video card help!

[krnjason]

hey im in the market for a new video card, but im in a bit of a state of confustion.

A couple of questions that I have are:

-is there a difference in the brand names? ie pny,XFX,gigabyte? which one is the best?

-when they talk about 128,512,640mb and like 128 384 bit what does it mean?

Im probably going to spend less than $100 for a card since since im not looking for a crazy card...
any suggestions on what the best i can get for 100? (pci express x16, Geforce series)

[Krispy Kritter]

First, you need to know what type of card you need. Based on your computer specs, I'd say AGP or PCI-E.

I wouldn't say there is a "best" brand to get. Like any other product you get what you pay for, and buying a name brand product usually has other benefits besides just a quality product (ie: support, extras, warranty). Name is irrelevant, just choose whichever chipset/product is in your price range.

The numbers (based on the context of where you may have read them) are likely the amount of memory on the card. For everyday windows use, you shouldn't need more than a 256MB card. If you are a gamer (which I doubt since you are wanting a budget card), then 512MB would be a better choice, especially for Direct-X 10 and/or high resolutions. The 64/128/256 bit number, is the number of bits the card can read/write from the video memory on the card. Basically, higher is better. Also, GDDR3 memory is faster than GDDR2.

In the $100 range, you should be able to pick up an upper range nVidia 7x series card ( http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150185 ) or you can get an nVidia 8x series card (8500/8600 GT series).

Bottom line, for everyday use (surfing/office apps etc) any of the cards in the $100 range are plenty fast enough (especially when you are upgrading from a nVidia 5x series card). Basically every step up (5x to 6x series for example) is roughly twice as fast. Also note, that the major name brands (BFG Tech, EVGA, XFX) all have lifetime warranties (which typically come handy more often if you aren't a gamer who replaces their card once a year).