Decent Video Card?

[ineedballs 0]

im here with a 750mhz duron running win2k. what's a good video card that i can buy? less than $150 prefrebly. im using a Voodoo3 2000 now, but i want better game play. can someone tell me what to look for in a videocard?

[CUViper 0]

Go with either an ATI or an NVIDIA chipset, and then just get the best one you can afford. As for board manufacturers, ATI makes their own boards, and with NVIDIA boards it doesn't really matter except for the bundle that comes with it (games, etc.). Personally I prefer NVIDIA, and you can get a Geforce3 TI 200 for about $150.

[JP- 0]

It would be a choice of ati radeon 8500 or gf3 ti200. Up to you Both are fast, both support the newer features and both will run games well. I think the 8500 is actually faster than a ti200 though.

[Avalanche 0]

Personally with your system, and the money you say you want to spend, I'd say go for a GeForce2 Ti 64Mb. I got mine for $179 Canadian dollars, so that's gotta be less than $100 US.

 

The card is great I think. It's not as fast as either the Radeon 8500 of the GF3 cards, but it'll run any game with decent detail settings at a respectable frame rate.

 

My system specs are these:

Athlon 1.2Ghz

512Mb PC-133 SDRAM

GF2Ti 64Mb DDR

 

I get a score of 4950 in 3DMark2001.

[edit]

I suppose I should qualify that score by saying I ran the default benchmark, 1024x768x32bit.

[/edit]

 

I think GF2Ti's are a great buy right now, hell, it cost $30 less than my voodoo3 2000 when I bought that!

 

Good luck!

[SHS 0]

I think GF3TI 200 is a better buy right now.

Oh you do know that GF4 is just a round the coner you may want hold of that one.

[ineedballs 0]

Thanks a Lot. I'm still undecided, but i'll probably pick a GeForce3 Ti200 or just wait and see if the price drops when the Geforce 4 comes out. Even though i dont have a very powerful system, i think it's good enough to run what i need.. gameplay . Thanks again!

[Brian Frank 0]

Just for the record, the Radeon 8500 is faster than the Ti200.

[Avalanche 0]

Don't most benchmarks show that the Radeon 8500 is faster than the GeForce3Ti500 too?

 

But in town here where I live the 8500 is more expensive by about $100 than the GF3Ti500, and that's too much for me to concider buying one.

 

But you guys are probably right, I should have waited til the GF4 comes out before I bought. I could have got a GF3Ti200 probably for the same price I paid for my GF2Ti64Mb.

 

Oh well, I'm still happy with it. Live and learn I guess.

[JP- 0]

Most 3dmark2001 benchmarks show the radeon faster yes. Find some real games and its slower.

[Brian Frank 0]

I just saw benchmarks with the Unreal II engine and the 8500 came on top except for the highest resolution, and that is a real game. I'm not sure how optimized it was however.

 

That's funny about the 8500 being an extra 100 over the Ti500. It's typically 100 less than the Ti500.

[Avalanche 0]

Yeah, that's what I hear about it. Everywhere they says it's cheaper, and while it's true that I can find an OEM model for a little bit cheaper up here, if you compare the ATi Radeon 8500 to say a VisionTek Xtasy GeForce3 Ti500, the Radeon is $499, while the GF3 is $399.

 

Mind you these prices are at a couple "big box" stores, and typically you can get slightly better deals at the small mom'n'pop stores around here.

 

These are Canadian prices, in the north of British Columbia, so keep that in mind.

[JP- 0]

OK 1 game its faster but everything else = slower, and its not like you can play UT2 atm is it.