Hello Duncan,
How much is your budget?
If you're willing to buy used, you can get :
1) 9800 Pro for ~$90 shipped
2) 9700 Pro for ~$75 shipped (can be a little hard to find)
3) 6600GT AGP for ~$100-110 shipped
4) 6800GT AGP for (IIRC) ~$240 shipped
Speed wise : 9700 Pro < 9800 Pro < 6600GT < 6800GT.
The 6800U is not worth it (seeing as you can get the 6800GT for much
cheaper and OC it).
Those figures above maybe with or without 3rd party coolers (Arctic / NV
Silencer, etc.)
A 6800NU (non-Ultra) may be worth it if you can get it cheap. They
typically fetch ~$140
and at stock speeds are only just as fast as the 6600GT. If you can get
them unlocked
and OC'ed (basically trying to get them to be 6800GTs), then they're more
worth it.
ATI aside (X800XL, etc.) the 6800GT is probably your best bet if you want
to stick with your
current CPU/mobo, as AGP is most likely EOL. It's a damn shame too, since
you can get
the PCI-E version of the 7800GT for ~$290 after rebate/s. Now imagine if
there were an AGP
at that price! :P
Personally, I just swapped out an Abit KV8 Pro (AGP, Socket-754) for an
Abit NV8 (PCI-E, S754)
and traded a 9800 Pro for a 6600GT.
HTH
--
JW
