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Buy the 8800GT now or a better card later?
- Thread starter Mercuric Oxide
- Start date
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Any chance in hell that the 8800GT can be purchased separately at the Apple Store...?
Yes, it is on the US store now for $349, and UK store for L220.
Marginally faster is the word you are looking for.
The bang for the buck is the Geforce 8800GT.
By the way, if anyone is wondering how to put a new firmware onto a PC NVidia card, you have to do it from within DOS, and you need a copy of an EFI firmware (such as the one Apple will supply on their 8800 GT.
The following article is for overclocking, but you could follow the latter half of the instructions to just load a new firmware using DOS.
http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/11/23/overclock_your_graphics_card_in_five_minutes/
If you are a performance fiend you can always take your Apple 8800GT, put a better cooling HSF unit on it and overclock. OR flash the new GTS, since it is a G2 core card.
I agree the 8800 GT is a great card, more than I expected from Apple. Just looking at all available options. The GTS is about 7-10% faster, maybe $50 more. GT is the best bang for the buck when just the card is considered... but when spending $2000+ on a computer, I'd take a 7% 3D graphics performance increase for $50 any day.
Again, more than you expected for today - wait 500 days and see how you feel about it when it is STILL the high end BTO card
I heard that a stock 8800GT PC version wont work on the mac but will work in bootcamp windows. so by looking at that I would presume the PC version of the 8800GTS wont work either...except through bootcamp. BUT I would love to know if for some reason this is possible. Id LOVE to get an 8800GTS. or any 9000 series card.... but thats wishfull thinking.
If someone flashes a GTS and gets it to work please let me know!!!! Im ordering my mac in approximately 3 weeks and will be ordering the GT. but if I can flash a GTS then Ill definately do that!
another question.... The PC version of the GT only works in bootcamp XP/vista. does that mean the mac version will only work in OSX.......?
yeah that new 8800gts card looks great, it did beat out the gtx and the ultra in most cases, but when the res went above 1920x1200 thats when the gtx and ultra started pulling ahead. Lucky for me all my games i play are 1920x1200 or less.
if someone can clarify that the 8800GTS is STABLE on the new macs and completely reliable then Ill definately get that!
Well only by Feb 13, by the time 8800GT is shipped,
the problem is that the timing is very very odd.. You see
the 9600GT and 98xx series will be released and then the 8800GT will seem like dust.
Bad timing because a cheaper 9600 GT is expected to perform better (not sure what margin) over 8800 GT, but at least faster than double of 8500 GT.
So the PC again will have a more robust graphics in real time matters.
AND, timb and lordblackadder did say they were working with EFI on making the 9 series Nvidia cards work on Mac Pro, they can't make promises but they sure sound like they know what they are doing and are committed.
So I might play the waiting game until Valentines day, see what rolls around. IF nothing happens and the hackers still can't help us, I guess 8800GT you should order. By the time a month rolls around you should be able to pick it up in the store right away and the 5 week wait wont occur again. Like when the x1900 XT just arrived, there was a wait, some time after they had plenty of stock and you could just walk in the store and buy it.
If I'm wrong with any of these, you can correct me, but this is the info that I have gathered.
the problem is that the timing is very very odd.. You see
the 9600GT and 98xx series will be released and then the 8800GT will seem like dust.
Bad timing because a cheaper 9600 GT is expected to perform better (not sure what margin) over 8800 GT, but at least faster than double of 8500 GT.
So the PC again will have a more robust graphics in real time matters.
AND, timb and lordblackadder did say they were working with EFI on making the 9 series Nvidia cards work on Mac Pro, they can't make promises but they sure sound like they know what they are doing and are committed.
So I might play the waiting game until Valentines day, see what rolls around. IF nothing happens and the hackers still can't help us, I guess 8800GT you should order. By the time a month rolls around you should be able to pick it up in the store right away and the 5 week wait wont occur again. Like when the x1900 XT just arrived, there was a wait, some time after they had plenty of stock and you could just walk in the store and buy it.
If I'm wrong with any of these, you can correct me, but this is the info that I have gathered.
Nope.
The 9600 GT will have approximately the same memory bandwidth as the 8800 GT but the 8800 GT will have more shaders and a higher fillrate.
The 9800 GTX is going to blow everything off the map including the 8800 GTX and Ultra.
But Apple will never offer a card as expensive as the 9800 GTX as a bto consumer video card.
I will be happy with the 8800 GT. I like my games but I shouldnt be playing them anyways
I have a 1900XT right now and its great at 1900x1200 on almost every game except crysis and a few others. so the 8800GT will be a nitciable improvment over that. should last me a while....but a 9800GTX would rock soooooo hard!Thanks for kindly correcting me. Other people who've corrected others do it so snobbishlingly.
I don't fear being wrong!
But we all need the correct answer!
Cool, so my choice lies between 9800gtx flashed or 8800GT
And theDommer
yeah almost all games minus high end games released final quarter of '07 are slow, but even dx10 card owners report the same problem.
My 24" 2407wfp-hc monitor does really excellent scaling function at 1680x1050, and pretty decent 1280x800 as well so the only games I need to run at the smallest, 1280x800
are World in Conflict and Crysis.
