What graphics card to buy?

Yucca · 30 Mar 2006 at 21:07

Im building a new pc and want to know whats what in the graphics card market at the mo.

Without starting a war...shall i go for ATI or NVIDIA? Which ones bang for buck at the moment.

Whats the best card in the £130-£160 range? Whats the best card in the £160-£200 range and whats best if i am prepaared to go up to £250?

Basically, whats the bang for buck, omg what an amazing deal, buy at the moment?

Sparky · 30 Mar 2006 at 21:09

PCI-E or AGP?

chaparral · 30 Mar 2006 at 21:10

Take your pick between the nvidia 7900gt and ati x1800xt cards in your up to £250 range..

If your thinking of running a SLI or crossfire setup later then i say get the nvidia 7900gt...ATI x1800xt master cards maybe very hard to find later on and very pricey.

fenderbass86 · 30 Mar 2006 at 21:11

£130-£160 - GeForce 7600 GT 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £119.95 (£140.94 Including VAT at 17.5%)

£160-£200 - ATI Radeon X1800 XT 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £169.95 (£199.69 Including VAT at 17.5%)

£200-£250 - GeForce 7900 GT 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £199.95 (£234.94 Including VAT at 17.5%)

Vegeta · 30 Mar 2006 at 21:14

fenderbass86 said:
£130-£160 - GeForce 7600 GT 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £119.95 (£140.94 Including VAT at 17.5%)

£160-£200 - ATI Radeon X1800 XT 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £169.95 (£199.69 Including VAT at 17.5%)

£200-£250 - GeForce 7900 GT 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £199.95 (£234.94 Including VAT at 17.5%)

What he said, i'm sure 1900xtx we're going under £300 recently? If you can find one for under £300 that would be good.

chaparral · 30 Mar 2006 at 21:19

looking round at the prices both ATI x1800xt 256mb and Nvidia 7900gt 256mb can be had for £179 ex vat (£210 including vat)

Yucca · 30 Mar 2006 at 21:26

PCI E. What about the ocuk 7900, any good?

chaparral · 30 Mar 2006 at 21:29

Yucca said:
PCI E. What about the ocuk 7900, any good?

All 7900gt cards are the same apart from the sticker for different brands and different length warranty's.

Apart from the highend asus one that uses a bigger heatsink cooler.

But XFX & BFG normally keep a higher resale value then some the other brands.

fenderbass86 · 30 Mar 2006 at 21:36

Go with the XFX.

Rob43 · 30 Mar 2006 at 21:37

BFG tend to keep a bit better value because of the lifetime warranty

amdnv · 30 Mar 2006 at 21:43

All card aint the same, Nvidia dont make them apart from ref cards, the manu gets the pcb, in their own colour/spec, they are told whats core and spec of ram and if vivo etc allowed, they then fit all that plus there own brand choice mosfets/caps etc etc, thats why some makes are better than others and have slightly different caps etc although same values, but they have guidelines to stick by from Nvidia as i have said.

Dont kid yourself on that a PNY is as good as a say Leadtek/gainward/evga/chaintech.

Yucca · 3 Apr 2006 at 16:48

THe BFG GeForce 7900 GT OC 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-018-BG) seems to be a good buy at £146. Its a few quid more than the ocuk one but its got lifetime warrenty.

Am i correctin saying that if i buy the above BFG card that 1) its one of the best avalable and the only card better is a £300+ x1900 and the expencive 7900gtx cards and 2) That it will destroy pritty much any game i throw at it.

Also I can get a x800tx for that price, will that be better or worse.

If i buy the above BFG card and want to run an SLI set up later, what do i need to do, just buy another one of the same card and thats it?

ajgoodfellow · 3 Apr 2006 at 16:52

Yucca said:
THe BFG GeForce 7900 GT OC 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-018-BG) seems to be a good buy at £146. Its a few quid more than the ocuk one but its got lifetime warrenty.

Yep. Bare in mind that if you change the cooler this is void!

Yucca said:
Am i correctin saying that if i buy the above BFG card that 1) its one of the best avalable and the only card better is a £300+ x1900 and the expencive 7900gtx cards and 2) That it will destroy pritty much any game i throw at it.

The 7900GT is a good card, performing on par with the X1800XT 256MB. As it's overclocked it should be the same, if not a little faster than the X1800XT 512MB (and, of course, the 7800GTX 256MB).

The 7800GTX 512MB is better but difficult to get hold of and way over priced. The next step up would be the 7900GTX or the X1900XT, both of which are far more expensive

Yucca said:
Also I can get a x800tx for that price, will that be better or worse.

Do you mean the X1800XT or the X800XT?

The X1800XT is about the same, not much in it really. Both would completely destroy the X800XT - this is a previous gen card

Yucca said:
If i buy the above BFG card and want to run an SLI set up later, what do i need to do, just buy another one of the same card and thats it?

Yep that's it

Yucca · 3 Apr 2006 at 17:14

So would i be better of getting a x1800xt that is cheaper seen as its going to be the same speed?

The Sapphire ATI Radeon X1800 XT 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI is about £40 cheaper and the HIS Excalibur ATI Radeon X1800 XL 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI and Connect3D ATI Radeon X1800 XT 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) are cheaper to.

So which ones best? Do i pay extra for the nvidia card or will the above ones preform just as well and save me £50 odd?

And what about the PowerColor ATI Radeon X1800 XT 512MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-048-PC)?

Surly that would be a better buy as its simular preformance (according to what you have said) and also 512 ram?

Im stuck now?!

ajgoodfellow · 3 Apr 2006 at 17:18

If it's cheaper yes

Any make will be fine really - Sapphire is considered to be one of the better makes so it's a bonus if it's cheaper!

If you can go for the X1800XT 512MB - I would. It performs about the same at 1024x768 and lower and edges ahead at 1280x1024 and starts to create a large lead at higher resolutions

If you want to play with maximum texture detail and plenty of AA and AF then the 512MB card would be worth the extra

Cyber-Mav · 3 Apr 2006 at 17:47

xfx 7900gt can be had for £199 inc vat and free delivery is you look hard enough.

The Running Man · 3 Apr 2006 at 18:38

long lead time though, not available till end of the month

kbc · 3 Apr 2006 at 18:59

Yucca said:
And what about the PowerColor ATI Radeon X1800 XT 512MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-048-PC)?

If I had the choice between this card for the same price as the BFG 7900GT, I'd opt for the one quoted. It has 512MB of video RAM onboard and the BFG may have a lifetime warranty - the overclock is very minor compared to stock.

Personally, the BFG is slightly overpriced - but people will still pay for the brand. I managed to get hold of the XFX GeForce 7900 GT XXX Edition for a fraction more than the BFG price.

thedemon13666 · 3 Apr 2006 at 21:28

you should bite the bullet and buy a geforce 7900GTX 512 mb

Yucca · 4 Apr 2006 at 18:05

Would there be a huge difference between a x800xtpe which i can get for £150 and the £250 card were discussing above?

I want to play games such at HL2 and Doom3, Call of Duty 2 ect ect at 1280*1024 with high graphics with a bit of AA and AF. Wont the x800xtpe do this?