which video card are the cheap and fast and good gfx

[mainframe19]

i mean like for playing ps1 games and n64 games, i wanted a card tha will meat the next gen. of emulators! ati 's or nvidia's geforces??

and it must have shadeing! like the ngc can do.

[jollyrancher]

You should check these forums for past video card discussions... there are only about 10-20 threads on this topic. If you want a legitamate answer then you need to be really specific.... exact price you want to pay, what games you want to play, what your system specs are and what kind of performance you expect. Otherwise the fanboys will just give you nonsense answers.

[Allnatural]

Please make it stop... :corpse:

[pj64er]

ati's geforces are much faster than nvidia's.

[AlphaWolf]

Nah, the 3dfx parhelia is far better. Plus it has 9 gigahertz of ram.

[jollyrancher]

I think it's 9.5 ghz of SRDDR RAM...

[pandamoan]

a geforce 4 mx is cheap, rock solid and will run everything but tenebrae halflife 2 and doom 3.

none of those are playable anyway, really.

[Hexidecimal]

ATI, i have an MX400 now, doesnt do enough for my taste, but im also buying a 9800SE this week, (and softmodding it to a Pro god willing)

[Tagrineth]

a geforce 4 mx is cheap, rock solid and will run everything but tenebrae halflife 2 and doom 3.

none of those are playable anyway, really.


and it must have shadeing!

[mainframe19]

right now i have geforce4 64mb 4xagp.

[Tagrineth]

Mainframe, 1. Ti or MX, 2. Why do you comment on DRDRAM?

[CyrylTheWolf]

*BLINX*

People... I see SO many things wrong in this thread. I am officially FRIGHTENED..

You people scare me... Heheh...

*raises a snout to the air and sniffs*

I smell...n00bishn3ss...

[jollyrancher]

Or maybe the sarcasm went over your head.

And I just noticed Mainframe edited his question and made it more specific. The thing is that your GF4 MX should work perfectly (well not counting the emulator's flaws) with the PSX/N64 emulators. Speed problems would be CPU related. And since the next generation of console emulators is still in the early stages, it's hard to say what type of requirements they need for shading, etc. I wouldn't be surprised if they worked great with a 4ghz CPU and your GF4, however, as most emulators tend to be more CPU-dependent.

[AlphaWolf]

People... I see SO many things wrong in this thread. I am officially FRIGHTENED..


It seems you've discovered the TechTalk forum.

[karth95]

It seems you've discovered the TechTalk forum.

GF FX5200 64meg r00lz, doodz! it plays all the gamez you'd ever wanna play! L0L0L!1!1!!

[CyrylTheWolf]

*nods*

I concur. The GeForceFX 5200 looks like the card to get right now. It's what I'm getting as soon as I can pull up the funds. (My onboard GF4 MX SUCKS. HORRIBLE memory bandwidth since it's using the system memory...)

But yeah... If it's a damn good card you want for the buck...then the GFFX 5200 is the ticket. Find yourself the MSI version if you can. MSI makes some of the best cards on the market right now. The benchmarks prove it.

Locally for me it's priced at a mere $130. I've seen it running in a lesser system than mine and it 0WNZ my system for graphics. (My system runs damn nice otherwise...)

I'm thinking of selling my server just to get it...it looked so damn good. Heh.. Just a little AMD K6-2 w/256MB PC100. Using it as my dialup server and domain controller. But I know that it'll pull me enough $$$ to get that card... (For which I will feel guilty for not using it to pay some bills later. *shrugs* Oh well.)

*waves two fingers in front of your face and speaks in a calm tone*

You WILL buy the GeForce FX 5200... *grins*

[Tagrineth]

All this maniacal GEFORCE FX 5200 shit makes me want to cry.

GeForce MX400 -> FX5200 is a downgrade. Not an upgrade. :\ Seriously. Look at some comparative benchmarks.

The FX5200 Ultra isn't much better, either.

[Tagrineth]

*BLINX*

People... I see SO many things wrong in this thread. I am officially FRIGHTENED..

You people scare me... Heheh...

*raises a snout to the air and sniffs*

I smell...n00bishn3ss...

You think I'm a n00b? I feel sorry for you.

[flow``]

how many threads do we have to have regarding the best video card to choose?

nvidia 5700 ultra or radeon 9600/9700 pro, whatever brand you like best

anything very high end is a ripoff, anything low end is a dumb so-called' upgrade'

[AlphaWolf]

You think I'm a n00b? I feel sorry for you.

It pains me to admit this, but without a doubt, Tagrineth knows more about 3D cards than anybody on this forum by far.

[CyrylTheWolf]

*shakes head*

I didn't say that you were anything, Tag. I never specified. :P

At any rate.. I suppose my opinion is also based on the fact that I have HORRIBLE memory latency due to the fact that my onboard video is using my system memory. (Which is a REALLY shitty thing.) For ME...the FX 5200 WOULD be an upgrade since it is it's own AGP device with it's own memory and subsystems.

