Building a New Box - Looking for Mr. Good Card...

[Vin DSL]

Alrighty then! I got bored and decided to build a midtower....

Here's what I've amassed so far:

I bought an Enermax case (aluminum front panel) in dark blue (400w PS):
http://www.bzboyz.com/store/product3909.html

Here's the board - ECS 848P-A - Intel 848P chipset (Modified 845/Brookdale):
http://www.ecs.com.tw/ECSWeb/Product...D= 26&LanID=9

The CPU - Intel Pentium 4 3.0GHz, 512K 800 FSB Hyper Threading:
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...7508&CatId=260

The sticks - 1GB (2x512) OCZ PC-3200 Dual Channel Kit:
http://www.ocztechnology.com/product...r_Dual_Channel

And the HD - Seagate 200GB, 7200RPM, Ultra ATA/100:
http://www6.tomshardware.com/storage/20040209/

I've got it all sitting here, ready to assemble. Anyone care to suggest a suitable video card?

BTW, I'm not a gamer. This is gonna be used for PHP-Nuke software development, Paint Shop Pro, surfing the web, et cetera...

EDIT: One thing...

I'd like the card to have a DVI connector, so I can hook it up to my GWIII:
http://www.crutchfield.com/S-4G37IkI...p?i=15842WE610

I'm sort of leaning toward a ATI Radeon 9800 Pro:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...102-286&depa=0

Whatta ya think?

[Zacrifice]

can't recommend a graphics card but am wondering why your going U ATA instead of SATA which is faster plus it doesn't cost any more then the old drives you can get

[Spathiphyllum]

Originally posted by Vin DSL
Alrighty then! I got bored and decided to build a midtower... I'd like the card to have a DVI connector, so I can hook it up to my GWIII:
http://www.crutchfield.com/S-4G37IkI...p?i=15842WE610

I'm sort of leaning toward a ATI Radeon 9800 Pro:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...102-286&depa=0

Whatta ya think?

Well, I've always advocated getting a DELL since you can't build a home tower as good or as cheap as them but since the parts are laid out already, I'd suggest a Matrox although I think they're a French company - if that bothers you. (It bothers me but I just had to break down not too long ago.)

I've not bought a gaming card in quite a while so I can't vouch for the new GPU screamers from anyone. But for business graphics without spending the money for an SGI-equivalent card, Matrox has been the gold-standard. They've got a niche for business rather than 3D graphics so you might want to visit a brick-and-mortar to see if it is up to spec for you. I'm using a dual port G550 Millenium (yeah, it's a little dated) that has both DVI and VGA output but I've not tested the DVI. I have another developer system with the G400 with dual VGA and it works like a charm despite its age and still more than I really need. Great to hook up two monitors when developing.

I think I almost bought that same card about 4 months ago but still decided to pull the G550 from eBay since the Matrox cards are so good for non-gaming work. Newegg is a great outfit and I know they carry many good cards. All I remember from my shopping a while ago was to look at the specs from the ATI and Nvidia cards very closely. It looks like the one you selected is loaded and the DDR memory is key. With DVI, S-Video, and VGA, it looks like you would be set for any output. If your MB handles 8X AGP, then I can't see anything wrong with the card. Review a hardware site or two to see if there are any current driver bugs. Since you didn't specify dual output, then this card should be great even though I've traditionally been an nVidia fan.

[Spathiphyllum]

Originally posted by Zacrifice
...why your going U ATA instead of SATA which is faster plus it doesn't cost any more then the old drives you can get

Yes, UATA is starting to get replaced by SATA as is evidenced by the number of new MBs that can accommodate the new interface. While the disk technology remains the same (as well as the reliability) for the platters and heads, the reliability of the interface may still have a few bugs. Probably not but entirely possible.

At this point in the SATA technology cycle, I'd go with single SATA for systems that aren't very important. Next I'd run SATA in RAID 0 for somewhat important systems. But for my best system, I still go SCSI with or without RAID. They are just plain more reliable in my experience, and reliability means something in harddrives. Call me stubborn. Even a difference in hundreds of dollars is worth it to increase one's odds of not having premature harddrive failure with concomitant loss of critical data. Data retrieval of these large capacity disks can run in the thousands of dollars just for the retrieval process, nevermind the downtime and labor fees.

PS - no rolling eyes about DELL vs brown box? I'm shocked and a little dismayed.

[lokki]

I just bought the 9800 Pro/128M card for gaming. BestBuy has/had a sale and rebate, bringing the total cost to about 180 (once the rebate comes in) for in-store pickup. I think Outpost.com has a similar deal for $170, no rebates. Dunno if it's honest-to-god ATI.

While it's been great for gaming, I haven't noticed a real boost in 3D or 2D graphics.

At work, I run Matrox 550s in a couple of machines with dual 20" Flatpanel LCDs. Fantastic for development, but not so hot for colour digital imaging. The Matrox cards I have are a bit on the dragging side compared to newer stuff, but you may never notice as a code warrior.

check bensbargains.com for deals on random stuff. The ATI has come up a couple of times at various prices, but be absolutely certain to read customer ratings of the sellers whenever possible. I've passed up some deals that were incredible because even the BBB decided to list a vendor as disreputable.

[Vin DSL]

Originally posted by lokki
I just bought the 9800 Pro/128M card for gaming. BestBuy has/had a sale and rebate, bringing the total cost to about 180 (once the rebate comes in) for in-store pickup. I think Outpost.com has a similar deal for $170, no rebates. Dunno if it's honest-to-god ATI...

Yeah, I actually had one in my sweaty palms this afternoon. Fry's sells them at Outpost.com for 169 bones, but when you buy them in a Fry's retail store, they are 199, so I thought, "Screw 'em!" I suppose I'll be more desperate towards the end of the week, when I put this monster together...

