Best graphics card for FSx

[michael davies]

Title says it all, whats the best and most stable bang for buck graphics card for FSx, OS is Win XP SP2 and running DX9, not looking to upgrade to Vista yet so DX10 isnt a strong selling point for me right now.

MOBO is a Giga Byte GA-965P-S3 with an intel E6300 processor and 4Gb of RAM.

I'm thinking of a 8800 series graphic card and a new Dual or Quad core processor.

Game play is ok for testing but I want more now.

All input gratefully received.

Best

Michael

[txnetcop]

Michael the problem is that video is just too subjective. Beauty truly is in the eyes of the beholder with video cards. I have always been an Nvidia fanboy but the recent ATI cards have taken me away from Nvidia as my favorite card. However I test both Nvidia and ATI regularly. If you are pretty well stuck on Nvidia and a budget the new GTX 260 cards are fine and the drivers are fairly stable now. The fastest card in the world will not help you with FSX! The 4870x2 is great with most games as is the GTX280 for speed, but neither is the HD4870 and GTX 260 a slouch either, but where FSX is concerned, no matter what Tom's Hardware says, it almost doesn't matter...period. I do believe the ATI renders better looking textures but again you will find another out there who will disagree. In our tests at TechCorp it was a divided house, but ATI won the most votes for "prettier."

If you would like to try the ATI cards the new HD4850 and 4870s are good also and the 8.12 drivers are stable as is the newer Catalyst. I have the settings for the Catalyst that will work best with the 4800 series cards. I spent quite a bit of time with the reps from both companies getting driver info for use with FSX.

Tom's Hardware is all screwed up on their numbers for FSX so I recommend looking at the Guru3D charts to get an idea of how each card will run for you on most games. If you are only wanting a card for FSX even the 8800 you are thinking of will do fine as FSX is geared more toward how powerful your CPU is rather than your GPU. I found the best results with FSX at 3.4GHz or better.

I have both ATI and Nvidia cards but I like the ATI cards just a little better. With Nvidia I had to use nHancer to get it really right...the good news is that it is donationware and a fine product. Please donate if you use it.

http://www.guru3d.com/category/vga_charts/

top 10 cards compared(260 vs 4870 and 4850):
http://guru3d.com/article/top-10-games-with-radeon-4870-1-gb--geforce-gtx-260-core-216-test/

The numbers favor Nvidia for speed (except for the 4870x2 which was not compared) but only by a couple of frame rates so that leaves things pretty wide open.


PCstats has some great comparisons as well and one of their guys works very closely with TechCorp.

Specifically for Nvidia the

GeForce GTX 260 Core 216 Superclocked -http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-078-EA&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=927&name=EVGA%20GeForce%20GTX%20260%20%22Core%20216%22 %20896MB%20GDDR3%20TV-Out/Dual%20DVI%20(PCI-Express)%20-%20Retail

ASUS 9800GTX+ http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-188-AS&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=1009&name=Asus%20GeForce%209800%20GTX+%20TOP%20%22Dark% 20Knight%22%20512MB%20GDDR3%20HDTV/DVI%20(PCI-Express)%20-%20Retail

ATI HIS 4850 ICE-Q-4
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-102-HT&tool=3

The HD4850x2 is not that expensive either:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-189-SP&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=912&name=Sapphire%20ATI%20Radeon%20HD%204850%20X2%2020 48MB%20GDDR3%20TV-Out/Dual%20DVI/HDMI%20(PCI-Express)%20-%20Retail


or HD4870 Sapphire and Powercolor had the best showings:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-185-SP&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=939&name=Sapphire%20ATI%20Radeon%20HD%204870%20%22Toxi c%22%20512MB%20GDDR5%20TV-Out/Dual%20DVI/HDMI%20(PCI-Express)%20-%20Retail

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-093-PC&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=939&name=Powercolor%20ATI%20Radeon%20HD%204870%20PCS%2 0Extreme%20512MB%20GDDR5%20TV-Out/Dual%20DVI/HDMI%20(PCI-Express)%20-%20Retail

I hope this helps you.
Ted

[Butcherbird17]

Michael,
If your looking to go 8800 series the 8800GTX or 8800GTS (512) would be a great choice as both cards are pretty cheap in price right now and will handle fsx well. You could also go with the 9800GTX which is in the same price range. If you want to go with the newer nvidia series card the one txnetcop posted (GTX260 core 216) is a great card and is the one i'm looking at to upgrade to, I have a 8800GTS (512) now. But don't overlook the ATI 4870 as it is a HOT card and for the low price I would call it the Best Bang For Buck vid card out there. (I am a Nvidiafanboy):friday:
I checked to see if Gigabyte had a BIOS update for P965 chipset to run the latest cpu's (wolfdale and yorkfield 45nm). They have an update for CPU microcode but it don't say if its for the newer cpu's (45nm) are for the new steppings on the older conroe or yorkfields (65nm).:isadizzy: Do you know what rev board you have (rev 1.0 or 3.3)? If you go with an older (65nm) I would go with the q6700 or q6600 as both are rather cheap now and would be a great upgrade over your e6300.

