Octopus Overlords

It looks like the vid card on my wife's computer is determined to foil my carefully laid out upgrade plans. She's currently using a GF4 4200, and when I built my PCI-E based system later this year I was going to pass on my AGP 5900XT to her. It was a perfect plan, but now we've hit a snag.

The card has started to lock up the system hard once or twice a night during WoW and the occasional other games she plays. It's gone from the point where it was mildly annoying to the highest level of frustrations. It's caused issues more than once while we've been in instances, which are exactly the kind of places you don't want someone dropping to restart.

I've tried all the standard stuff, updating drivers, checking the system for overheating and cleaning it out, but I really think the card is faulty. I used it for a about 20 months and I can remember it doing the exact same thing in my system, so it's likely independent of drivers or other system-related issues.

So what I need to find is an inexpensive ($100 or less) card that is comparable to the 4200, or slightly better, to get her through until I can build my next system is 6-9 months. Any thoughts or recommendations?

In that price range, probably an ATI 9600 pro?

I don't know anything about the manufacturer, but NewEgg is selling this 9600 Pro card for $104.

I would agree with Freezer. The 9600 pro is probably your best choice for that $100 range.

After that, you're into the 9800's. Although newegg is also selling this 9800SE for $129.

I couldn't give you a side-by side comparison to justify the extra $25, though I suspect someone could.

I just picked up a 9600 pro. Nice little card for the money.

I must take away my recommendation for the 9800SE after reading this review.

Just to introduce other options - you could try a GeForce 6200 with Turbo Cache for $70. See review at http://www.techreport.com/reviews/2004q ... dex.x?pg=1

I can offer you a nice deal on a used but perfectly fine 9800 Pro 256MB. e-mail or pm if interested.

Ned Flanders wrote:I can offer you a nice deal on a used but perfectly fine 9800 Pro 256MB. e-mail or pm if interested.

YGPM.

I have been using a 9600 Pro as my vid card since shortly after they came out. I did pick one that could be overclocked fairly massively, but I've had 0 problems running every game that's come out since at high graphics settings at min. 30 frames per second - including HL2, Far Cry, WoW, DoW, R:TW and more. I'm also considering moving to a PCI:E system later this year, but so far I love my little overclocked 9600 (and my hugely overclocked barton 2500, for that matter). In fact the reason I haven't upgraded yet (way past my usual cycle) is simply because I haven't found a game yet that's given me ANY problems running at the res and detail I want! Awesome card.