Video cards: Pipelines vs. Memory

Lets say we have 2 video cards. Card A has 256mb and 16 pipes. Card B has 512mb and 12 pipes. Both cards are 256bit, and have the same clock speeds and memory speeds (or are VERY close), and the price of each card is about the same. I'm inclined to go with more pipes over more memory. What do all you folks think? RAM vs. Pipes..... what's more important? Which is better for gaming: card A, or card B?

BTW- PC specs are AMD64 3200+ with 1.5gb DDR400 and a 250gb SATA HD.... XP Pro SP2

 

Under the paramaters that you have detailed, I would take more pixel pipelines over more ram.

Cheers

 

^ i 2nd that

 

thirded. a 12 pipe card wont be able to take full advantage of the extra memory, it's just not able to process that amount of information fast enough

 

Sometimes it's possible to unlock a 12 pipe VC to 16:tas
Butt there are no guarantees

 

that is true...he needs to tell us what cards they are though, because i dont know of any 16 pipe cards that unlock, it's usually the 12 pipe cards and below

 

The cards in question are a 256mb 6800gt (16pipes) and a 512mb 6800gs (12 pipes). Even though I've been a die hard NVidia fan for years, I think I'm going with a Radeon x1950GT 256mb....

 

oh man that's a toughy...do you have access to the 6800GS to try and unlock it? what is the manufacturer? im assuming these are AGP cards, yes?

the 6800GS is a beastly card for it's specs, their performance is close to that of a 6800Ultra. If it unlocks then you'd have a great card for cheap. Have you looked into a 7900GS or 7950GT? IIRC, the best performing AGP card for the price is the x1950XT

 

I don't have any of the cards yet. I've been researching AGP cards for awhile now, and I was going to go the EBay route but I just couldn't deal with buying something used. Especially from EBay. Friends have had so many problems with parts dying 32 days after purchase.... so I'm likely going to buy a new x1950GT. I can't afford the XT, but the GT's specs should be plenty. Anyway, the brands are DiabloTek for the 6800GS (part number V6800GS-512A), and either PNY or GigaByte for the 6800GT....