Looking to upgrade from 8800gt 512mb ?

D

Davie_UCF

Here since 2001, Trainz!!
Hey,

I'm curious as to the options for graphics cards at the moment.
Trainz performs reasonably well in DX, getting 40fps in places.. yet in Opengl I get 10fps (was fine the other day, somethings a miss.. wonder if its my card).

Ive been pondering a new card for a few months now and I think its time to take a more serious look and get suggestions.

So here are my current specs.

Windows 7 32bit
4gb ram (3gb usable of course)
nvidia 8800gts 640mb
Quad core 4x 3.1ghz (overclocked from 2.6ghz)
PSU 500w (I think, i'll check later).


I think i'll stick with Nvidia, thats my only major criteria, apart from the obvious fact it has to be a noticably better improvement over previous card.

I look foward to your help!
David

Edit Note the bold bits, I got it wrong in the subject, I'm a fool !
 
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I bought the Palit version of the Nvidia 1GB GTX460 and its lovely - very cool , quiet and powerful. Do a price search on Amazon, got mine for £150.
 
I was looking at that too. Dabs have it for 149ish, overclocked version. I'm so tempted just to buy it... Its my student overdraft though :hehe: Aaaah temptation.

Glad to see it must be worth it! :)
 
The Palit is £147.98 Ebuyer, I couldn't justify that so ended up with a GTS 450 which is well up to the job.
Just check that whatever you are getting from wherever has the correct connectors or an adapter with it if you need a VGA output. It appears that they are dropping that connector off on most of the 400 series.
 
clam1952 said:
The Palit is £147.98 Ebuyer, I couldn't justify that so ended up with a GTS 450 which is well up to the job.
Just check that whatever you are getting from wherever has the correct connectors or an adapter with it if you need a VGA output. It appears that they are dropping that connector off on most of the 400 series.
Click to expand...

I'm all DVI here! So shouldn't have a problem.
I guess I could get a lower card but I want it to be worth upgrading so might aswell get something better. I'm sure theres a lot higher than the gtx460 aswell!

I've got 700w psu it seems, so should be fine I think.
 
Just wondering.. what is the opinion of ATI these days? I remember I had an ATI back in trainz 1.3 days and I replaced it with a nvidia because it caused me nothing but trouble..
 
O/glide is recommended for use with n/videa cards, I tried dx but got fuzzy distant images but better fps.
My card is a 9600 GSO which runs at 768mb memory+580 mhz core which I dont think is that much different to yours, frame rates are 30+. That was with xp, I've just gone to win7 ultimate 64 bit and the frame rates are similar but the draw time is much faster, by a lot.
Before you get a new card I'd be looking at your drivers and settings, you should be able to get similar results to me using o/g.
If you go to ATI make sure you remove all traces of nvids drivers.
 
fran1 said:
O/glide is recommended for use with n/videa cards, I tried dx but got fuzzy distant images but better fps.
My card is a 9600 GSO which runs at 768mb memory+580 mhz core which I dont think is that much different to yours, frame rates are 30+. That was with xp, I've just gone to win7 ultimate 64 bit and the frame rates are similar but the draw time is much faster, by a lot.
Before you get a new card I'd be looking at your drivers and settings, you should be able to get similar results to me using o/g.
If you go to ATI make sure you remove all traces of nvids drivers.
Click to expand...

I've checked settings and drivers a few times.. Still no change, it suddenly changed to extremely bad framerates yet DirectX is fine and great FPS.. So confusing. I'm just sticking to DX I guess and prob getting a new card in the new year as i've been after one a while anyway.
 
Quote
" Still no change, it suddenly changed to extremely bad framerates".
You dont recall if you updated your drivers about that time, if so go back.
 
fran1 said:
Quote
" Still no change, it suddenly changed to extremely bad framerates".
You dont recall if you updated your drivers about that time, if so go back.
Click to expand...

Well I changed them after.. twice. Used driver cleaner also and tried some older drivers.
I deffinately didn't change them between it working fine and then strangely slowing.
 
Have you checked the cooling vanes/fan for dust, that can cause gpu to slow down but not suddenly.
When you get your new gpu make sure the PSU has the output to run it.
 
Davie_UCF said:
I was looking at that too. Dabs have it for 149ish, overclocked version. I'm so tempted just to buy it... Its my student overdraft though :hehe: Aaaah temptation.

Glad to see it must be worth it! :)
Click to expand...

You don't need the OC version for Trainz. I found the same version I have on Google shopping for £126.
BTW it's always a good idea when looking for PC components to search for them on YouTube.
 
This is the oddest thing i've ever known!

I got a new graphics card along with new harddrives and such..

GTX460, 1gb OC edition.

On OpenGL, about 20fps.
DirectX - 80fps+

What on earth?!
 
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