Ram or GraphicCard for cheap performance?

T

Torchy85

New member
Hi, been reading a few of the threads regarding inproving performance in Trainz.
Now my problem is basically I'm skint, well nearly;) . Not looking for fantastic framerates on high poly routes or anything just like as much of a boost as I can get for very limited money. At moment I'm talking in region of £45-£60 with maybe the same in a few months then call it a draw until I win the lottery.
What I want to know is which would give best inprovement for now, increasing memory from 1Gig to 2Gig or a new Graphics Card?

At present my system is: Intel Pentium D920@2.8Ghz, Asrock Dual775_VSTA motherboard which supports DDR1 or DDR2 memory and AGP or PCIe graphic but PCIe is only 4 lane not 16. Memory is generic DDR400 2x512MB which could be used on a spare machine.Waste not want not;) .

Hoping for some ideas and thanking you all in advance,

Paul
 
You didn't specify your graphics card. It's kinda hard to tell if you need to upgrade it if we don't know what it is!:p

Cheers,
John
 
oops, Sorry

Ah, knew there was something I'd forgot:o

Graphics card is a Nvidia Gforce6200, 128MB memory, AGP.

Running mainly TRS2004 but dip into '06 now & again if that makes difference?
 
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More ram seems to be your best bet :) I would find out first if it needs to be matched ram as in you buy 2 x 512s same speed and make.

If you win the lotery lol then go for a computer with my specs or higher then you are a winner:)

And no i havnt won the lotery :eek:
 
It's probably worth taking a lengthy look round the graphics section of Tom's Hardware Guide.

In my experience you won't see much performance increase in Trainz by adding more ram above 1GB but that might just be my computer.

John
 
Nvidia 7600GS with 512K PCIe. It made a ten fold improvement compared to a Nividia 5700LE on a system much the same as yours.

William
 
I upgraded to an nVidia 7600GT 256MB AGP (no PCI-E socket in my computer) and it did wonders for my Trainz frame rates compared to the previous ATI Radeon 9800. It's amazing how much effect the power of modern graphics processors has on the speed of 3D programs.

Check your computer has sufficient power and ventilation for any new board. Modern video boards draw a lot of current and give off a lot of heat.

For anyone else reading this thread in the future, also check the video board socket compatibility, AGP (and which version of AGP) or PCI-E. AGP is regarded as out-of-date nowadays but it's still found on older computers.

As far as I can figure out, the order of nVidia model number suffixes from least powerful to most powerful is SE, LE, (no suffix), GS, GT, GTO, GTS, GTX, GX2 and Ultra (put me right please experts if necessary) and the choice of suffix has a fairly drastic effect. I'm not sure if the amount of graphics memory has any performance effect, possibly it only affects the highest possible x/y/colour depth resolution, or maybe textures can be cached in it???

John
 
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I think because your PCI-E port does not support 16x speeds you can not run any graphics cards in it but I might be wrong :P.
 
Torchy85 said:
Hi, been reading a few of the threads regarding inproving performance in Trainz.
Now my problem is basically I'm skint, well nearly;) . Not looking for fantastic framerates on high poly routes or anything just like as much of a boost as I can get for very limited money. At moment I'm talking in region of £45-£60 with maybe the same in a few months then call it a draw until I win the lottery.
What I want to know is which would give best inprovement for now, increasing memory from 1Gig to 2Gig or a new Graphics Card?

At present my system is: Intel Pentium D920@2.8Ghz, Asrock Dual775_VSTA motherboard which supports DDR1 or DDR2 memory and AGP or PCIe graphic but PCIe is only 4 lane not 16. Memory is generic DDR400 2x512MB which could be used on a spare machine.Waste not want not;) .

Hoping for some ideas and thanking you all in advance,

Paul
Click to expand...

With your cpu, XP and lower end video card 1 gig of memory probably will not be your bottle neck. Basically the fastest video card you can afford will give you the best upgrade performance for the money.

