On 01/24/2009 02:58 PM, Marc Shapiro wrote:
Ron Johnson wrote:On 01/24/2009 12:20 PM, Marc Shapiro wrote:I don't think that I have actually purchased a video card separate from the PC, or motherboard since my TRS-8- Model III died and I bought my first PC compatible. That would have been about 26 years ago. Getting a new board might not be that bad of an idea, but, as I have notrecently had to make such a purchase I have not looked into what is good,bad, works with Linux, etc. I am not looking to spend a lot of money and I don't need a fancy gamers board. I just need something that does the job. I noticed that Fry's has several inexpensive EVGA boards, specifically a 7200GS w/128MB or 256MB PCI-Express and an 8400GS w/512MBI'd go with the 7200GS, because (a) I know it works well, and (b) nvidia played games with some of the 8400 naming conventions. IOW, some weren't as fast as the 7xxx cards.Also, it's more likely that you can get passively-cooled 7xxx cards.The specs for the cards, as posted on the Fry's site are: * Interface: PCI Express x16 * Chipset Manufacturer: NVIDIA * GPU: GeForce 7200GS * Core clock: 350MHz * Memory Clock: 666MHz * Memory Size: 256MB GDDR2 * Memory Interface: 64-bit * 3D: API * DirectX: DirectX 9 * OpenGL: OpenGL 2.0 * Ports: D-SUB, DVI, TV-Out, S-Video Out * RAMDAC: 400 MHz * Max Resolution: 2048 x 1536 * SLI Supported: No * Cooler: With Fan
IMNSHO, unless this is a *workstation* where you do lots of OpenGL visualization, or you are dual-booting to play Crysis, Linux users just don't *need* uber-video performance.
Thus, I go for good-enough-but-silent over raw power which is overkill 99.999% of the time (especially if you use the nvidia driver).
Thus, I bough a card very similar to one of these: http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=2010380048+1305520548+1069609641+106790717+1295318921&Configurator=&Subcategory=48&description=&Ntk=&SpeTabStoreType=&srchInDesc=
and * Interface: PCI Express x16 * GPU: GeForce 8400GS * Core clock: 459MHz * Memory Clock: 800MHz * Memory Size: 512MB * Memory Interface: 64-bit * Memory Type: GDDR2 * DirectX: DirectX 10 * OpenGL: OpenGL 2.0 * Ports: 1 x D-SUB, 1 x DVI, TV-Out HDTV, S-Video * RAMDAC: 400 MHz * Max Resolution: 2048 x 1536 * RoHS Compliant: Yes * HDCP Ready: Yesso the 8400GS would seem to have a higher core clock and memory clock, as well as twice the memory. Are you saying that even with the higher specs that it may not run as fast,
Or, it might!
or that some 8400s actually did not have the higher specs?
Yes. -- Ron Johnson, Jr. Jefferson LA USA "I am not surprised, for we live long and are celebrated poopers."