Gamer with a Geforce Ti4200 should upgrade to a?

[Caly]

I want to get a graphics card as a Valentine's day gift for my boyfriend.
Any suggestions? Lay them out and I'll research 'em.

I found this listing to be interesting-
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articl...ics-cards-2004_13.html

Thanks!

 

[masshass81]

sweet gift

either 6600GT or plain 6800, ~$200 and ~$280 respectively

 

[sic wil]

Wow, I wish my fiance was that cool.

 

[DaveSimmons]

I'm assuming he has a computer with an AGP slot for the video card. If he has a recent intel / P4 system he might have a PCI-E / PCI-Express slot for video instead.

Some cheap computers have neither, just plain old PCI. This won't work with any good video card.

For AGP:

The plain nvidia 6800 is a great choice, especially for running at 1280x1024 screen resolution.

Here's one for $279 shipped at newegg.com:
Leadtek

The Leadtek is the second-cheapest 6800 they have, and it has a great user rating after 50 votes. If you do a search in the Hot Deals forum you might find a better deal, but this has no rebates to mess with and Newegg is a very safe company to buy from.


If you're sure he'll never run at screen resolution above 1024x768, you could buy an nvidia 6600 GT instead:
EVGA $217 shipped - evga
Leadtek - $220 - Leadtek
(Be careful shopping for 6600 cards, most are "PCI-E" / "PCI-Express" instead of AGP, these will not work)

 

[CraigRT]

that's hot... if I had a Ti4200 for this long, a 6600GT would be a worthy upgrade

 

[stevty2889]

Yep, 6600GT or 6800NU would be a nice upgrade.

 

[Ioo]

6600GT gets the vote from me

 

[gf4200isdabest]

Don't upgrade, GF4200 is "da best."

 

[Relion]

I had a TI4200 and now I have a 6600GT and Im very happy with it

 

[simonwh]

I would go for a 6800 too.

 

[thegimp03]

that's a freakin awesome gift on valentine's day. wish the girls i date would be that cool.

 

[JustAnAverageGuy]

regular 6800nu

 

[Abix]

Originally posted by: Relion
I had a TI4200 and now I have a 6600GT and Im very happy with it

I have a TI4200 and I wish I had a 6600GT, but Im too poor...and my motherboard(P4T533) just decided to stop beeping/POSTing in any form or fashion. Good thing the board is only 2.5 years old and it has a 3 year warranty...

 

[Lyfer]

X800XL should be under $300 when it arrives, its PCI-E but offer performance comparable to a GT at a much better price point.

 

[SagaLore]

Originally posted by: Lyfer
X800XL should be under $300 when it arrives, its PCI-E but offer performance comparable to a GT at a much better price point.

But does he have a board that supports PCI-E, that is important. Don't want to get him a card that doesn't work. And don't want to get him the best AGP 8x card if he plans on upgrading to a PCI-E board in the near future.

Perhaps for that price, buy him a really nice digital camera or mp3 player?

 

[Caly]

Hi guys, thanks!
He won't be upgrading his computer anytime soon as far as I know.
But he has been commenting about some games starting to give his video card issues.

His computer stats-
Asus NForce2 A7N8X Deluxe
AMD ATHLON XP2500+333MHz
CORSAIR VS512MB400 3200 DDR
SAMSUNG SP0802N 80GB 7200 RPM

He definitely has AGP.
Do the computer stats make a difference? Or is the 6800 still the way to go? ^^


Thanks again.

 

[LouPoir]

6600GT or 6800. Both super cards.

Lou

 

[bigpow]

6600GT is slower than plain 6800, but it has built-in WMVHD accelerator.
I'm willing to bet that Nvidia will release a newer 6800 with working Video processor too.
For now, 6600GT gets my vote.

 

[nitromullet]

Faster is always better, so if you're seriously willing to spend $300, go with the 6800.

 

[Caly]

He has a Dell LCD monitor actually. His native resolution is 1280x1024.

Is it me or is the Radeon X800 faster at that resolution?
Or does it not matter?

 

[CraigRT]

Caly, the X800 is faster than the 6600GT AND 6800NU, but also normally costs more like $400.
but if you can get one for $300, that is the card to get for that price.

 

[Caly]

Originally posted by: CraigRT
Caly, the X800 is faster than the 6600GT AND 6800NU, but also normally costs more like $400.
but if you can get one for $300, that is the card to get for that price.

Ok, thanks. Looks like I'll have to keep a sharp eye out for a great deal.

I just want to make sure that the computer he has can actually make the most of these cards?

Asus NForce2 A7N8X Deluxe
AMD ATHLON XP2500+333MHz
CORSAIR VS512MB400 3200 DDR
SAMSUNG SP0802N 80GB 7200 RPM
Dell 19in LCD 1280 X 1024

 

[fishmonger12]

for his display size, a 6800 or a 6600gt would match his system pretty well. if he had a smaller monitor he would be cpu bottlenecked with those cards.

 

[Snoop]

Originally posted by: Caly
I want to get a graphics card as a Valentine's day gift for my boyfriend.
Any suggestions? Lay them out and I'll research 'em.

I found this listing to be interesting-
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articl...ics-cards-2004_13.html

Thanks!

BTW, the benchmarks on that xbit article are way off. Try anandtech, firingsquad, or HardOCP for a more accurate and competant review.

 

[Caly]

Originally posted by: Snoop

BTW, the benchmarks on that xbit article are way off. Try anandtech, firingsquad, or HardOCP for a more accurate and competant review.

Thanks, I'll try to find these reviews.