I need help finding a video card too...

from GalCiv2 Forums
Hi everyone...I know very little about video cards and am utterly confused with whats out there. But I need one because playing GCII is a little difficult with my on-board memory. Heres my system specs:

AMD 64 X2 4200+
960 megs RAM
PCI Express slot available

I will not pay more than 100$ on a video card. What kind of card would work best for GCII, and other games like Civ IV?

Thanks!
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Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
GC2 and Civ4 aren't particularly demanding beyond needing support for DX9--most mid-range and up cards from the current or last generation can handle both games fine.

With PCIe, a $100 limit puts you right in the middle of the mid-range for options. NewEgg has a Radeon X1650Pro for $99.99 (there is a $10 rebate though bringing it down to $89 at the moment). That's about the best you're going to find for under $100. If you're looking to go lower, they have X1600s and some nVidia cards as well, though most of those are GeForce 7300s.

Personally, I'd sooner go with a card of an older generation that's in the 600 or 800 series (or better) than one of a newer generation that is not. The 600 series cards from both companies are the standard mid-range models, and performance-wise (though not necissarily feature-wise), the last generation's 600-series cards are often superior to the sub-600 cards of the newer generation. In practical terms, a GeForce 6600 is faster than a 7300, and a Radeon X800 is faster than a X1300, though all other factors considered the prices are similar.
Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
thats a nice card for that price, and unless your willing to double and half your price range, i'd just go ahead and buy that one

nice find kryo
Siege of Centauri
Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top


Thanks Kryo for the help, I really appreciate it.

I found a GeForce 7600GT 256MB at New Egg for 99.00 after rebates....is that a better card than the X1650?

The reason I ask is because I looked at Wikipedia and it said that the 7600GT was marginally better than the X1650.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814141043
Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I found a GeForce 7600GT 256MB at New Egg for 99.00 after rebates....is that a better card than the X1650?


Good find, I hadn't seen that one. The two are comparable cards. Due to architectural differences (The Radeon's texture units are grouped into 'quads'), the Radeon's performance can vary from a little better than the GeForce to a good bit less, while the GeForce uses a more standard approach and so should be more consistent in performance. Without real-world performance numbers in front of me, I'd say it's a toss up, but nVidia does traditionally have better drivers so that is one thing which may point towards the GeForce being a better buy.