Bargain GPUs

[Deji]

Okay, so my computer died yesterday and I'm looking for a new one.

The only real requirement that I have for it, is that it would have a GPU capable of showing HDTV quality through it's TV-Out and it would be decent for an occasional newer game I might choose to play, and the onboard sound should be relatively high quality for recording music, etc.

I haven't been following the hardware for the past few years so I have no idea what's good and what's not, last time I had a clue was when Athlon XP 2500+ was all the rage :P I've been looking at the 8600GT's, is there anything better in that price range?

Also, you can give advise about the other parts, I have a price range of about 450USD maybe a bit more, depending on how much the parts cost more here. So far, I think that a 300GB SATA drive, 1GB of DDR, a lower end Core 2 Duo and a 8600GT seems like a reasonable system and should fit in my range, anything I should change here? Also, what sort of PSU minimum should I be looking at here? Any specific configuration examples are also welcome.

[Foo]

The 8600s are nvidia's offerings to you as a target market. Occasional gaming, high-quality output, affordable.

You may find that purchasing a full pre-build PC then adding in your own graphics card will give a decent price/performance balance. Prebuilt budget systems are good deals at the moment.

However don't expect to play stuff like Crysis too well, they're currently prepping to show off a $700 PC that can play Crysis acceptably well, so if they can't get it below $700 that's the line...

[shadd_]

if video playback/video out is very important to you go with ati.

the ati 3850 series is faster in games, better video playback and has hdmi with audio out.

no reason to get less than 2gb of ram. prices are dirt cheap.

mobo i would consider is a gigabyte ds3l. less than $100, decent feature set(no raid)and upgradable to the newest c2duos.

[Foo]

Can't fit a $100 motherboard and $170 video card into a $450 budget.

8600 bottoms out around $95

[shadd_]

yeah you're right.

cheapest 3850 i could find $160, cheapest 8600 $120. in canada anyways.

i should have suggested the 3650 512mb. less than $100, more horsepower than 8600 and has all the video playback goodies(hdmi+audio).

http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php? ... e=SAPPHIRE

[obsidian]

How does the audio work on an HDMI videocard? Do they have their own built in soundcard or does it just channel whatever software sound you have on the PC out?

[shadd_]

it has onboard(can be disabled)or it can just pass through audio from whatever sound card you have. you'd have to read up on it. i think it can just pass the data to a receiver also.

there is a passive cooled 3450 for like $60. awesome for htpc.

[Deji]

What I got:

Core 2 Duo E6750
Intel 35DP35
2 sticks of 1GB DDR
320GB SATA HD
256MB Inno3D 8600GTS
And a pretty damn expensive case with a 500W, but atleast it's really well ventilated and quiet

I went quite a bit over my budget, but in the end I said to hell with it and bought it anyway.. it was pretty hard to save from places and keep the overall performance okay.

[AmIdYfReAk]

nice man! you should be happy with that !

btw, what case did you get?

[Deji]

Yeah, hopefully I can pick it up next week

It's this case: http://www.compucase-hec.co.uk/mainpage ... .asp?pid=8
I have one at the office and I must say, I don't really notice any noise whatsoever.