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Making a dream PC for cheap (as possible) - help anyone?
wreckedcarzz:
I always go ATI: 100%, will not buy another nVidia no matter what. I have had 2 nVidia cards and both have badly disappointed me (low FPS, low resolutions, uses system RAM for graphic purposes...). All my ATI's are great. You can get both of them, even high end models, fairly cheap - just gotta look around.
Of course if your like me and you make your Christmas lists early (starting around December-January :P) you go for the new, shiny, fast stuff. This card, for example (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814129103) has caught my eye. But that is the highest of high end. And in 2 months time it will be outdated. But after that you can find it in the discount center at ATI.com... :)
Lashiec:
Things are quite even between them. nVidia provides the best balance between price and power in the high end, with the aforementioned 8800GT. ATI rules the roost right now, thanks to the Radeon 3870X2, but that's very pricy, and it's not really recommended anyway, unless you have tons of money. It also uses some "black magic" to achieve the highest performance in the single-card field ;)
Anyway, considering your budget, I give you the same advice that I gave to wreckedcarzz: Buy a Radeon 3850. It's an excellent card for the mid-end, quite powerful to run without problems the most advanced games, but very affordable as well. If you can spend more money, it's either the 3870 or the 8800GT, both are good options, although nVidia has the edge in this case. It used to be a price difference between them favorable to ATI, but that does not seems to be the case anymore.
One caveat though: If you're going to buy the computer now (in two weeks, for example), my recommendation still applies. If you're planning to get the machine in a month, then wait a bit more. nVidia is releasing a new line of cards in March-April, and Intel is going to update the entire Core 2 line by then as well (note that the new Core 2 Duos are available, though not in great quantities). So you may have to revise your choice of the Q6600 by then.
Ooops! Brandon finished faster than me :P. So, what nVidia cards you used to give you so bad results? Reading "uses system RAM for graphic purposes" reminds of that wonderful card, the 6200 Turbo Cache, the king of the hill ;D
wreckedcarzz:
Lashiec, here is my little info-bit on my experiences with my 2 nVidia cards. Both were OEM machines, 1 card per PC, usual midrange computer that you buy at the local shop kinda deal.
nVidia GeForce 2 FX 32MB (used from back when XP was like less than a year old, up until about a year and a half ago)
nVidia GeForce 7300 LT 256MB (used for about 4 months in my dad's HP, switched to ATI card about 3 months ago)
Both cards gave (and this includes old games for the old card) about 10-15FPS in well cooled environments, with no computer issues. The hard drive would have to go nuts with its SWAP file on the old GeForce 2 (256MB of RAM, GTA III, music playing, high-resolution mods (at the time, they were)).
Neither one could keep going for a long time w/o losing FPS gradually, and the 7300 did HORRIBLE at video playback while AERO was on (it was average on XP Media Center 05).
Both lagged enough to be annoying, and it is just weird that even over time both cards do just enough to get by running the OS, and maybe light games.
-Brandon
Lashiec:
I'm not familiar with the GeForce 2 FX, but the GeForce 7300, as any low-end video card, it's shitty for everything. If it came with the machine, I guess you didn't have a choice.
It should not have problems with GTA III, that's true, but who knows ;D
Deozaan:
Well right now TigerDirect.com is selling a GeForce 8600 GT 256MB DDR3 for $80 after rebate.
I'm looking at Tom's Hardware VGA Charts at it looks like overall there is a big difference between the nVidia 8600 GT and the ATI 3850.
It looks like the price for an ATI 3850 is about $180. But I just saw this: nVidia GeForce 8800 GT Overclocked 512MB DDR3 for $210 after rebate. That's only $30 more and it has twice the RAM, and according to the Tom's Hardware charts, it performs a lot better!
One caveat though: If you're going to buy the computer now (in two weeks, for example), my recommendation still applies. If you're planning to get the machine in a month, then wait a bit more. nVidia is releasing a new line of cards in March-April, and Intel is going to update the entire Core 2 line by then as well (note that the new Core 2 Duos are available, though not in great quantities). So you may have to revise your choice of the Q6600 by then.
-Lashiec (February 08, 2008, 08:01 PM)
--- End quote ---
I'm not out to buy top of the line bleeding edge technology. Like I said, I'm concerned more about value than price. It doesn't seem worth it to me to spend $600 on something that in a year will be in the sub $200 range and not have any significant advantage over another product I could have gotten for $400 less at the same time.
Unless you're suggesting to wait because these new lines of GPUs and CPUs will lower the price of the ones I'm looking at now, what's the real advantage of waiting for the new stuff, taking into consideration what I just wrote about my opinion on value?
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