128 bit interface vs 256 bit interface

H

halfpipehippie

Geek Trainee
hey, im looking to upgrade my video card from a geforce 6600 256mb card. i looked at the X850XT cards which seem a low price for their specs and i found one for about 150.00 USD with a 30$ mail in rebate and it had a 256 bit interface, and i was also looking at the 7600GT with only a 128 bit interface with a few bucks more for price, 170.00 with 30$ MIR. i heard that the ATI card is old and not as good for games but it has some good specs. my wallet can hold only like 170.00 but im trying to only pay 150 in the end, but that can include a MIR. can you guys help? thanks
 
In this case, the bits (specifically the bit-depth) is in question. Higher bits=wider bandwith=more performance.
 
so what card would u reccomend? a 6800 GS/Xtreme that has 256bit interface, or the 7600GT with only 128bit interface, but which has a much faster clock speed?
 
Whatever one's cheaper. You're going to get roughly the same performance with either one.
 
ok well i think i have a new question between an ATI card and the two NVIDIA cards i was talking about above, how well would the 2 year old ATI X850XT 256MB 256-bit compare, because i heard that its an older card, nd doesnt support 3.0 shaders or something, is that a big deal?
 
It affects some eye candy in some games, but I don't remember a whole lot of SM3.0 specific games that were only 3.0 or 1.0, like FarCry.
 
It depends on the game but generally you'll see the 7600GT winning out the X850XT. If the 7600GT had a 256bit interface it would be no contest but to cut cost they lowered it. It makes up for that speed and surpasses the 6800GS due to very high clockspeeds. Pretty much any test will show that. Go for the 7600GT.
 
The memory bit depth is just one factor in the performance of a video card. Basing your purchasing decisions on just one factor is just silly.
 
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