GPU and Router suggestions

[captain_twinkie]

So within the next little bit I should be able to upgrade my 9800 GT to something better. Right now my price range is Between $150-$175, I have always been a nVidia fan, but have no problem going to ATI if its the better deal. This is the card I am considering going to.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814127506

I am also wanting to ditch my Netgear 100 MB router and upgrade to at least Gigabit speeds, I am not too super concerned about going to Wireless N or anything. Mainly concerned about the Gigabit speeds, I have a media server setup and want to increase my transfer speeds when uploading movies to it. I live in a condo where all the rooms are wired and I have my Netgear wireless router hooked up to it and it is handling everything.

Any suggestions or input would be very helpful.

[Thenior]

We don't use gigabit routers here @ work (everything is handled via the DNS and a Sonicwall firewall, plus a couple gigabit switches). But in the past, I have had VERY good results with EngGenius products. They have good support, and amazing range - especially if you crank up the settings. I ran a wireless router on their highest setting for around 1.5 years, and it never died once. The only reason it's not still running is my boss' wife confused the router with a broken router and threw it away

Here is a good EnGenius: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... -_-Product

[Krom]

Forget the GTX 465, it is frequently slower than the 460/1 GB cards and draw a boatload more power since they are a cut down 480 chips where as the 460 is a whole new chip with way lower power requirements. A 560 would be even better but unfortunately they are too expensive.

I have one of these myself: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814125333

A good place to look up the specs on routers is here: http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/componen ... temid,189/
Note that within the next couple of years there will be routers that will be able to handle gigabit WAN connections, let alone gigabit LAN switching. If I were you I would look for something that is certified to work with IPv6 native because it will become necessary with the depletion of IPv4 likely to start causing problems within the next year.

[snoopy]

I've been looking into the 560ti, but it sounds like it's out of your price range.

My take on it, at this point: I've traditionally stayed in the $150 range for video cards, and I find that I'm feeling the desire for an upgrade more often that I'd really like. This time, I think I'm going to splurge a bit more, and hope to get better life out of the card.

[Krom]

I've been looking into the 560ti, but it sounds like it's out of your price range.

My take on it, at this point: I've traditionally stayed in the $150 range for video cards, and I find that I'm feeling the desire for an upgrade more often that I'd really like. This time, I think I'm going to splurge a bit more, and hope to get better life out of the card.

The $250 bracket is usually the most active/competitive slot and generally gets you the best longevity/price ratio. For instance my 8800 GT that I pre-ordered before they even shipped originally is still a workable card at high/max detail in most games (assuming 1280x1024 resolution anyway, higher resolutions obviously need more power). I finally gave it up for the 460, but now I'm severely CPU limited and that is not a cheap fix for me. The reason I like the 460/1 GB is it is ~85% as fast as the 560 for $100 less so it really gets you just about to the mark without breaking the bank. The 560 will probably do everything at max and a high resolution for the next 18 months, but the 460 is barely any different for now.

[snoopy]

I'll probably be sitting on it for the next 4-5 months before I'm really ready to buy, so we'll see what happens in that span of time.

BTW, how do you tell if you are GPU or CPU limited? As far as I can tell, my Phenom 960 still handles pretty much everything that I throw at it like a champ, but that's based on it not having all four cores maxed really ever, so I might have programs waiting on it that don't properly use all of the cores.

(not to hijack the thread)

[Krom]

If you change screen resolution to much higher or much lower and see no difference in framerate ---> CPU limit.

[Freakster]

I run D3, and I currently have the Intel Chipset Family thing that comes default with the Dell Inspiron laptops as my GPU, and I'm able to run full settings no issue.

As for router? I got a Linksys E3000 wireless, it works wonders for me. Especially when I port-forward my games.

The router: http://homestore.cisco.com/en-us/Router ... ewprod.htm

[AceCombat]

i will vouch for Kroms Suggestion of a 460 1GB, i took his advice and im extremely happy with that!


http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130566


is the closest to the one i have available... REMEMBER!! EE IS BETTER!!

[snoopy]

I just bought a:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814121420

Who knows if it's better or worse then Ace's

[AceCombat]

mine has a tad bit higher Mem, Shader and Core Clocks then that one


here is mine which is no longer avail....


http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130581

[Ferno]

well, since just about everyone and their dog is throwing wireless into their routers, you can't go wrong with the asus line of GbE routers. sure it has wireless N with it, but who doesn't these days?

As for the vid, I'm with the majority here. GTX 460 Fermi. The one i'm running is the Gigabyte 460 1GB SE. It's been running everything I throw at it with ease. Crysis 2 can be cranked up to maximum and no discernable drops in FPS. Starcraft2? yep. D3 (uh, you're joking, right?), Fallout New Veg, Mirror's Edge and Prototype. Even Resident Evil 5 runs great on it. Of course, I have a i5 760 @ 4.1GHz powering it, but it just shows how well this card is doing.

[Krom]

Just so you know, the 460 SE is a weird cut down part:
The regular 1 GB 460 has 336 shader cores and 32 ROPs
The regular 768 MB has 336 shader cores and 24 ROPs
The 460 SE has 288 shader cores and 32 ROPs.

So the 460 SE comes up short on shader power compared to the generic 460 / 1 GB, and the 768 MB 460 comes up short on memory bandwidth compared to both (because it has fewer ROPs).

[Thenior]

Of course, I have a i5 760 @ 4.1GHz powering it, but it just shows how well this card is doing.

Is that a typo, or serious overclocking?

[Krom]

It isn't that uncommon to get i7 chips over 4 GHz, actually I've seen reports of people closing in on 5 GHz stable with them.

[Ferno]

Of course, I have a i5 760 @ 4.1GHz powering it, but it just shows how well this card is doing.

Is that a typo, or serious overclocking?

all at 1.3v, and i haven't even hit the wall yet.

[Thenior]

I'll have to look into that - I just got an i7 950.

[captain_twinkie]

This is the card I decided on.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814127551

And this is the router I decided on.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6833168050

And got myself a second monitor so I can finally go dual screens.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6824009212

[Thenior]

just remember, if you're not quite getting the range you want out of the EnGenius router, if you log into the settings, you can usually crank up the radio power. They recommend not putting it on the highest, but it worked great for me.

[captain_twinkie]

Thenior,

Thanks for the heads up, luckily I don't need much range on the router, I mainly needed it for the Gigabit speeds, but just from what I have read, I like all the settings you can do on it, looking forward to it when it gets here.

[snoopy]

Nice.

I just put in my new GPU last night, and got a marked performance increase.