Howdy. It's been a while since I've put together a comp, but I'm building one for the girlfriend now. I have a few questions that I think you guys could help me out with:

The last time I built a system, I needed a card for gaming, so I was worried about the typical stuff (memory, etc.), but she'll mostly be doing graphic design work (Adobe Illustrator & InDesign mostly). Does the graphics card really matter that much for most 2D stuff?

What would be a good card for her if games aren't an issue? I was looking at an ASUS EN6200TC. Any thoughts?

Graphics card is pretty much irrelevant except in that you want a newer card with a good RAMDAC.

But a cheapo $50 X300 would do you just as well as a $500 card in Photoshop and Illustrator. Cheap Radeons usually have good display quality so that's a good bet for her.

Thanks for the info. How do I know if the RAMDAC is good?

If 2D display quality and color accuracy are important, check out Matrox vidcards.

Mostly just buy a new-generation card for a decent RAMDAC, like an X300 or X1300.

Matrox cards are the best for display quality, but they can be a little pricey.

They do have their die hard fans though (Ape this means you! )

Since gaming doesn't matter, you can find a really really cheap Matrox G450 or G550 on eBay, if you're using an AGP mobo. You can also find PCI versions of them, but they're not as common. They'll do dual monitor setups as well, and be rock-stable and will go up to insane resolutions. If you're really nuts they sell boards that will drive 4 monitors at once, but they're a little pricey.

I don't know what their PCIe boards cost currently, but you don't really need PCIe speeds for 2D work, even old PCI is fast enough.