Purchasing a New 3D card.

[Joker]

Hi there,

My brother's 3D card recently burned out and I'm gonna buy him a new one but I'm afraid I'm a bit 'out of the loop' when it comes to upgrading.
All he's gonna use it for is World of Warcaft (prereq: 32mb 3D card) so we're not looking for anything fancy.

I was wondering if you could give me some tips on what I should look out for? I don't know what the numbers mean for instance or acronyms such as GT or GE and such.

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

[drothgery]

It's probably better to decide about how much you want to spend, and then narrow your options from there. Available video cards go from ~$50 cards that are a major upgrade from 'integrated graphics' and will let you run the new GUI for Windows Vista, but won't be worth much in demanding games, to $500+ ultra-high end cards that can run just about anything at 1600x1200 or 1920 x 1080. Most tech web sites tend to agree that the best value cards are in the $100-$300 range.

A few things will help narrow it down, though.

What are the specs of the PC you'll be upgrading (CPU, RAM, etc.)?
Does it have an AGP slot, a PCI Express slot, or neither?
If you'll be using an LCD monitor, what's its native resolution?
If you'll be using a CRT monitor, what's its screen size?

 

[TwistedBishop]

I'm guessing your brother is a typical casual buyer of video cards, which is to say he doesn't want to spend more than $100 and doesn't plan on pushing the thing very hard (which World of Warcraft won't).

As such...

First determine if he has a PCI-Express slot or an AGP slot. The slot should have its type etched into the motherboard. For reference:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI-Express

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AGP


Once you determine that, these would be my suggestions for cards for each type of slot. I'm suggesting EVGA brand cards due to their Step-Up program (you can return the card within 90 days and get a credit equal to what you paid towards a new card) and excellent warranty service.


For PCI-E:
EVGA GeForce 8500GT 256MB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130089


For AGP:
EVGA GeForce 7600GS 256MB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130076


For the PCI-E card (which is the current standard), I'm passing up better performance in a DX9 card (the $150 7900GS) for a lower performance DX10 card because I'm guessing Vista and DX10 will impact him more than a sudden desire for higher end games. Plus both have very low power supply requirements, which -- unless he built the system himself or it was a high end pre-built -- his computer probably requires.

 

[Joker]

Yeah, I'm looking for an card that fits into an AGP slot.

Specs:
Processor: 2.4 Ghz
Ram: 1 GB
Monitor: CRT 17Inch (Sometimes makes a buzzing sound. Solution: disconnect monitor)
Speakers: 5.1 Surround (Sometimes picks up Russian/Arabic/Japanese or British radio)

It's a pretty old computer but it's more than enough for the game he wants to play.

http://tweakers.net/productsurvey/survey/3524

I found this one at tweakers. It's in dutch but do you guys see any sneaky things in the title of the card? I know manufacters sometimes add a few letters to confuse casual buyers in thinking they're getting a good card .

 

[TwistedBishop]

It's a pretty old card at this point (4 pixel pipelines compared to the 7600's 12), and it's crippled by a 64-bit memory bus, but it will certainly run WoW.

However, that's not saying very much, considering my old Gateway's integrated graphics ran WoW fine too. There's a lot better bang for the buck cards out there.

 

[Joker]

Ok, so when I go to the store on Saturday (I don't have a credit card to buy online) I should look out for the following:

# of pipelines (8 or 12 right?)
Memory bus (128 bit+?)
256 mb

And the number or letters behind the name (i.e. 7600GS/GT), do those mean anything?

 

[TwistedBishop]

That sounds about right. I think you shouldn't settle for an 8 pipeline model, since that's like three year old tech at this point, but again for WoW it won't matter. Ideally you want a memory bus to match the amount of RAM on the card, but sometimes you have to settle for a 256MB 128-bit setup. GDDR2 RAM is probably what you'll get, but look to see if any GDDR3 is available in your price range. You should also compare the ATI cards.

The company does tend to matter as well. For Nvidia, I personally trust EVGA the most, but XFX, Gigabyte, and BFG are name brands people have success with. For ATI, the only name that springs to mind is Sapphire (sorry, I don't keep track of them as well as the GeForce stuff).

As far as the letter designations such as GTX, GT, GS, XTX, XT, whatever....I wouldn't pay too much attention to them. At times the two companies seem to intentionally ape the other guy's naming conventions to create confusion. Look for the cards you can afford then let the product specs be your guide.

 

[GlassJaw]

Newegg is your friend.