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• What about this other card that’s not on the list? How do I know if it’s a good deal or not?This will happen. In fact, it’s guaranteed to happen, because inventory levels and prices change quickly. So how do you know if that card you’ve got your eye on is a good buy in its price range?Here are two resources to help you judge if a card is a good buy or not. The first is the graphics card hierarchy chart, which groups graphics cards with similar overall performance levels into tiers. The top tier contains the highest-performing cards available and performance decreases as you go down the tiers from there.You can use this hierarchy to compare the pricing between two cards, to see which one is a better deal, and also to determine if an upgrade is worthwhile. I don’t recommend upgrading your graphics card unless the replacement card is at least three tiers higher. Otherwise, the upgrade is somewhat parallel and you may not notice a worthwhile difference in performance.At the request of readers, I have added mobile graphics and integrated chipsets to the hierarchy chart. I want to make it clear that there is very little performance data available for these graphics solutions. While the discrete video cards in the chart are placed in tiers based on a lot of information, many of the mobile and integrated devices in the chart are guesstimates based on their specifications. At worst, I don’t think they’re more than one tier away from their actual performance, but this is something to keep in mind when considering mobile graphics chipsets.Graphics Card Hierarchy ChartGeForceRadeonIntelDiscrete: GTX 295Discrete: HD 4870 X2Discrete: HD 5870 Discrete: GTX 280, GTX 285 Discrete: HD 4850 X2, HD 5850 Discrete: 9800 GX2, GTX 260, GTX 275 Discrete: HD 4870, HD 4890, HD 5770 Discrete: 8800 Ultra, 9800 GTX, 9800 GTX+,GTS 250 Discrete: HD 3870 X2, HD 4850, HD 5750 Discrete: 8800 GTX, 8800 GTS 512 MBGo (mobile): 280MDiscrete: HD 4770 Discrete: 8800 GT 512 MB, 9800 GTGo (mobile): 260M (112) Discrete: HD 4830 Discrete: 8800 GTS 640 MB, 9600 GT Discrete: HD 2900 XT, HD 3870 Discrete: 8800 GS, 9600 GSOGo (mobile): 260M (96) Discrete: HD 3850 512 MB, HD 4670 Mobility: 3870 Discrete: 8800 GT 256 MB, 8800 GTS 320 MB, GT 220Go (mobile): 8800M Discrete: HD 2900 PRO, HD 3850 256 MB| Mobility: 3850 Discrete: 7950 GX2 Discrete: X1950 XTX, HD 4650 (DDR3) Discrete: 7800 GTX 512, 7900 GTO, 7900 GTX Discrete: X1900 XT, X1950 XT, X1900 XTX Discrete: 7800 GTX, 7900 GT, 7950 GT Discrete: X1800 XT, X1900 AIW, X1900 GT, X1950 PRO, HD 2900 GT Discrete: 7800 GT, 7900 GS, 8600 GTS, 9500 GT (GDDR3) Go (mobile): 7950 GTX Discrete: X1800 XL, X1950 GT, HD 4650 (DDR2) Mobility X1800 XT Discrete: 6800 Ultra, 7600 GT, 7800 GS, 8600 GT (GDDR3), 9500 GT (DDR2) Go (mobile): 7800 GTX, 7900 GTX Discrete: X800 XT (& PE), X850 XT (& PE), X1650 XT, X1800 GTO, HD 2600 XT, HD 3650 (DDR3), HD 3670,Mobility: X1900, 3670 Discrete: 6800 GT, 6800 GS (PCIe), 8600 GT (DDR2) Go (mobile): 7800, Go 7900 GS Discrete: X800 XL, X800 GTO2/GTO16, HD 2600 PRO, HD 3650 (DDR2), Mobility: X800 XT, HD 2600 XT, 3650 Discrete: 6800 GS (AGP)Go (mobile): 6800 Ultra, 7600 GT, 8600M GT, 8700M GT Discrete: X800 GTO 256 MB, X800 PRO, X850 PRO, X1650 GTMobility: HD 2600 Discrete: 6800, 7300 GT GDDR3, 7600 GS, 8600M GS Go (mobile): 6800, 7700 Discrete: X800, X800 GTO 128 MB, X1600 XT, X1650 PRO Mobility: X1800 Discrete: 6600 GT, 6800LE, 6800 XT, 7300 GT (DDR2), 8500 GT, 9400 GT Go (mobile): 7600 (128-bit) Discrete: 9800 XT, X700 PRO, X800 GT, X800 SE, X1300 XT, X1600 PRO, HD 2400 XT, HD 4350, HD 4550 Mobility: X800, 3470Integrated: HD 3300 Discrete: FX 5900, FX 5900 Ultra, FX 5950 Ultra, 6600 (128-bit) Go (mobile): 6800 (128-bit)Integrated: 9300, 9400 Discrete: 9700, 9700 PRO, 9800, 9800 PRO, X700, X1300 PRO, X1550, HD 2400 PROMobility: X1450, X1600, X1700, 2400 XT, X2500, 3450Integrated: HD 3200, HD 4200 Discrete: FX 5800 Ultra, FX 5900 XTGo (mobile): 6600, Go 7600 (64-bit) Discrete: 9500 PRO, 9600 XT, 9800 PRO (128-bit), X600 XT, X1050 (128-bit)Mobility: 9800, X700, X1350, X1400, X2300, HD 2400 Discrete: 4 Ti 4600, 4 Ti 4800, FX 5700 Ultra, 6200, 8300, 8400 G, G 210 Discrete: 9600 PRO, 9800 LE, X600 PRO, HD 2300Mobility: 9700 (128-bit), X600, X1300Integrated: Xpress 1250 Discrete: 4 Ti4200, 4 Ti4400, 4 Ti4800 SE, FX 5600 Ultra, FX 5700, 6600 (64-bit), 7300 GS, 8400M GS, 9300M G, 9300M GS Discrete: 9500, 9550, 9600, X300, X1050 (64-bit) Mobility: 9600 Discrete: 3 Ti500, FX 5200 Ultra, FX 5600, FX 5700 LE, 6200 TC, 6600 LE, 7200 GS, 7300 LEGo (mobile): 5700, 8200M, 9200M GS, 9100Integrated: 8200, 8300 Discrete: 8500, 9100, 9000 PRO, 9600 LE, X300 SE, X1150Mobility 9700 (64-bit)GMA X4500 Discrete: 3, 3 Ti200, FX 5200 (128-bit), FX 5500, Go (mobile): 5600, 6200, 6400, 7200, 7300, 7400 (64-bit) Discrete: 9000, 9200, 9250Mobility: 9600 (64-bit), X300 Discrete: FX 5200 (64 bit)Go (mobile): 7200, 7400 (32-bit)Integrated: 6100, 6150 Discrete: 9200 SEIntegrated: Xpress 200M, Xpress 1000, Xpress 1150 GMA X3000, X3100, X3500 Discrete: 2 GTS, 4 MX 440, 2 Ultra, 2 Ti, 2 Ti 200 Discrete: 7500 GMA 3000, 3100 Discrete: 256, 2 MX 200, 4 MX 420, 2 MX 400 Discrete: SDR, LE, DDR, 7000, 7200 GMA 500, 900, 950 Discrete: Nvidia TNT Discrete: Rage 128 Intel 740SummaryThere you have it folks; the best cards for the money this month. Now all that’s left to do is to find and purchase them.Don’t worry too much about which brand you choose, because all of the cards out there are close to Nvidia’s and ATI’s reference designs. Just pay attention to price, warranty, and the manufacturer’s reputation for honoring the warranty if something goes wrong.Also remember that the stores don’t follow this list. Things will change over the course of the month and you’ll probably have to adapt your buying strategy to deal with fluctuating prices. Good luck!

