Graphics Cards

[Grosie]

OK. I currently have an ATI Raedon x600 graphics card installed on my machine (win XP SP2). The game runs, but only just. The graphics on the cut scenes look brill, but these are presumably pre-recorded as the game graphics look like a badly displaying edition of Tomb Raider. This leads me to beleive that the graphics card that I have is not powerful enough.

I went onto the NVidia website and did the 'Help Me Choose' thing for the GeForce Cards (I was told these were a good brand). The only one recommended for 'Play the latest PC Games' and under £50/$100, was the 'GeForce 8500 GT'. Great. But on my searchings through this forum, many people have said that this card isn't actually that good and wont run UT3 as well as can be acheived.
This makes no sense to me

So what do I do?

[MTL]

if you want to stick at the $100ish mark, then get what i have if you have pcix slot: 2600xt 512mb/ddr3
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814131066
the only issue i have with this card is that its not fully supported with AtiTrayTools [hell even CatalystControlCenter Overdrive], thus i have to use an AMD gpu tool to OC the card. The problem with this program is the OC is only good for the current session. If i restart, ill have to reapply my settings. Other than that, this game can run majority of all games on highest settings.

BUT, if you wanna stick with green company, try to aim for an 8600 series card. They are just a few FPS slower than a 2600xt.

[Grosie]

AtiTrayTools?

And this is?

And I am from the UK, so the 2600xt probably wouldn't get to me from the site you gave a link to.

[champdee]

get the newest 8800gts 512 mb card.. yes it isn't $100 but pc gaming just isn't cheap and will never be.. if you want to play to have to pay..

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814127314

get this one.. if you want a cheaper version goto newegg and search for 8800gts 512

[Benfica]

and under £50/$100

get the newest 8800gts 512 mb card.

I really needed an advice too. Ok, thanks



Edit: WTF?

[Benfica]

if you want to stick at the $100ish mark, then get what i have if you have pcix slot: 2600xt 512mb/ddr3

This a nice 2600XT too at 100$: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814102700

This thing plays Bioshock maxed @ 1600x1200. I was not expecting anything like that considering the price of this little card ...

[Ultron]

If you don't have a PCI-Express x16 slot, then your video card upgrade options are more limited.

What brand and model computer do you have? Example: HP Pavillion m7100e

[T@F]

How much you looking to spend??
I`m guessing around £50.
£25 more and you could get this one.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...-057-OK&tool=3

Not to bad for the price,and it should run ut3 good enough.

[edit]if you got an agp slot then this one is about the only one you can get within your price range.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...=56&subcat=411

[Grosie]

I'm running a Dell Dimension 5150. With PCI Express x16 slot (I'm pretty sure that's what it is)

How much you looking to spend??
I`m guessing around £50.
£25 more and you could get this one.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...-057-OK&tool=3

Not to bad for the price,and it should run ut3 good enough.

How reliable is this site? The same card is ~£85 on Amazon. [edit] Also around £125 on PC World! [/edit]
And yes, preferably around £50

[Ultron]

Ah get a 8600GT from EVGA if you can find it. Not as fast as the GTS, but in terms of bang for your buck, it's a better buy. It'll come pretty close to the performance of a GTS but for much cheaper.

[KriLL3.8™]

Ultron: it's really poor bang for your buck, spend a bit more for a 8800gt and you have 10x the performance.

[T@F]

I'm running a Dell Dimension 5150. With PCI Express x16 slot (I'm pretty sure that's what it is)



How reliable is this site? The same card is ~£85 on Amazon. [edit] Also around £125 on PC World! [/edit]
And yes, preferably around £50

It`s pretty good,i normally get all my hardware from there.

[edit]also there is this one within your price range.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...=56&subcat=912
or
http://www.play.com/PC/PCs/4-/336063...d/Product.html

But if you want to stay with ati i guess this one would do the job just as good.i think as i don`t know much about the ati cards
http://www.play.com/PC/PCs/4-/332632...d/Product.html

[Ultron]

Ultron: it's really poor bang for your buck, spend a bit more for a 8800gt and you have 10x the performance.

No in terms of price/performance an 8600GT is the best thing Nvidia offers right now. In terms of best performance it's the 8800GT. Almost anyone should be able to afford an 8600GT for about $120USD You'll spend more than twice that on an 8800GT and not everyone can afford that.

[mezlabor]

get the newest 8800gts 512 mb card.. yes it isn't $100 but pc gaming just isn't cheap and will never be.. if you want to play to have to pay..

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814127314

get this one.. if you want a cheaper version goto newegg and search for 8800gts 512

Have this card love it play ut3 on max settings with great fraemrates.
if you wanna go cheaper get an 8800 gt but nothing cheaper then the gt if you want to play games at good settings.

[Nacher]

I'd say the cheapest card that offers good UT3 performance is ATI Radeon 3850 256mb. It costs something like 170-190$ (?) and actually runs the game quite well. Not as well as GF8800GT, but way better than 8600GT or any GF 7xxx series. GF8600 isn't really good bang for your buck, but if you absolutely cannot afford anything better, GF8600GT will offer playable performance in UT3 with a modest price.