The other stuff was a no brainer, but this graphic card thing is gonna be a bish...

I like the dual display idea! I ran dual monitors for a few years, when they added that feature to Windows, and I really miss it. I ran a regular monitor in the center, and a VGA mono off to my right. I would drag ICQ into the mono monitor, my email client, et cetera, and leave them open. Then, I'd use the regular monitor for surfing and production work. In those days, you had to run a PCI video card for each monitor (up to 4), but I guess you can run two monitors off one AGP card now, with dual outputs.

As far as speed goes, all I want is something that's fast enough to stream video, un-clipped, like watching news clips on the net, viewing DVD's, or whatever, but the text HAS to be sharp, since I pour over 1000's of lines of code daily, often with no sleep, e.g. tired eyes.

The problem with those high-end game cards, in the past, has been that text usually looks pretty sh!tty. Never could figure out why. I guess it 'cause they're optimized for 'movement', i.e. with excessive edge-smoothing.

I'm running a Guillemot Voodoo Banshee right now. It's an odd bird! Basically, it's a 28-bit 2D GDI accelerator core with an integrated 128-bit VGA Voodoo2 pixel unit and a 3Dfx powered texture unit. You couldn't beat it for the money, when it came out. I think I paid about the same price as the current love dragon ATI Radeon 9800 Pro.

I dunno... I'll probably end up flipping a coin on this. If you got any more ideas, keep 'em coming. I'm still in the 'discovery' phase...

[Vin DSL]

Originally posted by Zacrifice
can't recommend a graphics card but am wondering why your going U ATA instead of SATA which is faster plus it doesn't cost any more then the old drives you can get

I actually bought the HD a couple of months back. You could get it in ATA or SATA, but not both, so I choose ATA. It's so fuc*ing fast, I really don't think it'll make any difference. From here on out I'll be going SATA ...

[Vin DSL]

Originally posted by Spathiphyllum
I'd suggest a Matrox although I think they're a French company - if that bothers you...

That's a good idea, but Matrox cards are getting pretty scarce. That would definitely require an online purchase. No big deal, but I wish I could see one in the flesh!

And, no, I don't mind French products. They actually do a few things right. Bicycles and video cards come to mind. My favorite 'bikes' are Motobecane's, and my favorite video cards used to be Guillemot's. Hercules bought out Guilletmot, and the only thing they make that's worth a damn now are sound cards. Their sound cards are quite nice; the only thing keeping them afloat!

[Vin DSL]

BTW, here's your reward for reading this thread...

http://www.salescircular.com/index.shtml (Bookmark it!)

I keep meaning to post this link, but I never seem to find a way to work it into 'the conversation.'

This place has saved me untold hours of shopping the local newspaper ads, and 100's if not 1000's of dollars!

[Spathiphyllum]

Originally posted by Vin DSL
http://www.salescircular.com/index.shtml (Bookmark it!)

Thanks for the tip, but wouldn't you know... the item I was interested in "sold out" while I was shopping. Drat!

Well, it's difficult to vouch for an image since sometimes that is subjective. As an example, I'm looking at my two Matrox images side-by-side right now. Left monitor is the "new" G550 mated with an NEC XV17+ CRT | Right monitor is the old G400 mated with an NEC FE990 CRT. Both images are crystal clear as far as refresh rates and both cards will exceed the refresh/resolution capacities of either monitor. But the old card on the newer monitor blows away the new card on the older monitor. And neither monitor has been abused or overworked.

I guess you'll just have to visit the store and look at your combination in action to be convinced. Yea, hard to do with an older Matrox dually these days but I still love mine. They do everything I need them to do without hiccups and clear as a bell for all of the textwork I do. I'm not a gamer so first person shoot-em ups are very low on my list of priorities. Streaming video and DVD works just fine but I view DVD through a hardware renderer and not a software one. Any hiccups are a function of MB bus delays or caching and not the video card itself.

Hope this helps.

[Vin DSL]

Here's an eye-opener...

http://www.digital-daily.com/video/ati-radeon9800se/

To wit:

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...131-249&depa=1

[JPC-Greg]

nah, for graphics you really want this:

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...102-347&depa=0

or this:

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...102-375&depa=0

[Df_Gamer]

Originally posted by Vin DSL


I'm sort of leaning toward a ATI Radeon 9800 Pro:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...102-286&depa=0

Whatta ya think?

Overkill for what you are describing but at that price you won't be disappointed. The latest ATI Catalyst release ironed out several issues and added screen rotation. The 256mb version isn't much more expensive. I run the 8500DV and the text is very sharp on a flat screen. (I got rid of the 16ms flat panel because it just didn't have the precision, color depth or lag free operation of a CRT)

[Vin DSL]

Originally posted by Df_Gamer
Overkill for what you are describing but at that price you won't be disappointed...

Yeah,I agree!

Actually, I've been doing a LOT of catch-up reading the last few days. It turns out that the machine I'm building now is sort of 'old school'. So, I'm just gonna make a sh!tbox out of it anyway...

I'll probably go with a Radeon 9600SE clone. This is the most likely candidate: http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...102-289&depa=1

Then, I'm gonna build a 'new-new' box. This is what I'm lusting for now...

ECS 915P-A
http://www.ecsusa.com/products/915p-a.html

ASUS ATI RADEON X600 XT Video Card
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...121-513&depa=1

[Spathiphyllum]

Originally posted by Vin DSL
...the machine I'm building now is sort of 'old school'. So, I'm just gonna make a sh!tbox out of it anyway...

You know technology is grand when the box you described is considered "oldscool". What's a desktop PC, if they still exist, going to look like in 10 years? Probably simulating nuclear wargames on 'em I suppose.