Upgrades

[MetalScyther]

I didn't realize this forum was here and I was about to post in the video game forum.

Athlon 2000+ @ 1.67Ghz
768MB RAM (512MB PC2700, 256MB PC2100)
ATi Radeon 8500LE 128MB

^my crappy specs

My comp doesn't have too much going for it

Anyway I wanna upgrade it so I can run games better. Since I'm 15 and have a pretty tight budget I decided I'll just overclock my Athlon to hold out a little longer. So, basically I need a new video card.

Through a little research I basically found out that going to anything over a 9800 Pro is suicide for the following reasons: 1) too much money, and 2) my crappy processor would "bottleneck" the video card.

So I'm really not sure. I used to know a lot about computers when I bought mine ~3 years ago but since then stopped paying attention. To give you an idea of how long ago it was since I new ANYTHING about video cards: this was when having a Ti4600 was big shit and you were the biggest geek on the block if you had it.

I try looking at benchmarks but can't really get an accurate comparison. Here is what I am looking at:

GeForce FX5600-5950
Radeon 9600-9800 Pro

There are a LOT of cards in that area, and I can't make sense of it. Right now my 8500 runs UT2K4 on the 3rd lowest resolution with everything turned down with no stuttering whatsoever. The resolution however is like 640 x 400 or someshit and I would like to change that. My card also runs Doom 3 with not too much stuttering with everything turned all the way down.

I heard that the "GeForce FX series sucks" so I was mainly looking at Radeons.
I found a Radeon 9600 Pro for $100. I also found a Radeon 9600 XT for $130 I think, but I hear the XT can't touch the 9800 and isn't that much better than the pro. 9800's are about ~$140 or so. My budget is preferably around the $100 mark(making $130 a lot of money but not impossible). My friend also offered to sell me a "Sapphire 9600 256MB 128-bit with a better heatsink" for $75, and that would mean I could overclock it more with the $20 heatsink he put on it. I dunno.

Help.

[kainashi]

either a radeon 9600 xt or a radeon 9800 would be good. both play games great. from there, it's really your choice. you can't go wrong with either of them.