WTB opinions before i buy !!

[spartin117]

Hey just throwing a post out there hoping for some decent thoughts and opinions on the subject. im in the market for a new card atm and im a pretty hardcore gamer but mostly MMOS / RPGS. anyway im looking at these 3 cards :

EVGA GeForce 8500 GT Video Card - 1GB GDDR2, ( ~ 50$ )


GeForce 8800 GT 512MB (~ 120$ )


EVGA GeForce 8600 GT Video Card - 1GB GDDR2 (~75$ )


As you can see im looking at PCIe nvidia cards. im open for any info on these 3 cards and/ or any cards ppl think are better ( that are PCIe & nvidia ) for 150$ or less.

 

[rodney_ws]

That 8500 GT is a dog of a card. If you buy it, do NOT plan on gaming. The 8600 GT is a stinker as well... but it's clearly better than the 8500 GT. Light gaming should be fine on the 8600 GT, but what's the point? After all, you said you were a hard core gamer. In the $120 price range I believe you should be looking at the new ATI 4830 that just dropped or perhaps an Nvidia 9800 GT. Most cards at that price point offer an excellent bang-for-the-buck.

List your current specs so we know we're not suggesting you buy a card that'll be bottlenecked by a 5 year old CPU.

 

[rodney_ws]

You should also keep in mind that the higher performing cards generally carry higher power requirements... so if you've got an off-the-shelf Dell/HP, it's not safe to assume that the mid-range and higher-end cards will work without more amps on the 12 volt rail.

 

[mactronix]

We need the rest of your system specs and also what resolution you play at. What are you running now and what make/model is your PSU. Just to check if it can power the sugested card/s
Mactronix