Yet another video card question.

[bluemicrobyte]

1) Yes, I have searched all over google, and what google tells me isn't good enough.

So, for benchmarking purposes, I currently have a GeForce 6600 GT OC (http://www.bfgtech.com/6600GT.html) in my computer.

I'm going to be upgrading another computer in the house with one of the following cards:

GeForce 7300 GS - $80 (http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?product_code=338367&cmid=dsr&ref=dsr)

GeForce 7600 GT OC - $200 (http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?product_code=338239&cmid=dsr&ref=dsr)

At a glance, it looks like the 7300 GS is going to be much cheaper, and almost as powerful as the 7600 GT OC. I've tried searching all over the web for a performance comparison between the two (or three) cards, but haven't been able to find much. So my question for you warboarders is this: would it be worth it to shell out the extra 120 bucks for a 7600 GT OC, and how does the 7300 GS compare to a 6600 GT OC? (this new card needs to exceed the performance of my current card, or at the very least match it perfectly.)

(PS: as always, CompUSA is the only choice for shopping here. Don't ask why or suggest otherwise. I've already heard it =P)

[TheNutCracker]

I searched for 3dmark scores because they give a decent viewing of what the performance should be. The 7600gt looks to be almost two times better than the 6600 GT OC. The 6600 GT OC is two times better than the 7300gs in terms of 3dmark scores. I would go with the 7600gt if I were you.

[bluemicrobyte]

ah, I almost forgot about 3DMark. Well unless anyone has a second opinion it looks like I'll be going with the 7600 GT OC (for which, I assume, $200 is a reasonable price).

Edit: Newegg has a 3D Fuzion GeForce 7600 GT for $162 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16814143064), anyone care to comment? (on the 3D Fuzion brand name, purchasing from newegg, or anything else?)

[Wick3d]

compromise with a 7600gs.

[xodkrm]

You can get a 7600 for just over 150$.
The 7600 is a real bang for the buck - but the catch is, your mother board needs to be PCI-E, even better, SLI for future upgrades. The 7600 is supposedly a really great card to SLI, so later on, you can get another and make ur comp kick even more ass. (Note: if your computer is currently running on a 6600, your computer does not support PCI-E)

Im currently using a 6600GT as well, and it works fine, except when im raiding in WoW, I need to turn down the textures, and remove the name tags to reduce lag. Other than raiding, i can play WoW on highest and get a pretty good framerate. I am guessing you have about a gig of ram - if you do, i recommend for you to upgrade your ram to 1.5g-2g, for it will improve your gameplay by alot, escp when you are raiding.

Upgrading your motherboard from AGP to PCI-E / SLI is not that simple. You might need to change your CPU.

[bluemicrobyte]

Like I said before, the PC this card is going in is not my personal desktop (which has 1.5 GB RAM, along with the 6600 GT OC which works quite nicely).

The PC this card is going in has PCI-E, but I'm not sure what SLI is. Could you explain it?

[xodkrm]

A motherboard with SLI has two PCI-E slots. That means that you can have two of the same cards to improve your performance by like 95% or something.

[bluemicrobyte]

Ah, I see. Thanks =P

So then SLI is never a requirement for anything, just the capability of having two cards in one system.

[xodkrm]

Yup.
I wonder if you can have 4 monitors hooked up to two video cards, because that would be insane.
(Im currently using two 19"'s)