Video Card

[Antiochene]

I am looking for a video card from Best Buy. I have a gift card from there that will pay for the bulk of it. I have three that I am considering.

1.) BFG - NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTS OC Graphics Card for $159.99.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1195600207509

2.) PNY - NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT 512MB PCI Express Graphics Card for $149.99

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1202650464792

3.) VisionTek - ATI RADEON HD3870 OC 512MB GDDR4 PCI Express Graphics Card for $149.99

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1203815034383

Which one would you recommend and why?

[Blite]

I think you can eliminate the 8800 GTS from the conversation completely. It performs similar to the 9600 GT, however uses more power, runs hotter, and is more expensive.

It really comes down to the 9600 GT and the 3870, and I'm going with the 9600 GT based on value. Both of these cards also are very similar in performance, the 3870 comes out ahead in raw performance if you are running lower settings, and the 9600 GT comes out ahead with settings like AA/AF on. However, with that, why are you upgrading if you don't want to make the game look better. Plus, Nvidia has better drivers than ATI, historically and recently, and you have access to PhysX, which the ATI card doesn't have, also adding making games look better.

Therefore at the same pricepoint, the 9600 GT is the better value.

[Wolvan]

Here is some info for you, grouped by price:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...card,2064.html

I did an online search of bestbuy.com and found:
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1218006355798

Its a 9800 GT with 1 gig ram for $130, though its currently back ordered. Bestbuy doesn't have the best selection of video cards unfortunately.

Look for sale prices, a 9600 GT like your's above on Bestbuy.com for $120. You might be able to find more card for the money if you shop around little bit and look for sales. Call stores to see what they got in stock. Plus they can price match to other retailers (like Circuit City etc...they will not match newegg)

On Newegg there is a GTX 260 on sale for $200 even, but I understand the gift card for best buy.

I also like Nvidia over ATI for the frequently updated drivers plus alot of the industry has sided with Nvidia it seems. And they have PhyX and CUDA on the newer cards, that while are not big yet are coming in the next year and beyond. Getting a card with 1 gig Ram will help out alot over 512 meg.

[dumpsterdan]

look at newegg they usually have the best prices and deals.

[Wolvan]

He's got a large gift card from Best Buy which is why he's buying it there. Though they frequently have online only sails from Best Buy with additional products you can't find in stores and should still be able to use the gift card for.

Check Frys.com for pricematching too.

[Drakhon]

I also like Nvidia over ATI for the frequently updated drivers plus alot of the industry has sided with Nvidia it seems. And they have PhyX and CUDA on the newer cards, that while are not big yet are coming in the next year and beyond.

ATI has 12 driver releases per year. Typically they're one per month, but that is not a requirement.

PhysX is more mature on a hardware basis, but Havok (which is supported by ATI but not owned by them) is just as prevalent as a physics engine on the high-end titles: the Source engine, Starcraft 2, Diablo 3, Company of Heroes (and I assume Dawn of War 2), Fallout 3, and others.

When it comes to these types of things, it is rarely the hardware-specific implementation that comes out on top. It will likely be OpenCL and/or DirectX 11 that become the standards for GPGPU programming rather than CUDA or ATI Stream. Once those are more prevalent, Havok or PhysX could run on any of the hardware if they want them to.

Of course, the purpose of this thread is to talk about what to do now, not later. Right now, with a specific price point, it's best to go with the card with the best performance at that price with the settings you use (resolution, AA, AF) and not worry about those extra features. If the price point was retained but the Best Buy requirement was removed, you can get a 1GB HD4850 for ~$150. Of course, that doesn't work in this situation because his price point is based on the gift card value.

Given the specific limitation of purchasing from Best Buy, I would concur with the 9800GT recommendation, however.

Getting a card with 1 gig Ram will help out alot over 512 meg.

It only has a minor effect unless you're running at high resolutions (maybe 1680, but definitely 1920+) with some AA/AF, at least at this point.

[Fhuul]

The 9800 GT runs WAR great, that's what's in the Notwife's machine.

[Antiochene]

Thanks for the info guys I ordered the 9800 gt today.

[Chrysanthe]

You ordered the 9800 GT instead of the 9600 GT? Good call. The 9600 GT has had a lot of problems. You can run a search on it and find all kinds of stuff about the massive issues, mostly regarding extremely low fps.

http://forums.nvidia.com/index.php?s...5&#entry399995

http://www.overclock.net/graphics-ca...9600gt-oc.html

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...69237448&sid=1

http://www.incrysis.com/forums/viewtopic.php?pid=405694

[Antiochene]

I finally got it last night. It was on backorder. I put it in and it is running great so far. I need to test it in oRVR because that is where i got most of my lag at.