Budget Graphics Cards Compared

EconolineCrush writes "Tired of reading reviews of high-end graphics cards that cost several hundred dollars or more? The Tech Report has a round-up of three budget cards that cost $80 or less. ATI's Radeon X1300 Pro, NVIDIA's GeForce 7300 GS, and S3's Chrome S27 are compared in an array of gaming, video playback, power consumption, and noise level tests against not only each other, but also a typical integrated graphics solution. As one might expect, the budget cards offer significantly better 3D performance than integrated solutions. What's even more impressive is the fact that even with newer games, the sub-$80 cards still have enough punch to deliver respectable performance."

Feh

[The_Isle_of_Mark]

If I can't do 27,000,000,000,000 triangles a second for under $80 I'll not buy one!

Re:Documentation for 'Budget' models....

[LurkerXXX]

What's wrong w/ the existing nVidia drivers?

It's a blob. [openbsd.org]

Re:Power hungry and Noisy

[bri2000]

I had an 256MB X800 (note lack of suffix) which was passively cooled (made by Gigabyte, doubt they make it anymore but old samples may still be around). Coped very well with all modern games (including Oblivion at 1024*768 with bloom lighting and the view distances maxed out and F.E.A.R. at a similar resolution), cost about £130 and I was very happy with it. Unfortunately (and this may or may not have had anything to do with the 20 sessions of Oblvion it was forced to undergo on the weekend before its demise) it died exactly a week after its warranty expired.