so...2 pcs recently died.
did buy a used one now, since i dont have the money to build a new one from scratch.

the system atm is:

CPU: intel Q8200

Ram: 4 GB 800 MHZ

OS: win 7 64bit

GPU: radeon hd 3610

obviously...the real downside of this pc is the GPU.
my budget is about 100€.
id prefer to get nvidia just because i simply have had quite a few problems with ati.
never had that with nvidia.

so, can anyone tell me a card that is somewhat decent with a pricetag this "low"?

I'd say GTS250

A nice small card, packs a nice amount of power in it.

something like that then?
http://www.mindfactory.de/prod ... e-GTS-250-GDDR3-PCIe.html

Yep.

That card might even be a little too much for the configuration u have atm. But thats not a bad thing. GTS250 is a re-make of the 9800GTX+ wich is a decent card already.

It will be able to run all modern games on playable framerates.

Edit: I forgot u have Q8200, so it wont be too much. Eh :3

I'd rather get GTX 260 for a bit more (115 instead of 100 EUR).

Quote from hazaky :

Yep.

That card might even be a little too much for the configuration u have atm. But thats not a bad thing. GTS250 is a re-make of the 9800GTX+ wich is a decent card already.

It will be able to run all modern games on playable framerates.

Edit: I forgot u have Q8200, so it wont be too much. Eh :3

atm im only limited by the gpu....when i played mafia the fps were like...15.
setting graphics to the lowest and res too i get around 50.
and havent seen more than 50% cpu usage yet.

the only cards really worth having at that sort of price point are the ati 5770 or for a bit more an nvidia 460

Quote from hazaky :

I'd say GTS250

A nice small card, packs a nice amount of power in it.

a 3 year old hunk of crap more like

well, the reason i kinda stay away from ati a bit is that i had quite some problems in the past.
i couldnt get any physx game running at all (had a radeon hd4850).

kinda sucks when 70% of todays games use it

hm did you have an nvidia card in that system before and installed the ati without a full driver removal or format? im not sure if ive tried at all to run a physx game on my current 4870 but the only way i could imagine it being a problem (other than that the game is badly programmed) at all is if there are old nvidia drivers lurking around in the system trying to run physx in cuda mode on the non existant nvidia card

nah...that was a system build from scratch...all brand new parts.
but thats history anyway.
ive been told that physx support with ati is done by the cpu...so it should work either.
may have had a dodgy cpu then.

id guess it must have been a broken installation of the physx drivers
apparently quite a few games that ive tried on my card run with physx (although i cant tell you if i had it turned on or not or if all/any of them even supported physx in cpu mode)
either way i experienced no problems with any of them

Quote from Shotglass :

the only cards really worth having at that sort of price point are the ati 5770 or for a bit more an nvidia 460



a 3 year old hunk of crap more like

You're probably saying it only because its on DX10, not DX11. So its a really old and bad card now, no? Quit taking pills and make your facts straight.

Quote from hazaky :

You're probably saying it only because its on DX10, not DX11. So its a really old and bad card now, no? Quit taking pills and make your facts straight.

no im saying it because its an 8800 series card thats been rebranded twice

and why are 8800's bad? i had a 8800GT and it gave me nothing but joy. it's still working to this day. not what i would call a heap of junk.


is it just the 8800 or are you talking about the whole 8series? because a 6600GT(AGP) was the same as a 7600GT(AGP/PCI-E), which is the same as a 8600GT(PCI-E with dx10 support) and a 9600GT(PCI-E with less power requirements). the story goes on. it seems that the 460GTX(DX11 support) (fermi) is the way to go. two of those in SLI out-perform the GTX480. the GTX5 series are the same card as the GTX4 series but they use less power.

Quote from dadge :

and why are 8800's bad? i had a 8800GT and it gave me nothing but joy. it's still working to this day. not what i would call a heap of junk.

theres nothing wrong with the 8 series of cards in fact is was (emphasis on the past tense) a great series of cards
paying money for a 3 or 4 generation old card that pretends to be last gen hardware (despite having almost nothing whatsoever in common with the 200 generation architecture) however is very very bad

The HD5770 is around that price here. It is slightly slower (maybe the same with todays drivers). You won't notice it unless you are gaming on an extreme high resolution anyways I think. The 5770 has DX11 . So I'd say; if you want a more future-proof card, with more features, and most importantly, alot lower power usage, take the 5770.