I have to run GoW at 1680x1050, but 1920x1200 is ok for short periods of time before i get some small headache.
Call of Duty 4 runs great at 1680x1050 with medium and some higher settings on x1900 XT
I mean i guess we are not THAT outdated. Just a little more patience
I don't fear being wrong!
But we all need the correct answer!
Cool, so my choice lies between 9800gtx flashed or 8800GT
And theDommer
yeah almost all games minus high end games released final quarter of '07 are slow, but even dx10 card owners report the same problem.
My 24" 2407wfp-hc monitor does really excellent scaling function at 1680x1050, and pretty decent 1280x800 as well so the only games I need to run at the smallest, 1280x800
are World in Conflict and Crysis.
I have to run GoW at 1680x1050, but 1920x1200 is ok for short periods of time before i get some small headache.
Call of Duty 4 runs great at 1680x1050 with medium and some higher settings on x1900 XT
I mean i guess we are not THAT outdated. Just a little more patience
Well only by Feb 13, by the time 8800GT is shipped,
the problem is that the timing is very very odd.. You see
the 9600GT and 98xx series will be released and then the 8800GT will seem like dust.
Bad timing because a cheaper 9600 GT is expected to perform better (not sure what margin) over 8800 GT, but at least faster than double of 8500 GT.
So the PC again will have a more robust graphics in real time matters.
AND, timb and lordblackadder did say they were working with EFI on making the 9 series Nvidia cards work on Mac Pro, they can't make promises but they sure sound like they know what they are doing and are committed.
So I might play the waiting game until Valentines day, see what rolls around. IF nothing happens and the hackers still can't help us, I guess 8800GT you should order. By the time a month rolls around you should be able to pick it up in the store right away and the 5 week wait wont occur again. Like when the x1900 XT just arrived, there was a wait, some time after they had plenty of stock and you could just walk in the store and buy it.
If I'm wrong with any of these, you can correct me, but this is the info that I have gathered.
The Geforce 9600GT is supposed to replace the shortlived Geforce 8800GS, that is meant to fight the Radeon HD 3850.
You can see a preview of the card here. Only 3DMark2006 scores though.
^ Now thats good information, Pressure. There was so much going on for stats in macnn and other Mac sites that had some odd info.
So it looks to me the 8800GT will be the best card, bang for dollar to buy!
When the 9800 series are out, and the flash fix will work , and price goes down for it from 449 to 349, we can expect Mac Pro gamers to upgrade.
That's if the stated estimated price range of 449 is correct for 9800 series.
Can you help us confirm that too?
Thanks
So it looks to me the 8800GT will be the best card, bang for dollar to buy!
When the 9800 series are out, and the flash fix will work , and price goes down for it from 449 to 349, we can expect Mac Pro gamers to upgrade.
That's if the stated estimated price range of 449 is correct for 9800 series.
Can you help us confirm that too?
Thanks
Good to hear it cleared a few things
In regards to the Geforce 9800GTX, it will come later than the dual-chip Geforce 9800GX2. It's this dual-chip card that is rumored to initially cost $449 and be announced February 14th (source).
Information regarding the Geforce 9800GTX is a bit vague at the moment and nothing concrete have shown itself yet. There are some rumors regarding the specifications but they are so wildly out of proportion that I will refrain from posting them.
The 2600XT will not hold up for 3 years easy if you do any slight gaming at all. In fact, the 2600XT cant' even beat the previous generations budget card king, the X1950PRO.
The 8800GT isn't faster than the 8800Ultra. In fact, the current hierarchy goes this way: 8800 Ultra > 8800GTS 512 > 8800GTX > 8800GT, but the GT is very very close to the GTX and the GTS512 is close to the Ultra (though at 2560 x 1600 resolution, the higher bandwidth/bus on the Ultra and GTX let them pull away).
Little fact: 8800GT was supposed to retail at an MSRP of $249 or less but has been gouged like crazy because of demand and short supply. In fact, short supply in general might be why adding it causes a huge delay to ship.
As far as flashing an 8800GT to 8800GTS or vice versa, it doesn't work that way, and the SP's cannot be unlocked as they are physically laser etched out. Drivers wont work that way either - sure, you download the same drivers, but the drivers still detect what card is what...
As far as the 9800's go, the 9800GX2 is supposedly due midway through Febuary, and is rumored to be a dual-G92 solution (two 8800GTS 512's put together). As far as the 9800GTX goes, no one knows for sure whether it's the new generation architecture or a refresh of the 8800GTX. Nvidia has kept tight wraps on it.
Expect the next king of performance to retail for PC's at $600+ though (unless ATI gets their butts in shape fast), so I don't even want to imagine what Apple will sell it standalone as if they offer it at all.
Unfortunately, with what they did last time with the MacPro's, it would be a stretch to see them include the 9 series soon - after all, they had the 1900XT last time and since then there were the X1950's, HD2900's, HD3800's, and the 8800's and none were supported.
Is it working though? I get the impression that it's an OS issue not a supply one. In other words, even if you buy the card separately it won't work because Apple have to update Leopard. Just what I thought.