[Newbie Question] Which Video Card Should I Get?

[GDP]

Sorry for the newbie question. I'm sure you guys get them a lot, so I'll make it short:

What I need:

• Around $150
• 128 MB memory
• Card that won't be completely outdated in a year, something I can keep for a few years and not have to replace because it can't handle what I throw at it. I play RtCW: Enemy Territory.
• Reliability and good tech support.

Another forum recommended the 9600 XT, New Egg has a Sapphire for $165.00.

I'm willing to overclock the card.

 

[Jeff7181]

Technically, anything you can get for $150 right now is already outdated... but your best bet would be a 9600 Pro or 9600XT... the 5700 Ultra looks like it could be a good bargain too, but I'm not sure about the pricing... haven't looked recently.

 

[xSkyDrAx]

Well techincally if you stuck to the games you have now, and not play future games, then sure a 150 card would do. A 9800 or 5900 would last longer, but cost more. I would assume that the 9600XT would last till probably the end of next year or earlier? Well as long as games like Hl2 and Doom3 keep coming out and raising the bar...then don't expect it to last that long.

 

[Blackroot]

I would get a 5900, they dropping down if you would fish out another 30 or so, you could get same card in my sig, which i hope(crosses Fingers) will last me at least a year and 1/2.

 

[GDP]

I'm not a gamer by any means. I've scraped by for years with my Hercules 3D Prophet II MX.

I just want something decent.

 

[videoclone]

yeah you should look for a good price on an ATI9600 Pro .... make sure the ram is clocked fast around 600Mhz and it has a 128Bit memory bus and you should be set

Dont get the 256MB 9600 Pro's cause they have slow ram another thing you may want too look at is a Geforce4Ti4200 128MB card it will last you just as long as the 9600Pro will and will be even cheaper ..... so it looks like the better choice! for you to get .. either card will be 3 times faster then the one you have right now

 

[Vonkhan]

get a 9500pro/9600pro ... or get a soft-moddable 9500np

 

[Corporate Thug]

9600 pro

 

[McArra]

Originally posted by: shady06
9600 pro

 

[GDP]

Originally posted by: shady06
9600 pro

Why not the XT?

 

[Matthias99]

Because it's like $50 more and doesn't go much faster? It does come with [a coupon for] HL2, though. But some of the ATI RADEON 9600Pro cards also do (the ones produced after a certain date).

 

[GtPrOjEcTX]

if you're not a gamer, save your money and find a GF4 TI4200 or the like for ~$70. it will perform just about the same as a ATI 9600

 

[Quixfire]

I would recommend the ATI 9600 Pro, it works very well for me.

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: GDP
I'm not a gamer by any means. I've scraped by for years with my Hercules 3D Prophet II MX.

I just want something decent.

maybe try and find a 9500?

 

[INemtsev]

RAdeon 9800SE is quite cheap and I heard overclockable...

 

[GDP]

Originally posted by: INemtsev
RAdeon 9800SE is quite cheap and I heard overclockable...

I heard the 9800SE sucks.

In benchmark tests, the 9600 Pro didn't even outperform the 9500 XT. The 9600 XT does outperform the 9500 XT.

EDIT: Just because I'm not a gamer, doesn't mean I don't play games and don't enjoy high quality video. I just don't want to spend too much on something like a 9800 Pro. Too much IMO.

 

[GDP]

TTT

 

[xSauronx]

id get a 9600 pro

i still use a gf3, its aging fast though (plays ET fine, btw)

ill wait a f ewmonths and see if doom/hl2 come out for my birthday in april, whether they do or not ill get a card then. no sense to wait forever and by then $150 should get something a bit better than a 9600 pro

if youre not a heavy gamer the 9600 pro should do you fine for a while, its not a bad card, just not top of the line.

 

[VIAN]

I'd go for FX 5700 Ultra. Just under $200 and it can woop ass in OpenGL compared 9600 Pro, XT.

Just check out this benchmark of the 5700 Ultra wooping ass in Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory.

Save your money and buy this card.

And make sure speed is:

475 for core
900 for memory

 

[cindy22]

that article was using nvidia's forceware cheat drivers on oct.23,2003 ,3dmark03 came out with a patch
to prevent cheats on nov.11,2003 any articles not disabling cheats are not valid because in real games with accurate image the scores will be much different

go for ati's 9500 pro ,9600 pro or 9600xt if you want midrange cards otherwise 9800 pro or 9800xt are the best cards for recent and future games and are full directx 9 compliant that's why they do so much better in directx 9 than nvidia

nvidia is not full directx 9 compliant and has problems running games using directx 9 decently with aa and af
that means recent games using some or all of directx 9 features and future directx 9 games will run poorly on nvidia

why buy new a card when you can only play older games at decent speed and in the next couple of months with more newer directx 9 titles coming out you will most likely have to upgrade again if you want to play those new games

check it out at:

http://english.bonusweb.cz/interviews/carmackgfx.html

or

http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NTE5

or

http://www.techconnect.ws/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2874

