OT; Best Graphics card to buy $200 - $350

[Vorkapitan]

Hi All,

I need your help in deciding which brand would be the best choice for me in the $200 to $350 price range. When would be the best time to buy?

Also what do you use. I am currently using ATI Radeon 9800 - 128mg. Been very happy with it so far....until now. Some new games are now starting to stutter. :nope:

I am using Asus MB with AMD 3600+ chip / 1 gig mem Corsair.

Joe :D

[Gizzmoe]

Does the board only have an AGP slot or also PCI-Express?

[Vorkapitan]

my MB has PCI and AGP !:D

[SUBMAN1]

He is talking PCI-E, Not PCI!!! If you have AGP then you don't have PCI-E. Best card for that kind of money hands down is the NVidia 7800 GS. It performs similar to the 7800 PCI-E version, runs about $250, and has HDR as well. No other AGP card performs as well.

-S

[Vorkapitan]

Thanks Subman,
I was also leaning toward NVidia 7800 GS. If I was to spend a few $$ more, what would your next choice be? :D :D

Joe

[Gizzmoe]

If I was to spend a few $$ more, what would your next choice be? :D :D

Well, there is no better card for AGP. If you have money left and still use onboard sound get a real soundcard, like a Soundblaster Audigy 4. You gain a few FPS, it uses less CPU resources than an onboard card.

[SmokinTep]

Thanks Subman,
I was also leaning toward NVidia 7800 GS. If I was to spend a few $$ more, what would your next choice be? :D :D

Joe

I had a Radeon 9800 pro which recently died. Picked up the Nvidia 7800 GS, 256 MEG, for about 350.00. What a huge difference.

[Fritz Fraghof]

Actually you can get 7600GT and 7900GTs (mucho fasto) in AGP varieties now.

[SmokinTep]

I think mine is a 7800GT OC

[SUBMAN1]

Actually you can get 7600GT and 7900GTs (mucho fasto) in AGP varieties now.

Where?? I have not seen such a board, nor can I find a site to suggest that anything else but the 7800 GS exists. The 7800 GS should be faster than a 7600 GT by the way.

-S

[scandium]

He is talking PCI-E, Not PCI!!! If you have AGP then you don't have PCI-E.
Not so. The Asrock 939Dual-SATA2 (ULi 1695 chipset) motherboard accepts both AGP and PCI-e video cards (even at the same time). There may be others as well, but this one has been on the market for at least 6 months.

Editted to add: He mentions his board is Asus, but Asrock is an Asus company and they may be offering these boards under the parent logo as well by now (not sure since I haven't followed hardware trends since upgrading 6 months ago).

[SUBMAN1]

He is talking PCI-E, Not PCI!!! If you have AGP then you don't have PCI-E.
Not so. The Asrock 939Dual-SATA2 (ULi 1695 chipset) motherboard accepts both AGP and PCI-e video cards (even at the same time). There may be others as well, but this one has been on the market for at least 6 months.

Editted to add: He mentions his board is Asus, but Asrock is an Asus company and they may be offering these boards under the parent logo as well by now (not sure since I haven't followed hardware trends since upgrading 6 months ago).

That is true. I did see a board a while back that had both. THey are rare though. More likely than not though, he doesn't have PCI-E. That was back when they were making crutch boards like this though.

-S

[MENTAT]

Why not ATI?

[SUBMAN1]

Why not ATI?

ATI doesn't have a comparable board to the 7800 GS for AGP. Best they have is the x850 XT. All of their x1800's and x1900's are PCI-E only.

-S

[MENTAT]

So, PCI-E board is a must than. My poor wallet :cry:

[SmokinTep]

Only if your motherboard supports it.

[Skybird]

I just had tried an ATI X850XT board. While I had problems with the control software that some users are reporting to have with the latest versions of the driver (both Catalyst and Omega, 6.x), the board itself gave a good performance, so hardware-wise I would have stayed with it easily. Concerning hardware I recommend this configuartion very much, it is a very good compromise between performance and price.The question for me is if it makes sense to spend almost twice as much for a board of the latest generation - if that board still is doomed to become outdated again soon. Graphics boards are indeed very fast in this regard. :lol: I would always recommend to look not for the ridiculously expensive latest board generation, but one generation before, which then is available at far more reasonable prices (~200 Euros). I did so with my previous FX5900XT, I did so with the X850XT, and now changed that for an 6800GS. Happy ro report the chane went smoothly, and the store had a good service (and very fast), and I am operating the new board since some minutes. I run Oblivion with default ini-file and maximum details at 1024x780 (frames 30-35) and 1280x1024 (frames 25-30), frames measured in the outside world. Inside buildings and dungeons they are far higher. It is said the X850XT is faster than the 6800GS, but I remember the frames under the same circumstances being in excactly the same range with the X850XT - to me both cards do not make a difference. Good card, good driver and control software, excellent game. Can't wish for anything more. Every euro more would have been a waste only.

[Skybird]

Talking about AGP in my above post. The new board has extended the living time of my aging AGP-system significantly, since I do not plan to buy much games anymore.

[MENTAT]

I have an ATI Radeon 9800 pro and it was the king of all cards at that time.. I cant believe how it has become an "ordinary" card now ?? It was cost a 450$ to me and it was the most expensive part of the computer i employed (~20% of the total system)

It seems i have to get rid of that ASUS A7N8X deluxe Card which we had gone thru many adventures together..:cry:

So what do you recommend for a PCI-E system? For MB and for VC?

[SmokinTep]

Depends on how much you want to spend. I had a 9800 Pro myself that lasted about 3 years of heavy gaming. Like you said, it was top of the line back then. I replaced it with a Nvidia 7800 GS OC. What a big difference. Went with AGP for now since I didn't want to replace the motherboard yet.