Ebuyer.co.uk has this card Sapphire X1650 PRO 512MB DDR2 DVI HDCP TV Out AGP Graphics Card for 53 quid. Note Tomshardware.com rates this card as the best choice for under $100 but only the DDR3 version. DDR3 versions start at 87 quid in the UK.

They also have the Leadtek WinFast 7600 GS 256MB DDR2 AGP Graphics Card for 52 quid again recommended by Tomshardware which would probably be the better choice as you shouldn't have a clash with the old driver software.

My personal favourite would be the HIS X1950Pro 256MB 256bit GDDR3 Dual Link DVI TV HDCP AGP Graphics Card at 95 quid, over budget and it may need a new power supply but it should run Trainz etc with respectable performance for a number of years. Over time you might want to increase the memory on this option.

Both ATI options will need some sort of driver cleaning software.

Cheerio John
 
First of all thank you all for your help & advice. It looks like I'll be going with the graphic card upgrade for now.

Lo Poly; yes that is my motherboard.

Omber; Motherboard will run PCIe graphic cards, maybe not quite at full blast as it were but there is a list of some of the compatible cards on the Asrock site. follow the link Lo Poly gave.

JohnWhelan; Pretty much answered thanks. All I have to do now is troll around looking for the best deal :) Probably go with Nvidia 7600GS tho' I have DriveCleaner so could wipe out all the bits of Nvidia drivers if I decide to go ATI.
Only condern might be PSU, it's a no name 400W model so have to check what ampage it has on 12V line(s)?
Rest of system is 2x160G Maxtor IDE HDD's & 2 DVD's

Thanks again, Paul
 
Can I ask a question please? How much difference in performance in Trainz would you guyz say there was between a 7600GS and a 7600GT, all other factors being equal?

John
 
I think 400 W is fine. I put a 7600GS in a machine with nearly the same specs and measured the power usage with a gadget from work. It peaked at around 260 when booting and averaged 235 with TRainz running at 1600 x 1200 with SirGibby's Murchinson Logging route.

William
 
john259 said:
Can I ask a question please? How much difference in performance in Trainz would you guyz say there was between a 7600GS and a 7600GT, all other factors being equal?

John
Click to expand...

It takes some one with one of these cards to add their results to the thread. There is both a benchmark for TRS2006 and one for TC. Just a note if you have a cpu / video card combination that isn't there already doing the benchmark would help others decide what to buy.

http://forums.auran.com/trainz/showthread.php?t=14993

Currently the best thing is to look at the generic benchmarks in tomshardware.com. Note some cards have DDR2 memory some have DDR3, the DDR3 cards are better.

The 7600GT is supposed to be faster than the 7600GS but for PCI-e I suspect both cards are out dated by the 8800 GT. Initial price on newegg.com is $260 but the performance is extremely good. Currently Tomshardware rates the ATI products in the low and mid range price performance areas.

A note on the power supply I would feel comfortable with a 400 watts power supply and the 7600 GS.

Cheerio John
 
upbb4884 said:
I have 256 MB of RAM. I wonder what I should upgrade first:p


Why do I have to be so poor:'(
Click to expand...
Definately your RAM, to a minimum of 1Gig. Don't know prices in US but over her in UK can get 1Gig Kingston DDR2-5300 (KVR667D2N5/1G ) for £16, about $30.
Paul
 
I am throwing a question into the mist.
I have an MSI MS-7060 motherboard (for idea of RAM), 256 Mb of ram (do not ask what type), a Geforce 5200FX graphics card and a 3.0Ghz P4 Processor (Not the HT one or whatever it is. I missed that by about a month). If I was to upgrade, what would everyone recommend?
The computer had it's fourth birthday two weeks ago as a guide.

PS. If you have Classics you can download the City of Morgan for an example of the processing power. I cannot run it in interior view.
 
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jdenm8 said:
I do not have a hope in hell of knowing
Click to expand...
Belarc Advisor might be able to tell you the details of the system board and the memory. It's a freeware utility, very useful and totally safe. There are quite a number of similar programs available online but do check because some of them might contain adware/spyware.

HTH, John
 
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