What card for under $200

Y

y0bailey

Gawd
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Mar 31, 2003
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I recently came into money and I want a new GFX card for gaming (mostly TF2). I am currently rocking the 7600gt and it is showing it's age very much so, and won't let me use my 24inch monitor to it's full potential.

I want to put about $200 into it. I checked out TomsHardWare guide (yuck) best bang for the buck card, but I don't trust those fools.

I have no preference between ATI or NVIDIA. I have no noise preference, I want the biggest cooler possible, and mainly just performance reliability.

What would you buy for $200?
 
9800gtx+ is just barely better than 4850 and doesn't have the overheating issues the same as the 4850. Just read about the 4850's average temp before any mods.

The 9800gtx+ is about ten to twenty dollars more but with lower temps so I would say its alot more reliable.
 
DaedalusHelios said:
9800gtx+ is just barely better than 4850 and doesn't have the overheating issues the same as the 4850. Just read about the 4850's average temp before any mods.

The 9800gtx+ is about ten to twenty dollars better but with lower temps I would say its alot more reliable.
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+1 to that
 
IMHO, go for either the AMD 4850 or the 9800 GTX+ if they are around the same price. They're both good cards and perform nicely.


The AMD 4850 does get a bit hotter, but that's mainly because of the setting AMD gave the fan. I believe there are tweaks or utilities around to increase the speed of the fan which increases the cooling effect quite nicely without too much added sound.


I have a 4850 and I couldn't be happier with it, a very big improvement over my 7600 GT. (I'm not using any tweaks for the fan though, I don't notice much regarding the heat, but I do have a good ventilated case and room.)

My friend bought a 9800 GTX+ and he also had a 7600 GT, he's also very happy with his card.

As I said above, both 9800 GTX+ and the AMD 4850 are great cards, see which one of the two you can get for the cheapest price. They won't disappoint.


EDIT: The AMD 4850 does have DirectX 10.1, the 9800 GTX+ has not. I'm not sure how much difference this can make in the future, but reading that you especially focus on TF, I think it doesn't really matter.
 
I *think* the overheating is just a fan speed setting which is fixable - we shall see when mine shows up. I'm just really interested in an ATI product since it's been forever since I used anything but Nvidia. :)
 
Nice.

so the 9800gtx+ vs. the 4850.

I have been on the green team for a long time, I think I may switch over to the red for a try.

Not to mention I can just bump up the fan speed and give a little overclock to a little more juice.

Thanks all....now I just need to find one with a nice cooling solution. Any suggestions there?
 
Buying a dirt cheap Artic S1 fixes the heat issues of 4850 for good. On top of that one can do easy pencil mod and clock the card to 4870 speeds easily. I have honestly not had more impressive card than 4850 in a long long time. But if green makes you warm an fuzzy, cannot think of anything bad with 9800gtx+ either :)
 
What about a GTX 260? With the rebates now you can get one for just barely over $200.
 
kjdocs said:
What about a GTX 260? With the rebates now you can get one for just barely over $200.
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that is probably the best bang for the buck there. the 9800GTX+ just doesn't make sense with the GTX260 were its at. and with the 4850 seen at 140 I don't see the 9800GTX+ unless you get pretty damn close in price
 
I am in 4850 camp. stock heatsink for 4850 is fine. these chips are not like CPU. they can get 100 celcius. you will need to do a fan speedup during gameplay.
 
HD 4850 or 9800 GTX. The only question is whether you prefer supporting ATI or Nvidia. There isn't a noticeable difference in actual performance between the two so that's about the only tipping point (other than the ATI is a bit cheaper and the Nvidia is a bit cooler running).
 
4850
1 PCIe connector
single slot cooler.
low power
direct X 10.1 (not sure about this)
current architecture


9800GTX
2 PCIe connectors
2 slot cooler
mid range power

If you assume equal performance then the question comes down to features. Arguments can be made for and against the ones listed. From a OEM standpoint, or upgrading older computers the 4850 is a slam dunk. for our purposes it doesn't matter so much. (I am sure most of our PSU have at least 2 PCIe cables) I still have to give this to the 4850. I would like a dual slot cooler though. Still my GTX280 is pretty nice
 
+1 for the 4850. I have one and it ROCKS, running the accelero s1 passive on it and it is silent.
 
The 4850 is the way to go. You can clock that sucker to 4870 speeds cause it is the same GPU, just crippled in the bios, and with slower memory. You can flash the bios and turn it into a 4870 and make use of the headroom. Just add better cooling. Even without flashing you can oc the GPU from 625 to 700 mhz and run it 24/7, a 12% increase in performance. Flashing can be risky, I killed my first 4850 after the 4th time I flashed it playing around with settings. It took ASUS about 2 weeks to RMA it, but hey I have 3 computers at home so I didn't miss it.
 
JUSTJOEL73 said:
The 4850 is the way to go. You can clock that sucker to 4870 speeds cause it is the same GPU, just crippled in the bios, and with slower memory. You can flash the bios and turn it into a 4870 and make use of the headroom. Just add better cooling. Even without flashing you can oc the GPU from 625 to 700 mhz and run it 24/7, a 12% increase in performance. Flashing can be risky, I killed my first 4850 after the 4th time I flashed it playing around with settings. It took ASUS about 2 weeks to RMA it, but hey I have 3 computers at home so I didn't miss it.
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That wouldn't make me want to run out and buy one personally. ;)
 
Originally Posted by Jefferdo

That wouldn't make me want to run out and buy one personally.
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Hey its all about value for money for me and there is no better value now then maybe the old GTX260s being liquidated at around $210 but thats a whole other price bracket.
 
9800gtx+ >>>> 4850
quiet dual slot cooler >>>>>> noisy single slot cooler
nvidia drivers >>>>> ati drivers
nvidia software >>>>>> ati software
better performance in games that matter >>>>> worse performance in games that matter
 
Yeah don't completely agree with previous posters comments, ever since the new ati drivers I have had no problems and before that I was having just as many problems with nvidia drivers as I was having with ati drivers, sig system, and a 9850 w8800gts512mb
I personally really like the single slot cooler because now my graphics cards dooesn't take up the whole case and cover over pci lanes. Plus now with rivatuner 2.10 you can adjust fan speeds, it does sound like a hurricane at 100% but it dropped my temps by 40 degrees celsius 81 to 41.
For around 150 4850 is a great deal plus good crossfire boards are a heck of a lot cheaper than a good sli board, so if you ever decide to upgrade.
My 2 cents, the 9800gtx+ is a good card but the 4850 has more going for it.
 
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