I am thinking about upgrading my current mac situation. I have a QS 800Mhz, with the following upgrades: 30GB+120GB HD (in addition to the stock 40GB), 16x Dual layer DVD Burner (hacked to work as a "Superdrive"), and an additional 256MB RAM (Stock 256MB).
I am considering either purchasing a Mac mini or upgrading my current machine. The problem with the mini is that when I configure it to match my machine (in areas were it is deficient) it gets to be pricy (Superdrive and RAM upgrades).
On the other hand I can upgrade my current machine to match the mini for a little less. $200 - $400 for a new processor and hopefully $100 - $150 for a Video card. My biggest question there is Video card performance issues.
ATI Radeon 9200 with 32MB dedicated DDR SDRAM over an AGP 4x bus (Mac mini Graphics)
9200 PCI card ("upgrade", how does this compare to my 7500 AGP)
9600 AGP 64MB card, OWC mod
9000 Pro 128MB Card
I can't seem to find reliable info on performance on these Vedeo Cards, particularly compared to each other. I can asume the 9200 PCI is slower than the mini's performance, but at what cost. How does the mini's performance compare to the 9000 Pro with 4x the VRAM. How does the 9600 stack up to the 9000 even though it has half the VRAM.
Are there other good options that I am leaving out. Does anyone have a better card (proc/video) that they pulled form another machine they are looking to part with that might be of use to me
Thanks for any reponse.
I am considering either purchasing a Mac mini or upgrading my current machine. The problem with the mini is that when I configure it to match my machine (in areas were it is deficient) it gets to be pricy (Superdrive and RAM upgrades).
On the other hand I can upgrade my current machine to match the mini for a little less. $200 - $400 for a new processor and hopefully $100 - $150 for a Video card. My biggest question there is Video card performance issues.
ATI Radeon 9200 with 32MB dedicated DDR SDRAM over an AGP 4x bus (Mac mini Graphics)
9200 PCI card ("upgrade", how does this compare to my 7500 AGP)
9600 AGP 64MB card, OWC mod
9000 Pro 128MB Card
I can't seem to find reliable info on performance on these Vedeo Cards, particularly compared to each other. I can asume the 9200 PCI is slower than the mini's performance, but at what cost. How does the mini's performance compare to the 9000 Pro with 4x the VRAM. How does the 9600 stack up to the 9000 even though it has half the VRAM.
Are there other good options that I am leaving out. Does anyone have a better card (proc/video) that they pulled form another machine they are looking to part with that might be of use to me
Thanks for any reponse.