Keep 9800pro & buy IntelHT 3Ghz & 4xAGP MB or buy 6600gt 4 good performance in games?

[numan]

I am very confuse about my system. I have recently bought MSI Radeon 9800pro 128Mb (RX9800pro TD-128).
My system spec is

Intel celeron D 2.4GHz (256kb chace)
MSI Motherboard AGP 4x.
300W powersupply.
512Mb Kingstone DDR 400 bus

I am not getting good performance from my card. I instaled the latest drivers form ATI and control center (5.7 Catlyst). In Medal of Honor-PA game On medium settings 800*600 resolution I only get 10-30 FPS in palying game. But on its Menu game there are 60-100 FPS. My game hangs a little when an enemy come in screen and FPS falls from 30 to 17.
In Battel field 2 I run the game on low garfics at 800*600 and there r only 10-18 FPS.
How can i get constant FPS. I want to get good performance on medium settings and minimum 22-35 FPS in new games.
I am worrying about my system. I bought 3dCard only 4 days ago. Is it due to my PC spec.
What should I do.

1. Upgrade my processor to Intel Penteum 4 HT 3.02 Ghz (1 mb chache) and buy a AGP 8x motherboard (like intel GBF)

OR

2. Buy Geforce 6600gt and plug it in to my present system.

I want to get good performance.

AGP 8x 3dcard is better or PCI express 3dcard is better for gaming? Plz describe the features of both.

PLZ help me I am very much tense about this issue. Plz help me for taking a right decission.

[mikeandike22]

pci-express is better, main feature it is a faster connection it is 16x where agp is like 4 or 8. I have recently seen a lot of ppl having trouble with the 6600 gt for some reason, i do not have it myself. i would say if you want to get a card that expensive you might as well just get a 6800 or even 7800 if you really have the cash. now the 7800 only comes with pci-express or at least the BFG version so if you dont have those slots you need a new mobo i have found a combo pack of a evga 7800 GTx Oc that includes and nvidia evga motherboard for about $550 or so. The only problem is it is amd not intel and you have an intel processor. So in that case i would just get the 6800 it is better than the 6600 and seems more reliable, and to use it you wouldnt have to upgrade your system unless you want to go pci-express to keep up with the times.

[Coconut Monkey]

I have to wonder about your current computer configuration numan, because you should be getting decent enough performance out of the 9800 Pro. Forgive me if I repeat what I've stated in other threads, but I do browse a lot of forums. ;)

Does your hard drive light thrash around during gameplay? This would indicate a lack of RAM, with 1Gb recommended these days (but don't go out and buy some of the spur of the moment - let's be sure first!).

Have you tried gaming on a fresh installation of Windows? Switching cards can leave bits and pieces of old drivers behind, and combined with the clutter of an old install performance can be affected.

[jbennet]

celerons just plain suck for games

me and my cus have identical dells except his is the celeron D 3.6 ghz and mine is a 3.2ghz P4 HT

Mine is faster at games.

[Matt Tacular]

My system spec is

Intel celeron D 2.4GHz (256kb chace) MSI Motherboard AGP 4x. 300W powersupply. 512Mb Kingstone DDR 400 bus

Problems I see:

1. Celerons DO suck for gaming, plus yours is only 2.4 ghz, not bad, but notgood for gaming.

2. Your motherboards AGP is only 4x, the card is AGP 8x, so it's not running as fast as it should be.

3. The memory is fine for the minimum that games require now, but you said you wanted good performance, not just the minimum companies consider playable.

Solution: Expensive.

You need to upgrade most of your computer to get good performance in the latest games. If you don't want to do that then you need to turn the graphics down to near minimum.

Your system is very similar to my old one: Athlon XP 2000+, 512MB DDR, Radeon 9800 pro All-In-Wonder. And I got roughly the same performance you're talking about in BattleField 2, I also had an AGP 4x mobo.

Don't just go and upgrade your video card because the motherboard is slowing you down more than the video card. The cheapest thing to do would be to find a mobo compatible with your CPU and that is AGP 8x and go with that. But I don't recommend that due to the fact that it's not worth your money, just go onto tigerdirect.com and buy one of their cheap systems.

Here's a good exmaple:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2108757&CatId=1873

And get a modern graphics card, such as:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2274914&CatId=2234