new graphics card

[Gizanked]

heyy its kinda like a contest. except you don't win anything except my appreciation for 2-4 minutes.

but! here are the rules/question

what is the best graphics card i can get for $175 or less

all its gotta do is fit this mobo

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813131013

which basically means pci-e 16x, only 1 for now and i may decide to sli it later.

[MrBlah]

8600 GT

[jim beam]

not to steal your thunder rep but I have a similar question. I am going to most likly buy an 8800 gts. I have never bought a card before and was wondering if there is a certain maker i should go with compaired to another? my budget is 400 before any taxes. like i said i know nothing about this stuff.

[Gizanked]

another question, is it better to get a slightly lesser card with 512 mb or to get a recomended card with only 256?

[mujo]

Get a video card with DDR3 if you can, a card with 256mb of DDR3 will blow away a DDR2. Usually the cards with less RAM may have faster clock speeds and RAM speeds, making them faster.

Here's a link to Toms Hardware Guides, They do a list every month now of the best gaming graphics cards for the money. They do them by price.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/09/05/ ... the_money/

I would go by that advice on that site alone.

[MrBlah]

when u buy a video card look for a few things, RAM, GPU clock speed, RAM clock speed, shader clock, pixle pipelines, and over datatransfer rate. a card with much higher clock speeds and only 256mb of ram cna outperform that of a slower card with 512 mb of ram

for under 175... an 8600 will be ur best choice, they recently released one with 512mb vram so ur in luck

[MrBlah]

oh and as for manufacturer.. eVGA, nothing else, they have the greatest selection of nVidia cards and the best prices

[mujo]

[quote="MrBlah";p="39555"]
oh and as for manufacturer.. eVGA, nothing else, they have the greatest selection of nVidia cards and the best prices
[/quote]

eVGA also has a lifetime warranty on their video cards, a 90 day trade-it-for-a-higher-card deal, and the best tech support. On the 90 day thing, if you're not pleased with the performance of your card, you can trade it in for a higher performer, and only pay the difference. No other GPU manufacturer does this.

[Squidly]

[quote="MrBlah";p="39519"]8600 GT[/quote]


Hmmmm, I think ill take a X1950 pro instead!!!!

More powerful in most benchmark and i saw it at only 139$.

I just saw a x1950xt (even better) for under your price... (169$)!!! That would be a nice choice!!!

It is a Sapphire!!! Good compagny but they dont offer lifetime warranty like BFG or eVGA!!! But seriously, do we REALLY need lifetime warranty when we know that in 2-3 years, these cards will be outdated and that you will have to upgrade to a more powerful one!!!!

Oh BTW, I'm not a ATI freak...! I suggest these two ATI cards because in this price range, ATI has better cards (for the money). In higher end cards, I would go with NVIDIA (probably 8800GTS). Nothing beat this card when talking about price/performance!!

edit: I just saw that your MB is SLI!!! So Mr Blah was right in suggesting the 8600gt ONLY IF youre planning to buy 2 NVIDIA cards (or to add a second one later). Otherwise, you dont need this feature (you can also look for a CROSSFIRE MB in order to add 2 ATI cards in your system).

[Squidly]

[quote="Replica";p="39532"]another question, is it better to get a slightly lesser card with 512 mb or to get a recomended card with only 256?[/quote]

Youll have better performance with a high end 256mb card than with a low/mid end 512mb one!!!

As an exemple, the performance difference between a 8800gts 320 or 640mb are only a few FPS (about 4-5 fps)!!!

It is to the customer now to decide if he want to pay 100$ more for having 4-5 FPS more... Some do, not me!!!!!!

[Gen.Ben]

[quote="Squidly";p="39561"]
[quote="MrBlah";p="39519"]8600 GT[/quote]


Hmmmm, I think ill take a X1950 pro instead!!!!

More powerful in most benchmark and i saw it at only 139$.

I just saw a x1950xt (even better) for under your price... (169$)!!! That would be a nice choice!!!

It is a Sapphire!!! Good compagny but they dont offer lifetime warranty like BFG or eVGA!!! But seriously, do we REALLY need lifetime warranty when we know that in 2-3 years, these cards will be outdated and that you will have to upgrade to a more powerful one!!!!

Oh BTW, I'm not a ATI freak...! I suggest these two ATI cards because in this price range, ATI has better cards (for the money). In higher end cards, I would go with NVIDIA (probably 8800GTS). Nothing beat this card when talking about price/performance!!

edit: I just saw that your MB is SLI!!! So Mr Blah was right in suggesting the 8600gt ONLY IF youre planning to buy 2 NVIDIA cards (or to add a second one later). Otherwise, you dont need this feature (you can also look for a CROSSFIRE MB in order to add 2 ATI cards in your system).
[/quote]

I agree with everything that squid said.

Except Crossfire/SLI is just not worth it at all, you don't even get a 50% difference in performance. Especially if you get 2 8600 GTS's, thats alot more than a 8800GTS and a 8800GTS would kick the CRAP out of Sli'ed 8600's

The only time I think crossfire is worth it is when you are using the best card out, like 8800 Ultras or GTX's because there would be a single card for cheaper that could woop its ass.

[Gizanked]

well if the option to sli came along it would be an issue of available funds.. ya know.. money now money then.

if i get a card now i'd like to have the option later down the line of buying a second one to get a performance increase instead of buying an all new card by itself. this new card is for a new build and the card i have now is an evga 256mb nvidia geforce fx5500

but as it stands now the budget is $ 175 and i'd like to get the best card i can for now, with the option of buying the same card later to sli it. hence why i bought the sli board and not the single pci-e slot board like i had originally intended

[Gen.Ben]

I really think you should save up a few more dollars because 2x $175 cards are more than a 8800GTS($270) card.

And a single 8800GTS will absolutely blow two mid end video cards out of the water.

Adding another card will only give you minimal performance enhancement.

But if you really have your heart set on Xfire or SLI, get a 7900 or something similar as it is a very good card in a DX9 environment.

[Gizanked]

how about this one? pushing the budget to the limit..


http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDe ... ode=321212

or is this one a whole ton different for a little less money( money i can put towards some nice thermal paste or other building needs.. or even food for a few days)
it appears to be a non-superclocked version, but the core clock does appear to be fairly close

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814130084

[Gizanked]

i don't have money to throw around, this build is something i've been thinking about doing for 4 years now and its only happening because i've been buying it piece by piece for about 6 months now. I'd like to have it built by the time TF2 comes out, and throwing in an extra $100 isn't really an option as of now. the extra card might be added a year or so from now. its not like i'd go an add it month or two down the line. the question was what is the best i can do for $175, not what is the best thing i can do in general with however much money i feel like wasting.