Price Guides July 2004: Video Cards and Memory
by Kristopher Kubicki and Howard Johnson on July 9, 2004 12:05 AM EST- Posted in
- Guides
Introduction
Welcome to the latest edition of the Price Guides.In a time when technology is supposed to be getting cheaper and more powerful simultaneously, the industry seems to think differently in some areas. While the new generation of video cards from ATI and NVIDIA are both shining examples of hardware making leaps and bounds ahead of its own history, memory prices remain in the background to remind us of the glory days when RAM was bought and sold like popcorn.
With this guide, we will take a look at what bargains remain available and which products will give you the most performance for your dollar. As always, be sure to visit our Realtime Pricing Engine for the latest prices and deltas on everything you see here, and more.
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PrinceGaz - Friday, July 9, 2004 - link
If you're an overclocker on a budget (and which overclocker isn't, else they'd buy the more expensive higher-rated parts with less headroom), the memory recommendation would have to be that 512MB Corsair XMS4000 stick for $127 I mentioned.Or maybe the OCZ PC4000 from the same store as I see that is now listed at the same price, though AT haven't tested it so I don't know how its timings compare and definitely not how high it might go beyond 250FSB. Though every stick is different anyway so its always luck of the draw to some extent.
Video-card overclocking recommendations are not too difficult to deal with. They'll all overclock to a certain degree which depends on the cooling and memory chips used, but its unlikely you'd get 10% extra performance out of a different manufacturers card by overclocking it further to justify a 10% cost increase. Thats for cards in the sub-$200 region like the Radeon 9800 Pro or FX5900 (NON-Ultra). So just get the cheapest you can find provided it has a 256-bit memory bus and you'll have got best value for money. 9800 Pro's and FX5900's offer the best bang for the buck at present.
gimper48 - Friday, July 9, 2004 - link
How about a recommendation for overclockers. Maybe an ATI recommendation, a nvidia one and a memory one just to spice it up. Granted most overclockers already know their stuff when it comes to this kind of thing but opinions are always welcome.PrinceGaz - Friday, July 9, 2004 - link
That 512MB Corsair XMS4000 for $127 seems like great value if you're overclocking a Pentium 4. Also should be ideal for lowering the multiplier and raising the FSB of an Athlon 64 with a mobo with a working PCI lock.