Choices, choices...

[ubercaffeinated]

I've recently purchased a brand new computer capable of taking PCIE videocards (p4 2.8HT, 512mb ddr2). The problem is, I'm not too much into gaming and don't want to plunge into getting one of the nicer pcie cards, as nice as they are (maybe later down the line when I have time to play games I will reconsider investing into a new card).

The choices that are left to me are roughly in the ATI x300 range of cards, which I know some of the people on this forum will scoff at, but considering I only really want to play World of Warcraft, and some other games time to time, I don't think a budget card is a bad idea. For WoW I'm looking for pretty good graphics, and for some of the fps games out there, I'm looking for solid medium settings.

Right now I'm even considering a normal PCI card to do the job (a 5200 or 9200 with 256 mbs), since the prices all fall within the same range (I'm aware how bad pci video cards are). My question is, would a normal ATI x300 card beat the snot of the "higher end" normal PCI cards with 256 megs of ram? (oxymoronic, I know) Or would performance be similar?

I know many of you would tell me to just break down, and buy a x700 or 850 or something really nice to do the job, but I really don't need a shot gun to kill a fly right now. Any advice is very much welcomed.

 

[gusk1200]

I would just go with the most afforable PCI-X card you are willing to spend on. Doesn't have to be 256mb card, or top of the line ATI/Nvidia. Just get something that your system supports that you feel comfortable spending the money on. Chances are you won't suffer with the performance, especially in WoW.

 

[mwmorph]

pci-e please. pci-x is a completely different standard supported by only a few high end workstations. idont buy a pci-x and expect it to fit in a pci-e slot. as for medium settings, which games? hl2, farcry, halo and doomIII will rape it on low. unless its at 800x600 and lowest. im not sure if World Of Warcraft is a graphics hog so i cant comment on that. pci-e will be probably better.

 

[gusk1200]

Originally posted by: mwmorph
pci-e please. pci-x is a completely different standard supported by only a few high end workstations. idont buy a pci-x and expect it to fit in a pci-e slot. as for medium settings, which games? hl2, farcry, halo and doomIII will rape it on low. unless its at 800x600 and lowest. im not sure if World Of Warcraft is a graphics hog so i cant comment on that. pci-e will be probably better.

Sorry, kinda new to posting here. I guess "PCI-E" is the more PC term around here. I'll work on dotting my i's and crossing my t's...

Anyway, I hear makoto wants something that can get him by with playing one or two games without the big sacrafice. To me, buying my 6800 AGP for $240 was a sacrafice. I had a 9600XT which I thought was great, but had no DVI. I didn't want to downgrade and spend less money. Thankfully Micro Center had this 20% off sale on video cards. They still do, if you want to buy your "PCI-E" video card there. They have lots of good ones.

 

[mwmorph]

try an x600 pro. i dosent cost that much more(about 100dollars for the cheaper ones).

 

[ubercaffeinated]

Sorry for the confusion. I should rephrase. Basically, my question was, should I go with a low end PCI-E card (a x300 or comprable), or go with a high end PCI card (NOT pci-e, but a card like a 5200 or 9200 with 256 megs of ram, because they have those for the same price of a x300).

 

[Sc4freak]

Get the X300. And overclock it as far as it'll go. I got mine to X600 pro speeds.

 

[mwmorph]

delete

 

[mwmorph]

look at this review at legion hardware for the x300 standard not se
"Overclocking this budget graphics card was like no other; the PowerColor Radeon X300 offers some serious overclocking potential. I cannot recall the last time I pushed the core of a graphics card 195MHz above its standard setting. While the memory was only able to improve another 80MHz DDR, the results yielded from this overclock were well worth while.It is not uncommon for a good overclock to result in a 1000pt gain in 3Dmark2001 SE, but to receive a 3182pt increase is just insane! These impressive gains were also evident in real world applications, as this 4 pixel pipeline graphics card scored a massive 29.2fps boost in Unreal Tournament 2004. Overall, the overclocking abilities of this graphics card were amazing and with the right gear I am sure they can become even more amazing."

"To test the PowerColor Radeon X300 graphics card I have put together a very powerful system comprising of an Intel Pentium 4 560 processor, 1GB of DDR2 memory, and the new Gigabyte 8GPNXP motherboard. This system certainly has a lot of grunt and should be ideal for exploiting the full potential of all graphics cards."

-legion hardware

overclock page
325/400
to 520/480!!! x300 vanilla

"PowerColor X300 SE: Noise, Overclocking and 2D Quality

The noise parameter is completely out of place when we?re talking about the PowerColor X300 SE ? the card is equipped with a passive cooling system and is always absolutely silent.

