Good gaming 3D video card?
 

About 8 months ago, I'd be the guy dispensing advice on what video card to buy for gaming, but I've been out of the loop too long now. About a year of not paying attention to the market, and all my knowledge is obsolete. So perhaps someone can help me out.

I need a new video card in my gaming rig. I'll be running some pretty high-end games, and would like to have a card that isn't already too obsolete, if at all. I would like, but do not require, dual heads... since I have previously used dual monitors and would like to again sometime in the future if I can afford another monitor. I have a DVI-VGA adapter, so a DVI works as a second head. My price ceiling is about $250.

The card I had before was a GeForce Ti4200, which was a good card until it died on me... fan went out. It can be replaced on warranty, but I'll need a card sooner than that, so I figure I'll buy a new one, and throw the warrantied card on eBay when it gets back to me, and cut my losses a little.

Here's a card I am considering: The GeForce FX 5200 Ultra Video Card, AGP, 128MB DDR. It's $179 at CompUSA. Any opinions on that one?

In my experience, and maybe things have changed, nVidia and ATi were the two top video card makers. ATi made great hardware, but their drivers sucked massive, stinky piles of shit, so the cards were twitchy and unreliable. nVidia cards sometimes scored <i>slightly</i> lower on benchmarks, but had good, stable drivers.

So, to put it plainly.. what is the best 3D card I can get for $250 or less? All opinions welcome.

Thanks,

Ok, a little research, and now I'm leaning towards this one ($200):

Radeon™ 9500 Pro Video Card, AGP 8X, 128MB DDR

...opinions?

Holy crap. And I'm getting edgy about potentially spending ninety bucks on a GameCube...

See, this is why I've never been a big fan of modern PC gaming -- the video-card arms race. I bought my Athlon 1300 two summers ago with a GeForce2 GTS card; for the cost of a card like you're describing, which would bring it up to where it could run GTA: Vice City efficiently, I could _buy_ a PS2 and Vice City for it.

I game on my PC quite a bit, but it's mostly non-3D stuff (emulators, MAME) or older titles. I have exactly one PC game that strains my hardware (Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind), and I'm not sure there's a system on EARTH that Morrowind runs efficiently on and won't crash at intervals.

Here's a review of the nvidia 5600 & 5200 from Tom's hardware:

review

Looks like for the most bang for your buck to hit a radeon 9600.

Newegg


If I could recommend anything, I would recommend a Radeon 9700, as it is soooooo sweet. Unfortunately its not the cheapest at around $310.

I agree that the ATI drivers used to be pretty unstable, but from my experience in the past year, I have nothing but good things to say about them.

If price is unlimited, then the best is the Radeon 9700 and the Geforce FX.

Otherwise, go for the Geforce 4Ti4200 or even the Geforce 3 - It's more powerful than the Geforce 4 MX :)

Personally, for price and punch get the Geforce 4 Ti4200

I'm about to install a Radeon 7500 LE in my system. I hope the drivers work okay with Win XP.

I'll keep you posted on how it works out for me.

Brian

The Radeon 8xxx and upwards would be suitable. And anything above a GeForce 4 will not be needed for a long while. I still use a GF2 and can still run nearly all current games at 30FPS (the recommended minimum) at 1024x768. Doom 3 may pose something of a problem, but I am not into single-player FPS much. MP or sport is more my style.

update
 

card went in no problem :D


Drivers: problem
the included drivers are not supported by Win XP
I am currently downloading a new set from the internet. (painfully slowly too)

Brian

surrender
 

Okay...the new XP drivers are not working. Neither is the video card.

And on top of it all, now my computer is freezing at odd times without warning or reason. I thought XP was supposed to fix these things?

Brian