Best card for under $100?

[acid16]

Best video card under $100 ???

Can someone help me choose the best vid card under $100? So far the choices are between:

($99) Gainward GeForce3 Ti-200 128MB DDR
($88) ATI Radeon 8500LE 128MB DDR

... are there any other ones I should consider? Or should I just keep my GF2 MX for a couple more months and wait for the Radeon 9500 prices to drop...... ?

 

[Duvie]

depends...is that GF2 mx killing your gaming now??? if so get the radeon 8500le and avoid that always waiting for something higher to come down...All that waiting usually leads to inaction and nothing gets down or changes....Kinda like UN on the Iraqi front.

 

[acid16]

So would the Radeon 8500LE 128MB DDR be better than the GeForce3 Ti-200 128MB DDR???

 

[Duvie]

definitely!!!! many of the LE's are capable of retail settings of 275/275....Most I have seen have been set to 250/250 with even one that was like 275/250...Other then the clock difference you have the same card and even run the same catalyst drivers. where the non ati cards can suffer is the QC, quality of active cooling, TV-out quality, etc....


i think the 8500 retail one with newer catalyst drivers beats a GF3 ti500 and by enough of a margin that the LE should cover it as well...

I got 10000 in 3dmark2k1se with my card and the system below...Most GF3 ti200 owners I think are hard pressed to get out of the 7000's....

 

[Slappy00]

.All that waiting usually leads to inaction and nothing gets down or changes....Kinda like UN on the Iraqi front.

hehe../...

 

[cowsclaw]

Originally posted by: acid16
Best video card under $100 ???
... are there any other ones I should consider? Or should I just keep my GF2 MX for a couple more months and wait for the Radeon 9500 prices to drop...... ?

you might want to check out that one PNY Ti4200 128MB for $99 deal. Not sure if it is still going on. for details, check out that one obese wallet site.

 

[BoomAM]

If your games a really struggling to run, then get a card now, BUT, if they run, but in low res, then im sure you can wait until 9500 prices drop.

IMO its worth the extra for the 9500PRO if you decide to wait. The 9500 cards that can be modded to 9700, are very very very rare to come by now.
If you want to buy now, then out of the two cards, i`d get the 128mb 8500LE. Or, if you can, see if you can get a 128mb GF4 Ti4200.
But, of course, the price of a 128mb GF4 Ti4200 is only slightly cheaper than a 9500.

Neither a Ti4200 or a 9500 or a 9500PRO card, is slow and will do most of your games fine.
The 9500 cards, will last longer though, cos they are DX9 parts, compared to the DX8 of the GF4. Also, the Ti4200 can probably be OC`d to Ti4600 speeds, depending on the card.

 

[Brian48]

Be careful of the newer 8500LEs. These are clocked much slower than what they used to be (230/230 or lower). To top it off, they come with slower components that don't overclock very well. In a situation like this, I'd take the ti200. Check with the vendor before buying.

 

[kylebisme]

most defneatly good advice Brian48. if it were me i would most defneatly go with the 8500le, but make sure to find a good one.

 

[acid16]

Originally posted by: BoomAM
If your games a really struggling to run, then get a card now, BUT, if they run, but in low res, then im sure you can wait until 9500 prices drop.

IMO its worth the extra for the 9500PRO if you decide to wait. The 9500 cards that can be modded to 9700, are very very very rare to come by now.
If you want to buy now, then out of the two cards, i`d get the 128mb 8500LE. Or, if you can, see if you can get a 128mb GF4 Ti4200.
But, of course, the price of a 128mb GF4 Ti4200 is only slightly cheaper than a 9500.

Neither a Ti4200 or a 9500 or a 9500PRO card, is slow and will do most of your games fine.
The 9500 cards, will last longer though, cos they are DX9 parts, compared to the DX8 of the GF4. Also, the Ti4200 can probably be OC`d to Ti4600 speeds, depending on the card.

Is $215 US shipped a good price for the Sapphire Radeon 9500 (with "guarenteed" 9700 mod)???? What does it overclock it to, a 9700 or a 9700 Pro? ...... maybe ill just wait for a while. To be honest, like GF2 MX400 64MB is doing just fine for me (Warcraft 3, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, ect.). I'd really like an all-in-wonder card eventually, but they never seem to come down in price.

