Video Card Upgrade Advice Needed

Hello. My video card has crapped out (hardware acceleration problem) and the manufacturer is not getting back to me (it was still under warranty last week when it broke, but isn't any more).

Anyway, I'm upgrading. I currently have an ATI 9600XT 256mb by Diamond Multimedia (never order from them). I am going to stick with ATI for now and would like some advice on a card to buy. I feel my options are limited by the fact I need an AGP card, budget is $100-150, and I am only buying from reputable manufacturers now (ATI and possibly Powercolor). I prefer to order directly from the companies or from tigerdirect or newegg.

System specs: AMD Athlon 64 3400+ 2.something ghz, MSI K8Neo Platinum motherboard, WinXP pro, 1gb RAM. (Let me know if any other information is important, I can't readily recall it all).

Anyway, I obviously don't want a card that is worse than what I have now. Any help would be appreciated. (I am particularly interested in opinions on X850pro and X1600pro). I just want to find the best card for the price. The only game I'm concerned about running beautifully is GW. Is Shader Model 3.0 important for GW?

Hmm... I also have heating issues with my comp... I constantly run above 50C (usually above 60) and need a card that won't heat up my system much. (I plan on buying a Zalman fan, hope it will help - no clue why it runs so hot). Any advice on the heat issue would also be appreciated.

Thanks (The only problem with building your own system is the lack of tech support...)

EDIT: forget comparing to other cards, I've not had those cards, I don't know how fast or pretty they are...

Will an X850 Pro be prettier/faster than a 9600XT?

X850 XT is a lot faster than X1600 PRO. But it is also a lot more expensive. X850 Pro is probably still a bit faster than X1600 PRO. X1600 was sort of a disappointment in comparison to the competition, especially 7600GT.

At the $100 price range your options include the X700 PRO and X1600 PRO, both of which will run GW quite well. I'd lean towards the X1600 PRO. If you want to spend more, look for X800 XL or the XT PEs of both X800 and X850. X800 XL will be faster than a 6800 GT and the X850 Pro.

http://www.tomshardware.com/site/vgacharts/index.html

About your temps, are you referring to your CPU temp? This can be several things. First, the mobo temp sensor can be way off and meaningless (they are never accurate). Second, you could have a bad connection between the cooler and the CPU (unlikely considering the heatspreader on A64). If you are stable you don't really need to worry about your temps.

Just make sure it's not something obvious like no airflow out of the case. If the CPU heatsink is super hot, then it's doing its job fine and you just need more airflow thru it and your case.

value wise, 6800 is still the best choice

anything beyond it consumes way too much power (I'm already regret that I bought this 7800GTX)

ATI's Nvidia
x850 7900
x800 7800
x700 6800

so if you like ATi so much, you'll probably want to get a x700 or even x600

I am still wavering on nvidia vs. ati. I can't find the 6600 or 6800s online (by BFG or eVGA) or in the few stores I've checked in my area. And it seems the drivers are a lot more complicated (read: issues) with nvidia than with ati (I'm a Mac girl... still not used to all this driver BS). I had a 6600GT when I first built my comp, but it had cooling issues out of the box, so tried ati instead.

Seems rather difficult to find a wide selection of AGP cards by good manufacturers.

Thanks for your advice. And as far as the heating, I'm pretty sure my mobo may be inaccurate, as my dad has the same system (except video card) and runs 20C cooler. I'll probably get the Zalman fan just to be safe. The system does run stable, aside from this bad vid card.

So would the X850 Pro be better than X700 Pro or X1600 Pro? I don't want to spend $250-300 on the XL/XT PE versions. Around $150 is my budget right now. And are all of these better than the 9600XT?

Thanks for that link, still exploring it.

Well AGP is pretty much done for. The selection is just going to get worse.

This isn't accurate. Look at my earlier link for a better comparison. 7900 is a ton faster than X850. X800 is slower than 7800. And 6800 will wipe the floor with an X700.

More realistically:
X1900 7900
X1800 7800
X1800GTO 7600GT
X1600 6600GT
X850XT 6800U
X800XT 6800U
X700 6600plain

ugh, even though you say you only choose ATi, i will give you a backdoor option of a 6600GT. Very strong, very cheap, still gives the most bang for your buck.

Please read my earlier post. I had an XFX 6600GT last year that was crap out of the box and hear many of them have cooling issues (has this been fixed?). I am interested in a BFG or eVGA 6600GT card... but they are SO stinking hard to find. Nevermind all the issues posted on these very forums about nvidia drivers.

I am leaning toward ATi right now because there seem to be more cards available in my quality/price range. For nvidia, I can only find the 5200/5500 or the 7800 (by reputable manufacturers only), neither of which I want.

Drugs are bad, the 7800GTX draws on the absolute maximum less than 10w more than the 6800 Ultra. You also have no idea about which cards were made to combat which cards. The 7900 wipes the floor with an X850, I suggest you learn what your talking about.

I would suggest you don't let one bad experience make you think all products from one particular brand are bad.

For the best performance/value I would suggest a Nvidia 7600 GT.

Personally though I always go for ATI cards because they have better filtering (for the last couple of generations at least).

7600GT is not available in AGP until later this year. So you're saying XFX is a good brand then?

i would suggest you to wait a few months untill d3d10 comes out, then there will be new graphic cards supporting directx 10 which will be used at game in the future.

I can't really wait a few months. My card has crapped out, my computer can't run for more than 5 minutes with hardware acceleration on at all. I have hijacked my boyfriend's computer to play GW, but he's kind of sick of me on it all the time. I doubt they will be coming out with many more AGP cards anyway, more likely - they will be discontinuing production of even more of them.

If I have a bad experience with a company and research it to find that more people have had the same, I am definitely staying away from said company (i.e. XFX and Diamond Multimedia). MSI is alright, I have a mobo by them. My only problem was that a BIOS update killed my BIOS chip and I had to get them to send me a new one and replace it myself (that was a real pain in the ass). Their support is mediocre, their products seem decent enough, but their software is crap (not that it matters much, hello uninstall!).

At this point, I'm looking at the ATI X850 Pro, which goes on sale next week anyway (directly from ATI). They also have an X800 XL at a decent price, but it's a refurb... and ehh.... I don't know about that.

If only I could find the BFG 6600 GT OC...

One quick question: forget comparing to other cards, I've not had those cards, I don't know how fast or pretty they are...

Will an X850 Pro be prettier/faster than a 9600XT?

it will be a few times faster. nothing prettier about it though. there is no difference between cards in that way really, especially in GW.

I'd go for:
$130 X800 GTO (close to speed of X850 PRO)

I own a PCIe X800GTO2 and a friend has a GTO (on my suggestion). For months they've worked great at over 500 MHz core clock. The cards were hot deals a while back cuz of their low price and overclockability to match far more expensive models. Google them if you'd like. Some of the GTOs are now coming with the X800XL core (R430) which means 16 pipelines instead of 12, although they can't overclock as well. Doesn't matter though cuz of the extra pipelines.

but wont be able to be used with windows xp or any directx10 games out now... so its a waste untill dx10 cards are mainstream

Dont wait for them if you need a card now

For Heating problems try an Artic Freezer 7 pro it is a great cooler

Surkon