What Videocard Should I Buy?

[Lee Downham]

I got two 8800GT 512's in Sli (overclocked and running dual view ) ... one is an XFX on which I put a Thermaltake Duo-Orb aftermarket cooler, the other is a Gigabyte which has a kind of aftermarket Zalman cooler on it (Duo-orb is better at cooling btw) ...
Now to me they seem rather large, but nowhere near as mammoth as the 260 / 280 GTX's with their stock coolers ... any bigger and those buggers would need their own external enclosure

 

[Tim Ling]

I got two 8800GT 512's in Sli (overclocked and running dual view ) ... one is an XFX on which I put a Thermaltake Duo-Orb aftermarket cooler, the other is a Gigabyte which has a kind of aftermarket Zalman cooler on it (Duo-orb is better at cooling btw) ...
Now to me they seem rather large, but nowhere near as mammoth as the 260 / 280 GTX's with their stock coolers ... any bigger and those buggers would need their own external enclosure

Don't joke, if things carry on as they are, this will have to happen.

At the moment AMD/ATi are the better price/performance choice, plus NVidia 9XXX cards are meant to have some serious issues with the way they were manufactured. Since AMD bought ATi, it seems their driver problems have been resolved too. NVidia are having some tough times, and it's all their own fault.

 

[Steven Palmer]

Ye, it's a lil big but you have a small cooler, you should see them 8800's with the big stock cooler and then the GTX series and ATi newer gpu's, all proper beast!

I have a 8800 GTX and it is indeed a HUGE beast. :laugh2: I feed it puppies and kittens to keep it quite :wink2:

 

[Mehmet Arikan]

I have the 9600 GT GS 1 GB version and i am very satisfied with them
Less energy consumption in comparing with the 8800 and 9800 series !!!

 

[Damian Henderson]

At the moment AMD/ATi are the better price/performance choice, plus NVidia 9XXX cards are meant to have some serious issues with the way they were manufactured. Since AMD bought ATi, it seems their driver problems have been resolved too. NVidia are having some tough times, and it's all their own fault.

nVidia also have price on their side now though, with the GTX260 (and 216 core version which is faster then 48701gb and around same price) and others + you can pick up a GTX280 for around £230 now which is still theoreticly the fastest single gpu out there. I don't know what these serious issues with 9XXX cards you're talking about though, I know quite a few people with that series card and no problems + very good feedback on those cards from many PC hardware forums. Either way it's great competition from both companies and makes it good for us to chose from. nVidia aren't having tough times either, they have the fastest single and dual GPU's and have good prices on many of their gpu's, but really it's tough times for all companies in this time due to the world economic crisis

 

[Dave Stephenson]

Don't joke, if things carry on as they are, this will have to happen.

all it will mean is that hopefully the price of full towers will come down since more poeple will need them. sooner the better, im running out of 3.5 bays again.

 

[Laurent Michelis]

yop

 

[Abdul Al-Amry]

Guys, the 8800GS 384MB is lovely. All settings on Max, even trying to still click the right arrow for more than Max lol. Thinking of getting anudda to try SLI. Bought Crysis and slightly struggling to enjoy the game the way it should be. Anyone selling GPU?

 

[Damian Henderson]

As said before it's about same performance as my now sent back 8800GTS which could play all sims maxed out smooth so no surprise it's doing you proud! Also remember with SLi it will have to be a 8800GS you partner the other one with. (Some 9600GSO's are the same though )

Even with 2 of them you will still struggle to play Crysis at proper settings, the game is a hardware killer, but you could have better settings with 2 of course.

 

[Kyle Evers]

[Central Topic] What Graphics Card To Buy?

Hey all!

Around Christmas time, I bought myself a Nvidia GeForce 8500GT graphics card with 256MB VRAM. At first, it seemed good becasue it was a good step up from my old 6500 SE GeForce graphics card. However, I find when running GTR Evo, I get pretty low FPS unless I am using the hood. I also find low FPS ocassionally in rFactor in cockpit view, usually more in some parts of track than others. I run all high grahpics on rFactor but on GTR Evo I run relatively low settings. I also recently bought Test Drive Unlimited for my PC but I can hardly play on a lower resolution with low settings!

This has made me start looking into new cards. I want to know what good graphics cards are out there for under $80.00. so I don't have to update the grahpics card for a while, I'd prefer one with at least 756MB VRAM, preferably 1GB VRAM. It also should have some very good specs.

