New GFX Needed

[Willbo]

I'm looking to get a new graphics card for my rig.
I've got a budget of no more than £170 so I've been looking at the following;

BFG GeForce 8800 GTS OC2 640MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express)

HIS ATI Radeon HD 3870 XT ICEQ3 512MB GDDR4 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express)

HIS ATI Radeon HD 3870 XT ICEQ3 512MB GDDR4 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express)

I'm leaning more towards the nVidia, but I'm just wondering what you guys think.
I've got a 20" LCD at max resolution, play games such as Crysis etc and do photo editing.

 

[steve258]

Don't get the 8800GTS 640mb that's the old G80 version which performs worse than the new G92 8800GT and 8800GTS 512Mb.

I will recommend the 8800GT for your budget and I'm sure lots of other people will too. the 3870XT is good also though for less than £150 but it just doesn't quite keep up with 8800GT in majority of games.

 

[mattymaxx]

100% 8800GT 512mb!

Matt.

 

[Willbo]

Never noticed the S lol Oh well, so just looking at the GT versions, is there any preferrence or are they all the same? The two versions I picked out are the cheapest;

Gigabyte GeForce 8800 GT 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI

And the silent option;

Sparkle GeForce 8800 GT "Cool Pipe 3" 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI

 

[steve258]

Well it's upto you, I'd personally go with the cheapest there is but if you can't tolerate any noise then the extra might be worth it. Personally I can't hear anything from the card when the fan is at its default 29%