Help with choosing a new graphics card

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dnb4life

312 posts

Ultimate Geek
Inactive user

#20059 12-Mar-2008 07:52

I've decided on a system upgrade, my current system is shown below in my signature.
i'm planning on upgrading the ram to 3 gigs and my motherboard to a newer one with a newer graphics card socket as my current is socket 939. these i can sort no sweat but i was looking for some advice from experienced graphics card users.

i'm in the market for a geforce card,
i've been doing my research (including on older threads from here) and my price range is around the $250-$300 mark.
this new article on tom's hardware was very helpful as were their benchmarks. as i have an ati x850xt platinum edition i want atleast an 8800 so the improvement in my grapohics is substancial enough to see a difference and hence justify the upgrade.
as i will be running it on a 32inch lctdtv with high res i need atleast a 512mb card.
i also would like to stick to the good brands which in my opinion are gigabyte, msi, asus and xfx.
it of course also has to be pci-express.
it will be used for watching HD content and high-end gaming.

any help is much appreciated

Vorbis

176 posts

Master Geek

#116183 12-Mar-2008 19:50

The 8800GT 512 is the sweet spot at the moment, prices are currently dropping with the release of the 9600 cards from nvidia (the 8800 still outperforms these newer cards from benches I've seen) I think you can pick up an 88 for around $325.
The system I'm currently selling sports an 8800GT and a E8200 dual core processor, plays Crysis on 'very high' settings smoothly as long as you dont go past 1280x res.
Also use it for mediaportal/ripping dvd's and watching freeview on my 32" lcd TV with the technisat card, smooth as silk.

I'm a fanboy of AMD, and the picture quality that ATI produces, but Intel and Nvidia are kicking butt in the performance stakes these days.

Just a sidenote, the high-end gfx cards aren't neccessarily better for watching HD, the cheaper ones have hardware mpeg decoding, the high-end stuff usually have to fall back on sheer horsepower.

I've used high-end Asus, gigabyte, XFX cards, and also the 'cheaper' brands (sparkle etc) IMO not alot of difference in performance/build quality and reliability.

dnb4life

312 posts

Ultimate Geek
Inactive user

#116647 14-Mar-2008 17:16

Hey Mauricio, can you move this topic to the gaming section please? seems more suited there. cheers

JKRNZ

56 posts

Master Geek

ID Verified

#116951 16-Mar-2008 16:45

On the nVidia site there is a PureVideo Support table that has the features for each cpu. The 8500 GT, 8600GT and 8600GTS all support H.264 SD and HD decode acceleration. This may provide a sweeter price point than the 8800GT* cards that partially support decode acceleration.

McStag

8 posts

Wannabe Geek

#116972 16-Mar-2008 18:43

what do you use your computer for?
If your going for higher level gaming i agree you should look at the GeForce 8800 GT but ive never seen it under $300 (ie your sugested max price).

If you want a good graphics card realitivly low priced have a look at the GeForce 8600 GTS. You can get this for around $180-
$250 . While the 8600 GTS has only 256mb it can hold its own against any new games etc and is probibly one of the better deals for GeForce cards at the moment.