• ADVERTORIAL: ATI Radeon HD 4650/70: Top Value for Bottom Dollar

  All right, so the AMD ATI Radeon HD 5000-series graphics generation has arrived and quickly swept the field in performance tests. If you want the whole story backed up by benchmark tests and deeply technical explanation, see our recent coverage here (http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-5870,2422.html). We love a great come-back story as much as anybody else, but the fact remains that a lot of buyers can’t spring $350+ for the latest dream card, much less two of them to run in a dual-card configuration. In reality, there are two kinds of graphics enthusiasts: those who will buy the latest and greatest no matter what and those who stand ready to pounce on yesterday’s must-have technology at freshly (and deeply) discounted prices. There’s nothing like a little recession to help boost the ranks of the latter group, so we thought we’d turn the spotlight just a bit and revisit AMD’s former mainstream stars, the 4670 and 4650. Why? Because while cards based on the new HD 5870 may be selling for $379, HD 4650 and HD 4670 cards start at about $55 and $67, respectively. If you feel like getting 80% of the ATI bang for only 20% of the flagship’s bucks, then read on. We think there’s still a very persuasive case to be made for going a little retro.         

• We’ve talked about some of RV730's specifications already, but it’s important to pause for a moment, pull back, and get some perspective. The graphics market moves so quickly that it’s easy to be fooled by numbers. For instance, the HD 4670 has a raw GFLOPS (billions of floating-point operations per second) rate of 480 while the new HD 5870 measures out at 2,720 GFLOPS. So you might assume that the 4670 has only 15% to 20% of the 5870's performance and thus only 15% to 20% of the 5870's total value. This would be misleading and erroneous. For sure, if your sole purpose is to perform floating-point-intensive apps or keep looping 3DMark tests, then yes, the 4670 will be a small fraction of the today’s flagship parts. On the other hand, the 4670 is less than 20% of the 5870's price, so, from a benchmark perspective, you’re getting what you’re paying for. However, mainstream PCs are rarely ever tied to a single application. We use them for some gaming, sure, but also wide range of other tasks. It’s with these other tasks that we inevitably circle back to the Ford Focus vs. the Ferrari analogy. When you’re stuck with driving 25 MPH in the city, does it really matter which car you drive when all you care about is doing the task of getting from here to there? Of course not. A 4650 will deliver the same Web, Office, and MP3 playback experiences as a 5870 regardless of the price difference. So know the specs for what they mean, but take them in perspective. That said, let’s throw out some numbers. As mentioned before, RV730 is based on a 55 nm fab process and a PCIe 2.0 interface, although a handful of cards placed the chips on an AGP 8X bus. Both the 4650 and 4670 can be paired with either 512MB or 1GB of memory, although exactly what kind of memory is one of the two ways in which these GPUs significantly differ. The 4650 can use either DDR2 or GDDR3 clocked at up to 700 MHz while the 4670 can use DDR2, DDR3, GDDR3, or GDDR4 clocked at up to 1100 MHz. Ultimately, this all translates into a memory bandwidth advantage of up to 57% for the 4670, although, once again, how much real life advantage you see will depend on how heavily your applications lean on video memory. The other difference between these two chips is their core clock speeds. The HD 4650 runs at 600 MHz and the 4670 jogs a fair clip faster at 750 MHz. This difference is a key factor in the 4650 sporting a thermal design power (TDP) rating of 48W while the 4670 bumps up to 59W. An 11 watt difference may not sound like much, but if you’re upgrading a system with a fairly small power supply, 11W can be the difference between smooth sailing and random system resets.