 

[kylebisme]

nope, that is a ripoff and a half; you can get a 9700 shiped another 35$ or less if you shop around a bit. also, they are bound to get considerably cheaper real quck as well.

 

[Spyro]

Originally posted by: acid16
Best video card under $100 ???

Can someone help me choose the best vid card under $100? So far the choices are between:

($99) Gainward GeForce3 Ti-200 128MB DDR
($88) ATI Radeon 8500LE 128MB DDR

... are there any other ones I should consider? Or should I just keep my GF2 MX for a couple more months and wait for the Radeon 9500 prices to drop...... ?

I'm kinda in the same situation as you right now, but I'm keeping my GF2 MX for just a few more months........

 

[BoomAM]

Originally posted by: acid16

Originally posted by: BoomAM
If your games a really struggling to run, then get a card now, BUT, if they run, but in low res, then im sure you can wait until 9500 prices drop.

IMO its worth the extra for the 9500PRO if you decide to wait. The 9500 cards that can be modded to 9700, are very very very rare to come by now.
If you want to buy now, then out of the two cards, i`d get the 128mb 8500LE. Or, if you can, see if you can get a 128mb GF4 Ti4200.
But, of course, the price of a 128mb GF4 Ti4200 is only slightly cheaper than a 9500.

Neither a Ti4200 or a 9500 or a 9500PRO card, is slow and will do most of your games fine.
The 9500 cards, will last longer though, cos they are DX9 parts, compared to the DX8 of the GF4. Also, the Ti4200 can probably be OC`d to Ti4600 speeds, depending on the card.

Is $215 US shipped a good price for the Sapphire Radeon 9500 (with "guarenteed" 9700 mod)???? What does it overclock it to, a 9700 or a 9700 Pro? ...... maybe ill just wait for a while. To be honest, like GF2 MX400 64MB is doing just fine for me (Warcraft 3, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, ect.). I'd really like an all-in-wonder card eventually, but they never seem to come down in price.

I have know idea. Im in the UK, and dont know how many dollers there are to the pound. To turn a 9500 in to a 9700 isnt just a case of OCing, theres a few driver/bios modifications to be made. And even then, theres on a 50% chance of it working.
As for you wanting a all-in-wonder card. Have a look the 9000PRO All-In-Wonder. Its miles faster than your GF2MX, and is quite fast for the price. You should be able to get one in your budget.

 

[beerbong]

depends on what ou want to do with your pc. If its a gaming rig go with 8500LE, if its a workstation or just word processing, etc, Go with a matrox card, you can get them for cheap used, or under 100$ new.

 

[FearoftheNight]

Yea the better card is the 8500. Personally I just went from GF2 MX to Radeon 9500 Pro. Amazing...

 

[acid16]

Well, ive gone ahead and ordered a Sapphire Atlantis Radeon 9500 128MB DDR card. It's the Red PCB one. I paid $181 US shipped (from a canadian company, shipped to canada). Pretty good deal IMO! If I can OC it to a 9700, then ill have a 9700 card for less than $200. If not, then I still got a pretty good card.....

 

[BoomAM]

Originally posted by: acid16
Well, ive gone ahead and ordered a Sapphire Atlantis Radeon 9500 128MB DDR card. It's the Red PCB one. I paid $181 US shipped (from a canadian company, shipped to canada). Pretty good deal IMO! If I can OC it to a 9700, then ill have a 9700 card for less than $200. If not, then I still got a pretty good card.....

You cant OC a 9500 into a 9700, or even a 9500PRO. There are physical differences.
Heres a run down for you

9700/9700PRO
8 Pixel Pipelines. 256bit memory bus.
9500PRO
8 Pixel Pipelines. 128bit memory bus
9500
4 Pixel Pipelines. 128bit memory bus.

As you can see, its not a simple case of OCing. If you get the stuff that you need for the softmod hack, theres a chance that you can turn your 9500 into a 9500pro. And depending on how recent your 9500 pcb is, you might be able to re-enable the other half of the memory bus. Making it into a 9700, if you do both.