Joe

[hey_moe]

Just my two cent. I feel for speed and all around performance, the video card plays the least. The processor,and MB are the important factor along with ram. All four parts of the computer when blended together and matched up right is where ya need to look at...Mike

[Bjoern]

I think an 8800GTX might be a bit too much for an E6300.

With that setup, I'd recommend an 8800GTS 512 or a 4850.

[michael davies]

Whoa...system overload LOL.

Ok in baby steps.

Price isnt much of an issue to be honest, budget doesnt equate, neither does silly money, middle to upper market really, i do a lot of visual CAd work and only play FSx so thats the basic criteria.

I'm not stuck on either Nvidia or ATI, I'm currently running a Radeon X1950Pro so thats gives y'all some sort of benchmark, to be honest, anything new will be an improvement, but I'd rather have an educated improvement than a guessed one LOL.

The only thing I dont like is the Catalyst package, I always opt for the silent manual running one to reduce systems or packages running in the back ground. I've not tried nHancer yet.

One other question to throw in, not related to this quest but to overall graphics, what does FSx use, Direct3D or Open GL, I never seem to be able to alter either individually and have an effect on FSx, alter both the same and things happen ?.

MOBO, at some stage a new set up will be required, probably when TSx arrives, until then I'd like to squeak the best from this MOBO, Joe I dont know what revision it is, I'm using HWiNFO32 to gather the data, it says the Bios is Award Modual revision 6.00PG, now that means as much to me as boolean cut polys means to you guys I suspect ? LOL.

A awful lot of the PC is cut right back, I've always kept a clean house with respect to process's running and a clean registry at all times so I dont think I have much to gain in that quarter, RAM is all PC5300 DDRS Corsair VS1GB667D2, I'm told thats ok for the MOBO and anything faster ( DDR3 ) wont work.

Ok so the best bet so far looks like a Q6600 and maybe a 8800GTS or HD4870 ?.

I'll read all of the gratefully supplied links in a moment.

Kindest

Michael

[michael davies]

I think an 8800GTX might be a bit too much for an E6300.

With that setup, I'd recommend an 8800GTS 512 or a 4850.

Yes I think your right, thats why I also want to get a bigger chip as well, the best to match both really.

Best

Michael

[Butcherbird17]

Michael,
Go and get CPUZ. This will tell you what revision board and what BIOS version you have installed. http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php
I only ask this as it seems the 3.3 rev boards have better luck with the newer (45nm) cpu's. In any case the q6700 or q6600 would be a better fit for your current board. You still may need to do a BIOS update, but I believe that you can use gigabyte's windows based utility (@BIOS) to update the BIOS. I use it on my ga-p35-ds3r board with no problems.
Another thing if you go with a 4870 or GTX 260 is that you have a good PSU as these cards are power hungry.


Joe

[michael davies]

Michael,
Go and get CPUZ. This will tell you what revision board and what BIOS version you have installed. http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php
I only ask this as it seems the 3.3 rev boards have better luck with the newer (45nm) cpu's. In any case the q6700 or q6600 would be a better fit for your current board. You still may need to do a BIOS update, but I believe that you can use gigabyte's windows based utility (@BIOS) to update the BIOS. I use it on my ga-p35-ds3r board with no problems.
Another thing if you go with a 4870 or GTX 260 is that you have a good PSU as these cards are power hungry.


Joe

Joe, thanks for the pointers, will look into that right away, I think my PSU is ok, seem to remember its a 600W or a 750W, but will double check in the morning when I open the case, I'll certainly look at CPUZ, seem's a likely replacement for what I already have.

Thanks to all who have posted already, much appreciated

Best

Michael

Addendum, Ok found I already had CPUz on the PC, so gave it a whirl, it says its a P965/G965 Revision C2 MOBO chipset, so it looks like a BIOS upgrade is required as well.

[fcfcfc]

I have a dumb question - sorry...

Currently, FSX is unable to take advantage of multiple GPUs (eg 4870x2). Would it be too myopic to think that installing one of these muli-core cards today for future FS developments is a bit futile since by the time FSX evolves into the next version with multi-core GPU capability, there would be yet another generation of graphics cards? So a single core card would be the most sensible with the best cost-longevity trade-off?

[txnetcop]

It looks like DX10.1 cards are pretty much it until Intel-Microsoft Larrabee comes to fruition. Ray tracing grahics systems are going to be much faster but there are problems there as well especially with other game developers. I think it is safe to buy multi GPU platform if ya got the bucks.