Recommend me a Graphics Card

[C']

Seems my current card is dieing (weird artefacts appearing on screen and glitching massively when displaying 3D objects). Had my PC over 3 and a half years now and this problem first showed up almost 2 years back. Back then the machine was under warranty and I got the graphics card replaced like for like, but the warranty has no expired plus I think It's time I upgraded.

However, my knowledge of PC things has all but evapourated over the years so have no idea what I should be aiming for. My current card is an 128Mb ATI Radeon 9800 Pro which I believe was very good back in 2003 so would ideally like something as good now as that was back then. Not sure what kind of prices I'm looking at but can probably budget up to ?250. Also, I presume DVI-out is standard these days but would need that is not.

Thanks

[briareos_kerensky]

So, I guss your PC is an AGP machine...the 7600GS from nVidia or the X800GTO from Ati are your best choices. You can also pick up a X1600, which is more technologically advanced that the X800 (Pixel Shaders 3.0), but the X800 has more brute strenght.
Or you can try to underclock the graphic card or swap the heat sink/fan assembly for a new one to see what happens.

[talizker]

Hey ^_^

With a 9800Pro at the moment i'm asuming you have just got AGP on your motherboard. This somewhat limits your options so I would recommend a NVidia 7600 GT which can be had for ?120-?140 ish. If you want to stick with ATI then there are several cards in the Radeon X1600 range but I understand that these fall somewhat short of the 7600 GT in performance.

An AGP 7600 GT will likely offer 1 x DVI and 1 x VGA.

[C']

I am using the AGP port at the moment. The motherboard I am using does have PCI slots but I was under the impression that AGP was better so I?m assuming the comments about AGP limiting me means that there is something better I could be using.

Cheers for the tips. I?ll be checking them today.

[talizker]

AGP is better than the old PCI but PCI Express is where the cutting edge graphics technology is today but obvioulsy you would have to look at a new board/rig to go PCIe. The GeForce 7600 GT in both PCIe and AGP flavors represents the best price/performance board at the moment (DirectX9).

[VR46]

yes, a PCI Express slot is the next step up from AGP.

EDIT: beaten to it.

[C']

See? Like I said. Completely out of the loop in terms of PC tech. Thanks again

[eastyy]

I think ati and nvidia have release agp versions of some of there cards (pretty sure there is ati x850 agp version)

Would give a boost not a huge amount though

[gunrock]

I have an AGP 850XT and it rocks! However, the fan is pretty loud and it's not shader 3.0 compliant, so I get fantastic framerates at excellent resolutions in Oblivion, but I miss out on the fancy lighting. Still looks great to me, though!

[bootmonster]

sorry to piggy back this thread, but im also thinkin about getting an agp 7600gs/gt. is it worth getting the official nvidia one or are third party ones ok? my local comp shop http://www.pless.co.uk are doing what seems like a good deal on the gs, although it is branded as bfg?

http://www.pless.co.uk/product.php?popup=on&productid=1268&printable=y

whats the recommendations, can i get it cheaper and is there a shop i can actually walk into in glasgow, as prefer to do that to buying online if poss, just waited 3 weeks on a dvd drive, lol.