Right now, I am looking at the Sapphire Radeon 4670HD. It runs for about $80.00 or so from what I've seen for the 1GB version. Here are the specs: http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?p=AT...2f9620c368e894adb64514e73fa57f85550d289bd3a85

Is that a good card? I would assume a 1GB card that can run HD graphics is pretty high-end, but I don't know all of the models out there. Can anybody suggest some graphics cards for me? That would be greatly appreciated :rotfl:! Also important is the GPU clock rate and the fill rate.

By the way my slot is a PCI-E. I have enough RAM to run any graphics card so...

 

[Dan Coldrick]

Hi Kyle,
I think you may be a little confused (don't worry, most people are the same), the size of the vram doesn't make that big a difference unless your playing at very large resolutions such as 2560x1600, its the graphics chip that makes the difference.
A 4870 512mb will beat a 4830 1GB by a big margin.
Go grab yourself a 9600GT-
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814140093
or a 4830-
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102822

They will both play evo on full with some AA.

 

[Péter Bártfai]

I've bought a 9600GT last year, it's now quite cheap and it's really great!

 

[Kyle Evers]

Hi Kyle,
I think you may be a little confused (don't worry, most people are the same), the size of the vram doesn't make that big a difference unless your playing at very large resolutions such as 2560x1600, its the graphics chip that makes the difference.
A 4870 512mb will beat a 4830 1GB by a big margin.
Go grab yourself a 9600GT-
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814140093
or a 4830-
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102822

They will both play evo on full with some AA.

I know. That's why I mentioned that GPU clock rate and fill rate are important. My friend says he knows where to get a 4870 for $130. I figure if I can sell some old games and my old graphics card and processor, I can dish out the money towards a 4870 so I will not have to upgrade until at least 2 years. I saw a comparison chart of all of the specs of a 4870 and a 4830 and the 4870 is much better in the clock rate. It also has a larger bandwidth. I may also get 4850, which I believe is a step down from the 4870, but not too far. No way I'm forking over $300+ for a GTX 200 series . I surely have plenty enough money for it, but I just don't want to spend too much - I tend to save my money.

Thanks for the suggestions guys. Any other suggestions?

 

[Kyle Evers]

How about this 4850HD?
http://www.mwave.com/mwave/SkuSearch_v2.asp?SCriteria=Ca73470

Memory Clock: 993 MHz
Stream Processors: 800
Core Clock: 625 MHz

 

[Dan Coldrick]

Looks a good one mate, go for it.

You won't be disappointed. :dance2:

 

[Kyle Evers]

Looks a good one mate, go for it.

You won't be disappointed. :dance2:

God I hope not. Being the next thing down from a 4870, I'm expecting it to be pretty good.

I was looking at the specs of my current card and it says it only has 16 stream processors but the 4850 HD has 800. What's up with that? Doesn't seem right.

 

[Dave Stephenson]

Its right. 8500's are strictly bottom end for the 8-series range.

Just to put into perspective My 8800GTS (G92) has 128, 128 being the highest number in the 8-series range. 83's, 84's, and 85's are really entry level cards designed with giving Vista machines Aero support rather than high end gaming.

The performance difference from you current card to the 4850 is enormous. The Race 07 equivilent of racing a F3000 against mini's

 

[Damian Henderson]

4850 will do you proud.

 

[Kyle Evers]

Sounds good . I mainly need the card for GTR Evo and Test Drive Unlimited, as my current card seems to run rFactor and basically all high pretty decently. I'll be looking around a little more for good prices. On GTR Evo (especially since the patch), I get pretty low FPS in the cockpit camera and action camera. Usually get the best in hood, but even then it's only about 25. Seems to effect my performance too, especially on sections of Nurburgring where the FPS dips to about 12 or so, just a guess. In Test Drive Unlimited, I can't even get good FPS when playing on a slightly lower resolution and grahpics on low! It makes the game a lot less fun and playable.

I still have a question: how do you get the rebate on Newegg? Do you just need the coupon code?

And also considering that the 4850 is the third best card ATI makes (behind the 4870 and 4870 X2), it should be pretty good for at least a year, hopefully more. At this point I'm probably looking to spend about 100.00 - 120.00 USD for one.

 

[Kyle Evers]

Only problem is I may need a new PSU. Apparently I believe mine is only a 250W. I will also need a 4 to 6 pin connector for the power supply for a 4850. I know the cord is about $5, but could anyone suggest a good PSU for cheap? I think maybe a 450W one. In which case my cheap ass may be getting a 4830 instead. Depends on the specs.

Edit: Found a 580W for $20.00 on Newegg. So 20.00 + 5.00 = 25.00. Then the price of the graphics card 110.00 + 25.00 = 135.00 and shipping. Not bad I guess?