 

[uberthomas]

Does the 8500LE card support dual monitors? I was looking on the newegg website, and the 64mb version says it does, but it doesn't say anything about the 128mb version. sorry for the newbie question

 

[BoomAM]

Not 100% sure, but i think the 128mb version does as well. The two cards are identical apart from the amount of memory. Check the manufacturer wesbite for details.

 

[Saltin]

You cant OC a 9500 into a 9700, or even a 9500PRO. There are physical differences.

Actually, that is (for the most part) incorrect. There are eight physical pipelines on the 9500. It only utilizes four of them. It is (or was, I don't know if they changed this) possible to enable the other four pipelines via a software mod alone. It's not "technically" overclocking, it's just enabling hardware that has been disabled.

Making this change on the 9500 essentially turned it into a 9700 pro. The hardware on them is identical.
There are a slew of issues, both technical and ethical that come along with such a mod, and I certainly wouldnt do it myself.

EDIT: Should provide a little Linkage

When you buy a Radeon 9500 non pro, you are given a product thatis based on the R300 core, with 4 of the pixel pipelines disabled, potentially because they simply did not work, and it makes use of half of the avalible memory bandwidth. The hardware itself, however, is capable of using all 8 pixel pipes, and the whole 256 bit memory interface. The thing is, you aren't garunteed the 256 bit memory bus and 8 pixel pipes.

 

[blahblah]

Actually,

The story is that some of the older 9500 (Non pro) card made by Sapphier (sp?) and maybe some other company can be modded to 9700 pro via hardwared. (Lifting a resistor) There is a software mod too.

The main difference between 9500 series and 9700 is the memory bus. 9500 uses 128 Bits and 9700 uses 256 bits.

So the story is that in the beginning, to save money on design cost, some of the manufacturer just plugged in the 9500 VPU on the same board as 9700, thus the board has 256 bit memory bus.

The resistor mod is to enable the addition 4 pipe line and you will need to flash the card bios with 9700 one to use the full bus.

Anyways, the success rate seems to be in the 30% range. If you can get it working, it's amazing deal. If not, I guess you still have a good card.

You can always try the software mode to see if you can enable the addition 4 pipe line and thus turning the card into a 9500 pro.

 

[rdh]

Originally posted by: acid16
Well, ive gone ahead and ordered a Sapphire Atlantis Radeon 9500 128MB DDR card. It's the Red PCB one. I paid $181 US shipped (from a canadian company, shipped to canada). Pretty good deal IMO! If I can OC it to a 9700, then ill have a 9700 card for less than $200. If not, then I still got a pretty good card.....

"Best card for under $100" is a $181 card? I think not. At that price, you could have purchased any of the bunch of GF4 ti4200 cards, and then waited 6 more months for the 9500 Pro to drop, sell the GF4/buy the 9500 pro and still not paid more than $100 total. Instead, half the value of your card will evaporate in 6 months.... money better spent on a game or some pc3200 memory or something.

 

[BoberFett]

I just got a PowerColor 9100 and it was clocked at 250/183. :|

If that 8500 is actually an ATI it might be OK.

 

[Blooz1]

I recently got an 8500LE from NewEgg that was clocked 250/183 also! It's a Sapphire..with a little research, it turns out Sapphire makes 17 different models of the RadeonLE!

Read my post at the bottom of This Thread

More info here from Sapphire

 

[BoberFett]

Originally posted by: Blooz1
I recently got an 8500LE from NewEgg that was clocked 250/183 also! It's a Sapphire..with a little research, it turns out Sapphire makes 17 different models of the RadeonLE!

Read my post at the bottom of <a class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.cfm?catid=31&threadid=985080" target=blank>This Thread</A>

More info here from <a class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="http://www.sapphiretech.com/VGA/8500le.asp" target=blank>Sapphire</A>

What kind of memory does your Sapphire have? Have you tried overclocking it yet?

I had mine running yesterday through several 3dMark2001 loops at 275/210 and everything was fine, no artifacts that I could see. Bumped it to 300/225 and it locked up. I would imagine that was too much for the core. Going to try tweaking it a little more later.