7950 series, as their directX 9 performance should be superior to the 8600's. as for DirectX 10, anything that demanding, as far as DirectX 10's "superior" graphics capabilities, the 8600 Series won't handle it well anyways, due to less than desired specs, unless running at relatively low resolutions.
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