Hello. My old reliable Nvidia GeForce 7900GS is in its death throws, and must sadly be replaced.

Money is tight and I'm not sure what would be a decent upgrade for cheap. (I know cheap and upgrade don't go well together. Lets ignore that fact.)

Other basic Stats
Operating System: Windows XP Pro SP2
Processor: Intel Pentium D CPU 3.00GHz (2 CPUs)
Memory: 2046MB RAM


I'm not looking for some monster rocket engine of a card, just something that will run current games reasonably well.

Thanks in advance.

I dont know about your budget, but if you want another nvidia, 8800 gt 512 mb would be an excellent choice... Overclockable, cheap and runs great...

another alternative is the ATI 4850 512 mb... the price might be a little steep but it is a great card...

In fact I have 8800 GTS OC edition and I want to upgrade to this ATI card but not sure, since mine is running great too...

well i have the ATI\3650 hd with 512 mb \ DDR4 and i'm happy

but what are your mainboard chips is??
if you have a N-FORCE chips you need a NVIDIA VGA
AND IF YOUR CHIPS IS INTEL i recomand you to have a ATI VGA

I personally would reccommend an nVIDIA GeForce card. I would recommend only the 8 series at the moment because the price/value ratio to the 9 series isn't enough until you get up to the 9800. I have an 8800 GTX overclocked by BFG. I would recommend something like that. I have never had an ATI, but from what I hear people are pleased with most of them...

If you're low on budget, I'd go for GeForce 8600GT, costs round 50-60USD
(Paid 40€ for mine which is around 55$, haven't checked the current rates.) and gets the job done more than well enough.(Runs AoC smoothly on max settings, WoW also works fine on all areas with graphic settings pushed over the limits with scripts.[30+fps in LAGrath city]) My computer specs are similar to yours from what I can see at this point.(Mine is found -->here<--) If you can afford something more expensive, then go for 8800 or the 9 series.

edit:As for ATI Radeons, I used to have a 7600(256mb) on my old PC, it had severe problems running some games even on medium settings.(WoW on lowest and still hell of a lot of lag/screen freezing issues.) Haven't tried the newer models, so I'm not sure how well they work however.

Currently, Radeon has become better than N-Vidia, but I dont know how long it will last. I purchased a new Toshiba laptop that has a Radeon that is equivalent to an N-Vidia GeForce 9700. So currently I suggest Radeon at the moment. Everything totaled a fair price, but just the card should'nt be too much. Once you get it, you can run Crysis at maximum settings with no lag.

I have always been an nVidia fan, but at the same time, I don't think their current series, the geforce 9 series, is really cutting it. So I would probably recommend one of those new Radeon 4850/4870.

Thank you all for your input. I haven't had much experience with the Radeon cards so I'll probably keep away form those.
I had heard the GeForce 9 series is just the 8 series modified a slight bit, so I'll probably be grabbing one of those. I had been looking at the 8600 and am glad to see someone else advises it. However, if I come into some more money before I buy it, I will look at one of the more powerful ones you mentioned.

I'm glad you all threw your input in here. Thanks again.

Instead of 8600 go for a 8800, it is better...

As for ATI vs Nvidia, ATI has made a huge progress and has beaten nvidia, I dont know if you know the issues involving Assassins Creed between ATI and Nvidia but nvidia suffered some...

I would recommend 4850 from ATI or 8800 512 mb from nvidia, I think 4850 is about 200 bucks though not sure cause it might be cheaper in Europe or US, 8800 is way cheaper but much slower then 4850... After the release of 9 series the prices dropped a bit so it is time to grab a new vid card now

before any recomendation are made, what slot type are you using?

im guessing PCI-E, but if your using AGP, stop looking at cards, go look at a new motherboard+proc, its not worth the time and money trying to extend the life of a agp board.

100$:
Asus 9600GSO

200$
Sapphire toxic 4850
BFG tech 9800GTX+

300$
Any 4870 card

now, if your looking at spending more then 300$ then we start having to think about multi GPU setups and what not.



NOW, the 9x00 series cards from envidia ARE the same core as the last generation 8800's [the G92 core]. now the G92 is a very good core, but its being push to the edge of its lifecycle, and the new 4x00 series from ATI is demolishing the 9x000 series, and giving the gtx280 [nvidias top of the line wtf card] a good run for its money.

ATI is the way to go for any system being built right now. a 4850 is dirt cheap and blazing the fast, ive got over 100 hours into tweaking my 8800GT's bios, and about a 25% overclock, and a stock 4850 smokes my card

The best video card out there for cheap would have to the 8800GT SuperClocked Edition by EVGA. Its basically an 8800GTX with a die shrink for further overclocking. I currently own two of them in SLI running 730MHZ/2.2GHZ (Core/Memory) and score 18,335 in 3dmark06, and i can tell they can be pushed further. Thats with an Overclocked Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 running at 3.5GHZ. Newegg is selling these EVGA 8800GT SuperClocked Editions for around $120 dollars after discounts. I would buy one of these and upgrade your CPU to an Intel Core 2 duo E6850 or an AMD Athlon 6000+ for around $100 bucks after discounts. Its better to spread your money around than invest 300 bucks in just a video card, spend that 300 on a video card and cpu. With the combination i just gave, you can play Crysis at 1440X900 on High and get between 25-40FPS.