Looking for the best video card to purchase for the money? Games are starting to push the limits of video cards as more of the cut scenes are rendered by the graphics card. LCD monitors are getting larger and thus require more performance to push the higher screen resolutions. The game experience in Starcraft II with a Radeon 4850 vs. a nVidia 8600GTS is a dramatic difference. The better card will have near-video quality renderings of the cut scenes at higher screen resolutions.
In the $100 graphics card range, the Radeon 4850 offers excellent performance for the money. It doesn’t support the latest bells and whistles such as Direct X 11 support, but it makes it up for having excellent performance at lower prices.
For instance, Newegg was listing the card for $71 after rebate and coupon for a Sapphire Radeon 4850 with 512 MB of GDDR5 memory.
GDDR5 on the 4850 basically makes it a 4870 running it a lower spec 4850 speed of 625 mhz. Its equivalent to the Nvidia 8800 Ultra, 9800 GTX, and GTS 250. If you can order it for the $70-$80 range, this card is an excellent value for a high performance “budget” gaming machine. Moving to the next graphics card tier on Tom’s hardware costs is basically $160+.
If you can still find the Radeon 4850, go for that card. Otherwise, the NVidia GTS 250 will be a close second for price to performance. They can typically be found for around ~90 after rebates. It is essentially a rebadged nVidia 9800 with better power efficiency. The GTS 250 does have some cool features such as 3D ready support.
GDDR5 vs. GDDR3
Its best to opt for GDDR5 memory since the card will run faster when the settings are set to high vs. DDR3. Opt for a card that has a 256-bit memory interface vs. 128-bit if possible too. Avoid video cards running 64 bit memory interface. These make a difference when running the game settings on high.
Is your computer fast enough?
Another thing to consider is whether your computer supports PCI Express 2.0. Most computers built after 2009 should have PCI Express 2.0 support, which doubles the bandwidth to 500 MB/s and doubles the power to the card to 150W. This improves the performance when the graphics settings are pushed to the max on higher-end video cards. Computers with only PCI Express 1.1 support will still be able to run the PCI Express 2.0 cards with slight reductions to performance on max quality settings.
Graphics Card Hierarchy Chart 2010
Tom’s Hardware has a guide that lists the tiered list of the highest to lowest performing graphic cards. It isn’t the most comprehensive list, but it provices a good performance baseline between each of the graphic chipsets. http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-radeon-hd-geforce-gtx,2676-7.html
Sample Prices:
Radeon 4870 with 1GB DDR5 for $89 after rebate
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121376