If you don't care about DX11, get the 4890.

If you pay the electric bills yourself, and you care about them, check this : http://images.hardwarecanucks. ... -HD5770/XFX-HD5770-68.jpg
That's a good reason to buy a graphics from a newer generation IMO. (the cost of ownership)

the shop i usually order from has one for 96€.
and whats an extreme res for u?
i usually play at 1920x1080.
and yeah...i pay the bills myself...but thats affordable i guess

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/high_end_gpus.html

After checking out this reason, I see no reason to buy anything other than WinFast's version of GTX 460 (only difference it has with other versions is factory OC IIRC). Only AMD cards that outperform it are HD 69[5/7]0, HD 6870 and HD 5870, while using way more power & being way more expensive.

Quote from Shotglass :

no im saying it because its an 8800 series card thats been rebranded twice

Ninja please ...

9xxx series overall runs on same chip as 8800. GTS250 runs on same chip as 9800gtx+. Its updated twice and is alot faster. Why would u want to go with 8800 instead? lol ...

Quote from E.Reiljans :

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/high_end_gpus.html

After checking out this reason, I see no reason to buy anything other than WinFast's version of GTX 460 (only difference it has with other versions is factory OC IIRC). Only AMD cards that outperform it are HD 69[5/7]0, HD 6870 and HD 5870, while using way more power & being way more expensive.

well, firstly its well over my budget (about 30-40€) and secondly its kinda overkill for this system.
the cpu isnt the greatest of all, so i would have a new bottleneck there.
and im not upgrading anything anymore on this thing

only getting the gpu, after that nothing.
whenever it dies (or gets to slow for actual games) i build a new one.

I'll be parting with my GTS250 soon. 70euro if your interested.

Quote from [RCG]Boosted :

well, firstly its well over my budget (about 30-40€)

depending on where you shop its not really that expensive
http://geizhals.at/deutschland ... f=1439_GTX+460&sort=p

for the exact price point you mentioned this is still the card to get
http://geizhals.at/deutschland ... f=1440_HD+5770&sort=p
(try to get one with the oval shaped gen 2 cooler its a lot quieter)

its the card i fullheartedly recommended to a colleague about a year ago and which id still recommend if it werent for the 460 or the 6850 both of which arent all that much more expensive especially when you consider the price of a complete system build like what my colleague did back then

Quote :

the cpu isnt the greatest of all, so i would have a new bottleneck there.

depending on what you paid for the pc the cpu is a decent enough choice
sure its nowhere near bleeding edge but its still pretty fast and at the fullhd resolutions you mentioned gpu limiting is more likely to occur than cpu limiting

Quote from hazaky :

9xxx series overall runs on same chip as 8800. GTS250 runs on same chip as 9800gtx+. Its updated twice and is alot faster. Why would u want to go with 8800 instead? lol ...

oh for crying out loud
the gts 250 is a 8800 with a different sticker on it
those are the facts and i see no point in saying any more on this subject trying to educate someone who apparently is unable to be educated

Quote from Shotglass :

depending on what you paid for the pc the cpu is a decent enough choice
sure its nowhere near bleeding edge but its still pretty fast and at the fullhd resolutions you mentioned gpu limiting is more likely to occur than cpu limiting

i didnt buy the cpu.
in fact, i didnt build this pc myself, i bought it used, as a whole.
well, without hd's.
id never build with a intel cpu just because i prefer amd
but it was the "best" to get at an acceptable price.


and 120€ is still kinda over my budget
does it actually outperform a hd5770 by quite a bit?
or is there just a really small gap.

Quote from [RCG]Boosted :

does it actually outperform a hd5770 by quite a bit?
or is there just a really small gap.

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/high_end_gpus.html

It's more than 1.5 times faster.

+ when you'll build a new rig, you already will have a decent GPU - so reason "it's overkill for current CPU" is really good

Quote from [RCG]Boosted :

does it actually outperform a hd5770 by quite a bit?
or is there just a really small gap.

its a decent bit faster
too bad theres no real side by side comparison of the two on hardocp but generally you can expect to be able to play at higher sttings with the 460... at least 20€ worth higher settings in my oppinion
also when you do get a new system (sandy bridge is just out and awesome btw) a 460 sli system will outperform a single 480 in most situations which might be a possibility of keeping the card long term