Gf4 4600 Ti Or Gf4 5200 Fx?

[sage0112]

Ok this is the situation...

A have about 5 desktop computers in my house and space for them is very limited. Now i really need to get rid of one of them and have come down to the desicion to pick one of the two i've chosen.

PC #1 - has a GF4 4600 Titanium 128 MB.

Pc #2 - has a GF4 FX 5200 128 MB. (got this for free :D )

now... which video card should i keep? I've picked out all the good hardware to add to PC #1 since it has a way better case and a dual 60 GB HD, but i have no idea how to choose between the Vid. cards. Can someone help me?? and why one is better than the other?


Thanks!

[lynx]

Benchmarks (http://www6.tomshardware.com/graphic/20030311/geforcefx-5600-5200-03.html)

Although the 4600 isn't actually mentioned in the benchmarks, I would assume it comes between the 4200 and the 4800. These outperform the 5200FX almost everywhere, but of course they are only DirectX 8 cards, if that matters.

Edit: No doubt someone will correct me if my assumption about the positioning of the 4600 is wrong.

[sage0112]

Yea thats the hard desicion. Most new games only play with Dx 9.0
(HL2 - Halo )

5200 is the first of its model to play DX 9.0

Sooo confused. :huh:

[lynx]

But surely that's the whole point of the DX software, if the hardware can't do it directly it does it in software. Obviously that's a little slower, but often not a great deal.

[abu_has_the_power]

Originally posted by sage0112@13 October 2003 - 19:15
Ok this is the situation...

A have about 5 desktop computers in my house and space for them is very limited. Now i really need to get rid of one of them and have come down to the desicion to pick one of the two i've chosen.

PC #1 - has a GF4 4600 Titanium 128 MB.

Pc #2 - has a GF4 FX 5200 128 MB. (got this for free :D )

now... which video card should i keep? I've picked out all the good hardware to add to PC #1 since it has a way better case and a dual 60 GB HD, but i have no idea how to choose between the Vid. cards. Can someone help me?? and why one is better than the other?


Thanks!
i would sell both and use the $ to buy a radeon 9500

[DarthInsinuate]

Originally posted by lynx@13 October 2003 - 19:40
But surely that's the whole point of the DX software, if the hardware can't do it directly it does it in software. Obviously that's a little slower, but often not a great deal.
i don't remember it exactly but DX is the software that tells the card to run the DX9 type stuff - so you can only have DX9 features with a DX9 card

i think there's little point using the 5200 for DX9 games because it would look nice but it won't run very fast

[gamer]

Originally posted by abu_has_the_power+13 October 2003 - 20:09--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (abu_has_the_power @ 13 October 2003 - 20:09)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-sage0112@13 October 2003 - 19:15
Ok this is the situation...

A have about 5 desktop computers in my house and space for them is very limited.&nbsp; Now i really need to get rid of one of them and have come down to the desicion to pick one of the two i&#39;ve chosen.

PC #1&nbsp; -&nbsp; &nbsp; has a GF4 4600 Titanium 128 MB.

Pc&nbsp; #2&nbsp; -&nbsp; &nbsp; has a GF4 FX 5200 128 MB. (got this for free&nbsp; :D )

now... which video card should i keep?&nbsp; I&#39;ve picked out all the good hardware to add to PC #1 since it has a way better case and a dual 60 GB HD, but i have no idea how to choose between the Vid. cards.&nbsp; Can someone help me?? and why one is better than the other?


Thanks&#33;
i would sell both and use the &#036; to buy a radeon 9500 [/b][/quote]
i agree with him.. sell them both, and buy a really good gfx card with the money you get. possibly invest a little bit and get a 9700pro, and overclock it to 9800 nonpro speed.

