towzer

I'm in the process of building a games PC for a mate but am unsure what graphics card to go for. He's probably got a budget of £150.

Any advice/ideas are greatly appreciated.

Phil

Neil Smalley

ATI 9600 100-130 quid from Ebuyer. Currently it looks as though the Nvidia FX cards are pants at DirectX 9 games.


[Edited by Neil Smalley - 10/20/2003 6:16:35 PM]

jbryant

Get the Radeon 9600 Pro for that price. I've got the std 9600 version and regret it as that on my 2500Xp runs 3dMark slower than a friend's 9600 Pro on an 1800Xp! They're only about £30 over the standard 9600.

Silly me
Joolz

jase555

various options,

fx5600 ultra
radeon 9600 pro

or hang on a bit and try the 9600XT (faster than the pro)

or

look on ebay and try and pick up a 9700pro (there was a guy selling new got £165 last week)


basically a lot of people say nvidia crap blah blah, but there are not really any truly optimised dx9 games around, all of this based on benchmarks and stuff. So its basically your call.

Neil Smalley

Jase,

I'm not an ATI fanboy, but in all the DX9 games so far tested(Tomb Raider, HL2 etc etc) Nvida has been well behind. I suspect with seveal driver updates their cards will reach their full potential

jase555

yes but there is a big talk of some sort of optimisation on dx9.1 where the fx range will claw back some ground.

personally myself have had

gf 4 ti 4200,4400,4800se
radeon 8500,9500,9600,9600pro,9700

just about to get a fx5600 ultra, and basically with all the stuff i use it for cannot really comment much apart from scores on benchmarks.

All stuff i have needed to run has run

IMO

jase

Neil Smalley

Jase, I hope so. In the same way it was bad when Nvidia had it all their own way a couple of years back, it'll be just as bad for the consumer if ATI does the same.

stevebt

iTrader: (8)

ebay do the 9700 for £150