Video card recommendation for linux/win2k?

[Guest]

Hi everybody,

I'm currently building a system for college, and I have ordered all of my parts except for my video card. I'll be running an athlon 1.4ghz on an AMD 760 chipset mboard. I will be doing a dual-boot configuration with windows 2000 and mandrake linux 8.0 .

I have been looking at the Hercules Kyro II cards, and they seem pretty nice, especially for the price, but the only thing holding me back from getting one is that I'm not sure that it would be very compatible with linux, if compatible at all. If anybody knows anything or has had any experience with this card (the 3d prophet 4500 tv, or similiar card) in linux, I would greatly appreciate any input.

I have also been looking at Radeon, g450, and geforce2 cards. I am really having a hard time deciding between them. Compatability and 3d image quality are the main issue, but it has to have acceptable performance and speed also. I have heard that the matrox cards work very well in linux, but lack the 3d performance, and they remain fairly expensive for what you get, but the tv out dual-head is definately nice. I have no idea what the linux support for the radeon cards is like. I know that the geforce2 series has linux support, but the drivers are all closed-sorce, plus I've heard that the image quality of the geforce2's really isn't that great, not to mention the lack of any hardware dvd-features.

So i'm pretty much left in the dark, even after reading so many reviews on different cards. And if I were to choose a geforce2 or radeon card, there are so many different varieties that I wouldn't know which version to go with (mx, mx400, pro, gts, ultra, ve, etc). I'm looking to spend around $100 +/- $20.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thank You.

-Brian

 

[kevstev]

you dont specify any specific graphic needs, so for your price range a geforce 2 mx 400 should be good enough.
-Kevstev

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[Guest]

Yeah, I have pretty much decided that a Geforce 2 is the way to go. I don't even think I have read the words "kyro II, linux, and compatible" used in the same paragraph. It seems that the geforce2 cards have the best linux support, which is really nice. I will be doing mostly 2d applications, along with dvd viewing, and I would like to be able to hook up the tv to the card, just for DVD play. I'm sure that I will play the occasional game of Descent3, quake 3, or serious sam. I'm not exactly sure what other kind of 3d uses i'll come up with for it, but I want the card to last.

I currently have a voodoo 3 3000 card on my home system, and it's a bit doggy for me, and the fact that there is like absolutely no driver support anymore really gets annoying.

So now I'm forced to choose WHICH geforce2 card to get. I think the lowest i would go would be the mx400, but the gts can be found fairly cheap sometimes. I have no idea how much memory to get either, nor a good manufacturer.

Thanks for your response.

-Brian Saghy