Newbie Help. Video Card Suggestions

[austin316]

First let me start off by saying that in my opinion this is one of the best run boards and the most helpful I have come across on the net, so thanks for all of the help I have already received. Now that my praise is out of the way, here is my question.

I'm in the midst of buying components for my first foray into building my own pc and I was wondering what kind of video card I should get. I'm heavily leaning towards a Geforce 2, since no games out fully use the Geforce 3 technology and because I usually like to hit the sweetspot of price points which would mean about middle ground. So please tell me good Geforce 2 cards, or if you trully believe I would be better goin with the 3, let me know so reasons. Thanks in advance. And oh yeah, as for features, 64MB is a must and TV-out would be nice, but not needed.

 

[MANKOU]

The best buy right now is a GeForce 3 Ti200. Fast, can reach the best (and most expensive) nVidia models with a little tweaking and (the most important) has all the technological thingies of its bigger brothers. If you want to save some $$, go either for a GF2 Pro or for a GF2 Ti. (Avoid GF2 MX at any cost!).

Ah, and no matter what you read around, stay away from ATI.

 

[DaLurker28]

<< Ah, and no matter what you read around, stay away from ATI. >>



I'd have to disagree with that. I myself own a Radeon LE (hacked to Radeon DDR normal) and many of my friends own R7500's and R8500's. None of them have major problems, and are very pleased with their purchase. I'd say seriously look at the R7500 and R8500. More so the R8500 if ur looking towards a high end card w/ excellent 2d and DVD quality. If you're into pure speed/price ratio, than go for the GeForce 3 Ti200. It's a great value right now, but if you can get a R8500 for a good price, then go for it. It performs as fast as the GeForce Ti500 in most cases, and it's drivers are mature and stable. Dunno what all this crap about non functional drivers. Half the time it's because people dont uninstall drivers properly, oro it's nVidia drivers conflicting with the card.