The GeForce 4 series was an all-around pathetic release by NVIDIA in my opinion. (And I'm an NVIDIA fan saying this.) I saw nothing but crap benchmarks for most of the models. (Some of them did quite well, however.)

I wonder if you could find me information on why a GF4 --> GFFX 5200 would be a downgrade rather than an upgrade...Tag. If Alphawolf has such an esteemed opinion of your vid card knowledge...then I'm willing to trust it. (I can only go based on what I've read in the threads.)

Let me know then. You've got my system specs. What would YOU recommend for my system in the $100-$150 range? ($200 at the very most.)

[Doomulation]

A simple GF4 Ti4200 with AGP is a good all-around card which is cheap nowadays *with* shader support...
it's not like you require anything more for emulation now you know...
Most games will work top-notch with it, too...perhaps not the newest half-life 2 or whatever it is, though, but still...

[revl8er]

the Ti4200 of the mx400 are good choices. The Fx5200 isn't a bad choice, if you have money to spend you should try the Fx5900 Ultra.

[flow``]

The GeForce 4 series was an all-around pathetic release by NVIDIA in my opinion. ???!?!?!

what are you smoking..

[vampireuk]

The ti4200 wasn't that bad a card, and to be honest I would prefer a GF4 to the 5200.

[Tagrineth]

*shakes head*

I didn't say that you were anything, Tag. I never specified. :P

You said you smelled n00bishness. To me that implies everyone is a n00b around here. ;P Be careful with blanket statements. Seriously.


At any rate.. I suppose my opinion is also based on the fact that I have HORRIBLE memory latency due to the fact that my onboard video is using my system memory. (Which is a REALLY shitty thing.) For ME...the FX 5200 WOULD be an upgrade since it is it's own AGP device with it's own memory and subsystems.

Well, the easiest upgrade you could do is to use both banks of RAM. If you have an onboard GeForce4MX, I assume you have an nForce2 board, which means you should have more than enough memory speed to make up for the graphics hit.

Don't talk to me about memory latency, btw. Look at MY specs.


The GeForce 4 series was an all-around pathetic release by NVIDIA in my opinion. (And I'm an NVIDIA fan saying this.) I saw nothing but crap benchmarks for most of the models. (Some of them did quite well, however.)

Hell no. The GeForce4Ti line was just excellent. Ti4600 is still a more than viable card today, and the Ti4200 would be the best value card ever if the Radeon 9500 Pro didn't exist.

Now, the GeForce4MX, on the other hand... meh.


I wonder if you could find me information on why a GF4 --> GFFX 5200 would be a downgrade rather than an upgrade...Tag. If Alphawolf has such an esteemed opinion of your vid card knowledge...then I'm willing to trust it. (I can only go based on what I've read in the threads.)

A GeForce4 MX to GeForce FX 5200 is a downgrade. Hop over to www.beyond3d.com and look at any 5200 review.

The ONLY case where the 5200 is better than a 4MX is in DirectX 8 shaders. DX7 straight rendering, an MX440 or 460 usually beats 5200, and in DX9 the 5200 just plain dies.


Let me know then. You've got my system specs. What would YOU recommend for my system in the $100-$150 range? ($200 at the very most.)

Easy. Radeon 9500 Pro if you can find one, if not then Radeon 9600 Pro.

[LazerTag]

I agree there. I just sold my old ti4200 after grabbing up a 9600 Pro at BestBuy. An excellent move on my part I think.

Faster card then my ti4200, fully DX9 compatible, I get HL2 when it's released, and I sold my old card to a buddy for a decent amount. All worked out very well.

[fivefeet8]

Let me know then. You've got my system specs. What would YOU recommend for my system in the $100-$150 range? ($200 at the very most.)

The geforce4ti's were far from duds. They run dx8 games very well. It's only FSAA/AF that they are really weak at.

You can find some GeforceFX 5900 non ultra's around for $200 or less nowadays. Newegg has a few $200 5900's. A few people have gotten 5900's for as little as $169. Quite a deal IMO. They can easily overclock to 5900u speeds.

Here's a few sub $200 5900's here:

http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproduct.asp?DEPA=1&submit=Go&description=5900

[gokuss4]

if you want to have pixel shading, and good gfx emulation, try a GeForce 3. that should work well enough...or you could try to go for a GeForce FX 5600

or on an ati point of view...radeon 9000 pro, or 9200 pro

according to this site http://users.erols.com/chare/video.htm GeForce 3 would be best for performance. but if you want a little more features as well...go for a GeForce FX 5600

[Tagrineth]

ATi point of view, 9000 or 9200? Yeah, right. Any ATi fan would tell you the 9100 (or 8500 if you want to go as far back as GF3) or 9600 would be a far, far better choice than those two.

And spec lists are COMPLETELY WORTHLESS as far as performance goes. GeForce3 is NOT as fast as GeForce4Ti by a long shot, just for an example.