[lynx]

Originally posted by DarthInsinuate+13 October 2003 - 23:14--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (DarthInsinuate @ 13 October 2003 - 23:14)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin-lynx@13 October 2003 - 19:40
But surely that&#39;s the whole point of the DX software, if the hardware can&#39;t do it directly it does it in software. Obviously that&#39;s a little slower, but often not a great deal.
i don&#39;t remember it exactly but DX is the software that tells the card to run the DX9 type stuff - so you can only have DX9 features with a DX9 card

i think there&#39;s little point using the 5200 for DX9 games because it would look nice but it won&#39;t run very fast [/b][/quote]
I think that&#39;s wrong, and I&#39;ll explain why.

The whole idea behind DirectX is to give a direct interface to the hardware, and to provide software support where the hardware doesn&#39;t provide the required functions. So in theory you could run DX 9 oriented games on DX 9 hardware with the original DX 1 drivers, the only modifications required would be tell the DX (1) drivers that the hardware could handle the functions - no software intervention required.

So why is the DirectX software so big? Simply because it has to emulate all the various DX versions in software if the hardware is incapable of supporting it. So if your hardware only supports DX 8, any DX 9 software features have to be supported in software. But do you think your X00Mhz graphics processor is going to outperform your 2+GHz x86 processor with MMX, SSE etc? Not a chance, but of course your x86 processor can&#39;t do that and the rest of the game&#39;s requirements at the same time, so there will be some loss of performance, but not as much as you might at first think.

[sage0112]

Originally posted by gamer+14 October 2003 - 00:14--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (gamer @ 14 October 2003 - 00:14)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>
Originally posted by abu_has_the_power@13 October 2003 - 20:09
<!--QuoteBegin-sage0112@13 October 2003 - 19:15
Ok this is the situation...

A have about 5 desktop computers in my house and space for them is very limited. Now i really need to get rid of one of them and have come down to the desicion to pick one of the two i&#39;ve chosen.

PC #1&nbsp; - has a GF4 4600 Titanium 128 MB.

Pc #2&nbsp; - has a GF4 FX 5200 128 MB. (got this for free :D )

now... which video card should i keep? I&#39;ve picked out all the good hardware to add to PC #1 since it has a way better case and a dual 60 GB HD, but i have no idea how to choose between the Vid. cards. Can someone help me?? and why one is better than the other?


Thanks&#33;
i would sell both and use the &#036; to buy a radeon 9500
i agree with him.. sell them both, and buy a really good gfx card with the money you get. possibly invest a little bit and get a 9700pro, and overclock it to 9800 nonpro speed. [/b][/quote]
I would of done that, but i dont have the time or the resources to do it. I have someone whos willing to buy the whole machine now, so while i begin cleaing it and making it look brand new i have to also decide which to keep. =/

i&#39;ll most likely go with the 4600 since it has better performance, but i&#39;m just worried about the DX9 issues when i comes time to that. Thanks Guys.

[_John_Lennon_]

Originally posted by gamer+13 October 2003 - 19:14--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (gamer @ 13 October 2003 - 19:14)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'>
Originally posted by abu_has_the_power@13 October 2003 - 20:09
<!--QuoteBegin-sage0112@13 October 2003 - 19:15
Ok this is the situation...

A have about 5 desktop computers in my house and space for them is very limited. Now i really need to get rid of one of them and have come down to the desicion to pick one of the two i&#39;ve chosen.

PC #1&nbsp; - has a GF4 4600 Titanium 128 MB.

Pc #2&nbsp; - has a GF4 FX 5200 128 MB. (got this for free :D )

now... which video card should i keep? I&#39;ve picked out all the good hardware to add to PC #1 since it has a way better case and a dual 60 GB HD, but i have no idea how to choose between the Vid. cards. Can someone help me?? and why one is better than the other?


Thanks&#33;
i would sell both and use the &#036; to buy a radeon 9500
i agree with him.. sell them both, and buy a really good gfx card with the money you get. possibly invest a little bit and get a 9700pro, and overclock it to 9800 nonpro speed. [/b][/quote]
Agreed, a 9600 would be worth selling them both, and soft modding it etc.

[Neo 721]

About the origonal question the 4600 is (or will be) cheaper. and it clealy outperforms the 5200