Can somebody enlighten me a little about the pros and cons of the two? Which would be the more intelligent buy on purely performance grounds?
GTO2 for sure as you can unlock it to an X850 XT PE and then it will thrash the 7600GT.
But it does not have SM3(which is a paper feature anyway). \
And if you are buying the GTO2 from zhopudey, then I say go for it. He is giving it for 10K woth Ati Silencer!!!
Well.. Only Cons are.. the X800 series dont support SM3… So dont expect to play games like UT2007, Crysis, etc..
If i was you, id go with the 7600GT…
^^LOL no dev has explicitly said that those games require SM3. SM2 hardware is the baseline AFAIK. So you won’t get the extra eyecandy and HDR. Out of those 7600GT is a better deal. In fact an X1800GTO is an even better deal.
Yea, but i would feel better having SM3, and HDR+AA Capabilities, than not having em 
.
Definitely 7600 GT out of those two if u have to make a choice. It’ll perform not too far off compared to a X850 XT. And as chaos said if u can get the X1800 GTO even better.
Other side of the story…
With HDR disabled, X850 is as fast as a 7900gt in oblivion ;). 7600GT struggles somewhere in the middle.
Well since this thread involves my card, I’m going to jump in 
Disclaimer Obviously I’m trying to push my card. But I’m posting this here instead of PM’ing kandissa, so that he has the chance the see other peoples comments, and then decide on his own.
**Point number 1. - The most important. ** Henceforth, I’ll be treating my card as an x850xt. Now aditya would probably be the first to object 
Well here’s what I think.
Treating my card as an x850xt, is NOT the same as say, treating a 3000+ which has gone till fx-57 speeds as the higher chip. Why, because for OCing the cpu, a lot of factors are involved. Your motherboard, ram, smps, cooling, etc. i.e. An fx-57 will work as an fx-57 on all boards that support it, even the Rs 2K foxconn. You can’t OC the 3000+ on the foxconn.
However, if your system is capable of running an x850xt, ( I think smps is the only factor ), then my gto2 will work as an x850xt. No doubts about that. And it’ll also run cooler, and more silent, due to the ATI Silencer.
So, now that that is decided, compare the 7600gt with an x850xt. The 7600gt costs around 13.5K I think, while my gto2 is less than 10K. And for its defense, I’m calling these witnesses -
1> Poll @ techpowerup. x850xt vs 7600gt
x850 got 27 votes, 7600gt got 7 votes.
2> Heres oblivion benchmark from AT
Other’s are free to comment on this. Do point out if anything I’ve said is technically wrong.
No nV card can do HDR+AA not even 7900GX2 Quad SLi 
@ Zhop - Gotta agree with you mate ! Great work in finding those links.
@ Kandissa - Well, since Zhop is giving you the card pre-flashed (Isn’t it ?) and unlocked to 16x6 I would suggest that deal. Plus the ATi silencer is much more silent than 7600GT’s stock cooler.
UT 2k7 is gonna s’port SM2..
CHECK HERE
Though these r only possible requirements, but the real arent gonna be much different. A geForce 6 series card with DX 9 compilance (UT s’ports OGL also) should be the bare minimum.
X850 it gr8..X850 XT PE is even better…though costly…but should match higher cards like 7800 in performance
But i think, wed wanna play with All the Eye candy turned up, wont we…
@ Anish, i know that no nVidia card can do HDR+AA..
Rather than the X800GTO2 or the 7600GT, id choose the X1800GTO . Its unlockable too.
Of course, the x1800gto would be great Kandissa, if you can get that, go for it.
GTO2 is more value for money imho…The raw processing power at that price range is unbeatable.
and if somebody is thinking of buying a card keeping the future in mind then it is better to wait for directx 10 , directx 11 …whatever …capable cards to be released in future (8 ~ 16 months time frame). currently zhop’s deal is a good one considering the ATI silencer itself costs 2.2 ~ 2.5K here locally.plus it is “Built by Sapphire” meaning these cards will have top quality components.
you guys are talking abt X1800GTO as if it is available here …
Or is it 
??
Yup. Leave it to chaos to suggest stuff not available here
…
ahhh…this thread has been blessed by the presence of techboy. :yahoo:
Well even the X800 GTO2 isnt available here(apart from zhops) so i assume hes buying it from abroad
Edit: Rofl ,it has been blessed indeed. The 7600 GT is better than the X8500 XT PE even
But if u think about it, there is a greater chance of the 7600 GT going kaput
Techboy always gets the figures out of his @#$% . Since when did an X850XTPE become equal in performance to a 6800 ultra 
. Hell its faster than the 7800GS in most games.
X850XT PE > 6800 Ultra (X850XT PE = 6800 Ultra OC)
6800 Ultra will beat the c**p out of 7600GT
so X850XT PE >> 7600GT
Dont know much about the GTO2