We could only speed the GPU up (from 325 to 400MHz) in our overclocking tests. Of course, we applied additional cooling ? the heatsink was scorching hot even at the regular frequency. So, our supposition of a low heat dissipation of the X300 was never confirmed. Well, the X300 is a much more complex chip than the RV280 (RADEON 9200) and works at a higher frequency, and even the thinner tech process cannot compensate for that. The passive heatsink is anyway enough for the graphics card when it?s at its normal frequencies; additional cooling is only necessary for overclocking.

The memory wouldn?t be stable even at 210 (420DDR) MHz, the card hanging up in 3DMark03. The high access time and the simplified PCB deign must have led to this poor result.

The 2D image as outputted by the card was crisp in all resolutions up to 1600x1200@75Hz inclusive. The PowerColor X300 SE is of course unlikely to be used with monitors that support such a high resolution, but it wouldn?t disappoint you in this case anyway. "

-xbit labs

the x300se seems like a bad buy though.
go x300 vanilla.

also, even if it does clock to x600 speeds, it'll never be as fast or nearly as fast for that matter because of the fewer pixel pipes and vertex shaders. this is more important to a card than clock speed.

test for the x300. notice how the x300se is about 30-40% slower than the x300.

also, notice the x300 and x300se are raped by these modern games. 65fps or above is the bare minimum average for smooth gameplay because fps count can drop suddenly in heavy action.

 

[ubercaffeinated]

This was fantastic information. Thanks all.

For anyone that can answer, is it difficult to overclock the X300? or is it a software mod? Thanks again.

 

[zakee00]

oh no, its not hard at all. download a program called powerstrip (im pretty sure, havent tried to OC ati cards) and it shows some sliders. just slide and glide baby to your desired clock speeds
that was really lame, i apologize...lol
x300 should be fairly good for your needs, and plus u have the option of upgrading pci-e cards later if need be.

 

[PrayForDeath]

ATI Tool, PowerStrip, Riva Tuner, RadLinker and Rage3DTweak are all downloadable softwares that let you overclock, I personally prefer ATI Tool and I find it the easiest to use, so I recommend starting with this one. But keep in mind that overclocking = losing your warranty.

 

[mwmorph]

Originally posted by: PrayForDeath
ATI Tool, PowerStrip, Riva Tuner, RadLinker and Rage3DTweak are all downloadable softwares that let you overclock, I personally prefer ATI Tool and I find it the easiest to use, so I recommend starting with this one. But keep in mind that overclocking = losing your warranty.

ATI Tool, Riva Tuner, RadLinker,Rage3DTweak are free and probably better suited to you needs because of that. powerstrip is a 20or 30 dollar buy so if you are looking for budget, i'd avoid it. also, be sure to clock about 10-15mhz at a time and run games/ 3dmark and repeat until artifacts/distortions start showing.. dont expect 520 to work on the core and 480 to work on the memory for you because your airflow may be lower.

 

[mwmorph]

Originally posted by: PrayForDeath
ATI Tool, PowerStrip, Riva Tuner, RadLinker and Rage3DTweak are all downloadable softwares that let you overclock, I personally prefer ATI Tool and I find it the easiest to use, so I recommend starting with this one. But keep in mind that overclocking = losing your warranty.

ATI Tool, Riva Tuner, RadLinker,Rage3DTweak are free and probably better suited to you needs because of that. powerstrip is a 20or 30 dollar buy so if you are looking for budget, i'd avoid it. also, be sure to clock about 10-15mhz at a time and run games/ 3dmark and repeat until artifacts/distortions start showing.. dont expect 520 to work on the core and 480 to work on the memory for you because your airflow may be lower.

 

[mwmorph]

Originally posted by: PrayForDeath
ATI Tool, PowerStrip, Riva Tuner, RadLinker and Rage3DTweak are all downloadable softwares that let you overclock, I personally prefer ATI Tool and I find it the easiest to use, so I recommend starting with this one. But keep in mind that overclocking = losing your warranty.

ATI Tool, Riva Tuner, RadLinker,Rage3DTweak are free and probably better suited to you needs because of that. powerstrip is a 20or 30 dollar buy so if you are looking for budget, i'd avoid it. also, be sure to clock about 10-15mhz at a time and run games/ 3dmark and repeat until artifacts/distortions start showing.. dont expect 520 to work on the core and 480 to work on the memory for you because your airflow may be lower.