Ok. So I have been having alot of problems with the 4850, seems my motherboard justcan't get along with it. the problem is, from what I have read, there really isn't anything that can compete. Right?
I haven't been keeping up with what's happening on the graphics card scene, so I ask you. What is a good alternative to the 4850? Obviously i'm trying to stay around $200 :/
I have been looking at the 9800GTX, how do these cards compare? Are there any other cards I should know about?
In most games the HD4850 outperforms the 9800GTX, but not by a huge margin. In other games the 9800GTX performs just a tiny bit better. http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3341 So far i haven't seen any good benchies where all the cards were overclocked as high as they're capable of being overclocked, or even factory overclocked. If your mobo is having problems with the ATI, then a switch from the HD4850 to the 9800GTX is a pretty minimal one.
$180 for a factory OC card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814133220 even the mild OC 8800GTS 512 wouldn't be a huge hit in performance at $160 after rebate
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814143119
The 9800GTX is on par with the 4850. Your problem however probably PCI-E v1 / v2 or power supply related, what motherboard and power supply do you have?
jaydeejohn, sometimes the card auto-detects a PCI-E v2 instead of PCI-E v1 and therefore won't operate properly, a simple update of the GFX BIOS to force PCI-E v1 fixes these problems.
