What video card to buy?

[Liquidsnake]

I will give you a rundown of w2hat I use my computer for........I do play games on it, here and there, such as Age of empires, use the internet alot, I have a TV TUNER on it, which I will be using more often now, but I need a new video card, it leaves a nasty green tint on my computer, and the fan is going out (an annoying sound on it). I AM GUESSING this is my problem. I am wondering what type of card, I DONT want to spend an arm and a leg, would buy a used one if it was a good buy, but looking to spend less than $100. I know thats not alot. I will tell ya the card I have in there when I go home. I am sure it's an Asus card..I THINK....it costed quite a bit I think, a friend put the PC together for me. Thanks again for your time.

[geokilla]

What's your specs for the computer?

[Liquidsnake]

Please bare with me, as I am at work (PC at home) and I am a newb when it comes to that;) Haha. Trying to learn though.


I have windows XP Pro
2 GIG ram
500 GB Hard Drive
19" LCD Flat Screen ACER
Asus A8N-SLI - MB
PowerSupply - Hiper Type R Series 580W

Working on the rest of the Specs, just hard to do at work, haha.

[Skippman]

Proc would be nice. Given your board is an SLI, an nVidia card seems to be your best choice.

[Liquidsnake]

What what type? Haha, like I said, I am not much of an equipment junky when it comes to computers. I have been reading on them all day, found several for about 59.99 on TigerDirect or NewEgg, but not sure what type would work best with what I have. What does SLI mean:) Knowledge is great!

[Liquidsnake]

NM, i found out what SLI was;) Here is a few cards I was looking at....am I on the right track?

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... CatId=1839

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... CatId=1839

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... CatId=1839

[vicaphit]

I would splurge a little bit and go for the 9600GSO or GT

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814150320
Right now you get $30 off (not a rebate) and free shipping. $79.99 for a card with 768MB of memory, and XFX is an awesome company.

Newegg is a great place to shop, so take a look at what they have, and sign up for the email offers because things can get really cheap, and you don't want to miss out.

[Major_A]

I think the better of the buys for the price would be this HD 3870 for $75 after MIR.

[Liquidsnake]

From the reviews that one on NEW EGG the Radion, seemed to be quite noisey.

[Major_A]

Get ATiTool or something similar and turn the fan speed down.

[skier]

i got 9600GSO's and LOVE them, one $80 9600GSO gets almost the performance of a $170 8800GTS, the 8600 series is not worth the money, and the 8800 series is more expensive than it's worth now, 9600 series is the way to go

Id get that GSO linked above quick, because it's one of the few remaining ones with 96 stream processors(which is is more SP's than the 9600GT which is great for performance), because the new 9600GSOs are now going to be based off a new core, with only 48 SPs

[Liquidsnake]

XFX PVT96OSDFH GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB 192-bit GDDR2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Retail

That is what I bought. I am guessing with all your knowledge, I will be okay running that on my computer with my power supply and motherboard.

[skier]

yep, you should be fine

[Major_A]

XFX PVT96OSDFH GeForce 9600 GSO 768MB 192-bit GDDR2 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Retail

That is what I bought. I am guessing with all your knowledge, I will be okay running that on my computer with my power supply and motherboard.

Post count doesn't necessarily mean knowledge. But congrats on the new card.
9600GSO review with HD 3870 results

[vicaphit]

Keep in mind that he has an SLI board, so he may want to go GeForce now instead of having to buy 2 cards down the road if thats the way he wants to go.

[hercules71185]

Age of empires does use a lot of CPU and GPU, so you might get a bottleneck if you have a slow processor.

[skier]

Age of empires does use a lot of CPU and GPU, so you might get a bottleneck if you have a slow processor.

well, since it's socket 939, i'd imagine the CPU's gonna be the bottleneck, but at least you can hold onto this card for a couple years even if you choose to upgrade the CPU/Motherboard

[hercules71185]

true, I was very surprised when I saw results someone posted using the 9600 series. I figured it would be stronger than the 8600, but, I didn't expect it to rival the 8800 series

[martini161]

my 9600gt doesnt even begin to compare to my 8800gt

[skier]

martini, what did your 9600gt get in 3dmark06?

(and yes i'm fully aware that your system as a whole is different, and can't be a 100% comparison)