Best PCI-E Card For Under $100: Special Mention

I've seen the Jetway X1950 PRO on Newegg for $90: this is an incredible price for a solid card. The rest of the X1950 PROs are in the $170 range right now, so $90 it's the best deal I've seen in a very long time. It's probably not going to last for long, but it's important enough to mention - once they're gone, the best you can do is the Radeon 2600 XT or Geforce 8600 GT GDDR3 listed below.

Best PCI-E Card For Under $100: Tie

The performance of the 2600 XT is very close to that of the GeForce 8600 GT, but the 2600 XT has a performance edge when antialiasing is disabled. Although the GeForce seems to lead when antialiasing is turned on, it's not much of a real-world advantage, since neither card can effectively use 4x AA beyond 1024x768.

The 8600 GT was a terrible buy at $150, but now that it's under the $100 price point, it is much more attractive. The 8600 GT will slightly beat the old 7600 GT and X1650 XT in raw performance in the sub-$100 price category. In addition to speed, the 8600 GT has the added bonus of being DirectX 10 compatible, as well as being a good overclocker.

NOTE: Avoid the DDR2 versions of the 8600 GT! The GDDR3 versions are the recommended cards, DDR2 equipped 8600 GTs will be notably slower.