 

[cindy22]

all ati cards except their low end 9000 or 9200 models nowadays play faster than their competition with ati's outstanding image quality
especially when you crank up all the eye candy up

in almost all scores with aa and af enabled ati 9800xt pulls way ahead sometimes almost double the speed as nvidia's 5950 fx ultra


this article review was dated on oct.23,2003 using nvidia's drivers without disabling cheats or optimizing in them using more recent games

remember to look at the scores with aa and af enabled ,that's important because if you plan to buy a midrange to high end cards you should be atleast be able to play at decent speeds with aa and af on

check it out at:

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/fx5950ultra-9800xt_10.html

 

[cindy22]

Here's another review on nvidia 5700fx and ati 9600xt with directx 9 games
again look at the scores with aa and af enabled

this article was reviewed on nov.3,2003 .Cheat and optimizing was not disabled so imagine the real scores when nvidia's forceware drivers were patched to prevent cheats or optimizing the scores will then be up to 30% slower for nvidia's 5700fx while ati's 9600xt stays the same

9600xt wins almost all scores with direct 9 games especially using aa and af with some scores almost doubling nvidia's 5700xt

nvidia 5700xt does fairly well winning some loosing some when using games and benchmarks with the older directx 8.1

check it out at :

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/fx5700ultra-9600xt_16.html


so if you plan to play older games using directx 8.1 and must get nvidia get the 5700xt or 5900

but if you plan to play more recent and future directx 9 games using aa and af with good speeds also wth excellent image quality ,what ati's known for.Then get a 9600xt or 9800xt ,even when playing older direct 8.1 games ,9600xt still plays fairly well

 

[Atlantean]

Get the 9600xt it comes with a coupon for half life 2.

 

[VIAN]

that article was using nvidia's forceware cheat drivers on oct.23,2003 ,3dmark03 came out with a patch
to prevent cheats on nov.11,2003 any articles not disabling cheats are not valid because in real games with accurate image the scores will be much different

Ahem, it is a cheat becaues it is used only in the benchmark. There drivers are good and are distributed by nVidia.

nvidia is not full directx 9 compliant and has problems running games using directx 9 decently with aa and af
that means recent games using some or all of directx 9 features and future directx 9 games will run poorly on nvidia

nVidia is more than fully DX9 compliant and that is the reason it runs slower in DX9.

http://english.bonusweb.cz/interviews/carmackgfx.html

The Geforce FX has higher precision quality than the Radeon 9x00. This why it's so slow - too many calculations. You cannot test the card to be on par with ATi's card because they support different things like ATI's card supports 24-bit precision while nVidia's card supports 16,32-bit so too much loss in precision or too slow. You pick, oooh sorry, not up to you.

http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NTE5

Not all DX9 games perform this badly. Seems like the HL2 guy is siding a little too much with ATi. That is the worst DX9 performance I've seen from nVidia and nowhere else does it exist.

http://www.techconnect.ws/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2874

This was proven wrong in your other thread dubbed Nvidia is cheating again... and you still keep on posting this.

remember to look at the scores with aa and af enabled ,that's important because if you plan to buy a midrange to high end cards you should be atleast be able to play at decent speeds with aa and af on

Hah, on a midrange card, so the next game you buy you have to turn it off. AA & AF serve best on high-end cards.

And he plays an OpenGL game, where Nvidia excels at. He isn't much of a gamer, so I assume it's his favorite game and tell him where to get a good graphics card for his game.

Remember, buy Video cards for games out right now, planning for the future is not a bright idea. It doesn't work with computers. That's why the talk of such things appear - there is hope isn't there.

(cough)

Why are you so uptight about nVidia anyway. nVidia is a good graphics company and so is ATI, nVidia just made some mistakes. The geforce FX is a powerful card - more powerful than any 9x00, but there are obvious things slowing it down. Like pipelines. And the fact that it has greater precision. ATI just happened to be pussy whipped by MS and nVidia didn't.

Getting HL2 with the 9600 XT is also a plus. If you look at my previous link, the 5700 Ultra does very well against the 9600 XT. See, you can't even trust Sites anymore. They all put out different things. But if you trust Anandtech, and I assume you do cause that's why you're here, Anandtech rated the 5700 Ultra better than the 9600 XT.

 

[Acanthus]

Originally posted by: GDP

Originally posted by: INemtsev
RAdeon 9800SE is quite cheap and I heard overclockable...

I heard the 9800SE sucks.

In benchmark tests, the 9600 Pro didn't even outperform the 9500 XT. The 9600 XT does outperform the 9500 XT.

EDIT: Just because I'm not a gamer, doesn't mean I don't play games and don't enjoy high quality video. I just don't want to spend too much on something like a 9800 Pro. Too much IMO.

While the 9800SE does suck pretty bad, theres no such thing as a 9500XT