Thanks for your help SUO.
You are right the Gainward cards are Vanilla. I didn't think there would be a big difference between that and the Ultra and I thought it would be better to get the more memory.
When you say that I will only see a difference with more than 128MB would a 128 card run the next few releases at a good level with 256MB running them at max or would a 128 run at min with 256MB running at recommended. And in this respect would I be better to get a vanilla chip in order to get the 256MB memory.
There is a XFX 6800 chip 128MB i've seen that for around £210 would that be worth the extra £60 GBP.
Or I would even be tempted to pay £300 or so for a 6800GT with 256MB if I am going to get double the performance from it. (The others are all about £150). I just thought it was that price because it is new.
Another thing I am very aware of is that my LCD monitors are not designed for gaming and I don't want to spend loads on a graphics card that is sending out, say 80fps when it only looks like 40fps on the screen.
FYI: My favourite kind of games are 3rd person shooters, ie. Hitman, GTA3, Splinter Cell etc.
Another point I am hoping to get rid of my windows partition so I may not be able to run some of the just released games until they work in winex ( although at present I play all games on an old win98 partition because I haven't got around to installing winex so I don't know how good it is!)
What is the disadvantage with passive cooling? why don't all cards have it do you need to compensate by having a massive fan on your case. I really like the idea of having no fan because for the next few months my PC will be in my bedroom and I don't want to have to shut it down to get to sleep. Note I am currently looking at the Lian Li quiet case.
http://www.thinkgeek.com/pcmods/cases/6132/
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Clive