i need advice: 8500 128mb for $160 or ti4200 128mb for $180

[tefunk]

I have two choices right now. I have a retail Radeon 8500 128mb card coming in tomorrow that I bought for $160. Now I'm thinking about returning the Radeon and getting an Inno3d Ti4200 128mb card for $180. I'm not going to pay for the shipping back to buy.com so the question at hand is: it worth paying $20 more for the ti4200? If not $20 more how bout $10? Cuz I can get the ti4200 for $170 shipped ground, comes in on Monday but I am feeling impatient and might pay extra $10 for second day air.

 

[spanky]

if u're a gamer, get the ti200.

 

[Calygula]

I think I would choose the 8500 - it's not exactly as fast as the Ti4200 but I love the Video Out of this card! But if you're not planning to use this feature - stick with the Ti4200.

 

[BFG10K]

The Ti4200 is the better card unless you really need the extra (non-gaming) features that the Radeon provides.

 

[Dean]

I was also in the market for a 4200. Until I read this review here. That Radeon keeps getting better and better with each driver release and it smacks around the 4200 more than the 4200 smacks it around. It even hangs tough with the 4400 and 4600. When it first came out I thought it was junk but i've changed my mind now.

Dean

 

[Cadaver]

I bought my Radeon 8500 128MB (retail, not the LE version) from buy.com for $146 + shipping.
With a little tweaking and the latest Catalyst drivers, I'm consistantly getting over 9730 in 3DMark2001SE. I might even try o/c'ing a little more to see if I can break 10K...
That's only a hair slower than the Ti 4200, and I can run 4x ansio filtering with zero speed hit.
Plus, the 2D and DVD image quality is fantastic.
For the price I paid, it's unbeatable. I also won't feel like I've lost a lot of $$ if I choose to upgrade to a NV30 or R300 sometime in the near future, either.

 

[Mingon]

I have the inno3d geforce 4 ti 4200, the 2d is faultless, mpeg 1,2,4 playback is excellent and 3d performance aint too sad (10k with an xp2000 in 3dmark 2001). The card runs at 300/500 easily and could probably run higher but I dont want to totally kill the memory so its running at 300/460 at the moment (water cooled gpu). The choice between the cards is very fine, either will last at least 18 months, you wont be dissapointed no matter what.

 

[tefunk]

For those looking at ti4200's I just ordered the Aopen Aeolus 128mb card for $166 from gameve.com, shipped Fed Ex Saver free, and turned out to be $180 after CA taxes. There really isn't much stuff online about this card but I decided to get it after going to Sharky Forums and searching for Aopen and reading a few threads about how some of them were being memory clocked to 590. Also it comes clocked from Aopen at 500 not the standard 444. I'll report back my results after I get it this week.