Looking for World of Warcraft video card recommendations

[jtl63]

Looking for a little help and yes I’ve read many of the messages and reviews. My question is what video card do you all recommend based on the following criteria:

1. Cost <= $350
2. Reliability/Durability ( I won’t be over-clocking)
3. Fast frame rates in World of Warcraft at the highest resolution possible.

If you have a suggestion and play WOW would you post your frame rates best and worst? I’m assuming your worst would be in a 40 man raid during combat. I’m also hoping the card will have satisfactory performance with the Oblivion (Morrowind Upgrade) game but that has yet to be released.

My hardware is:
Intel D915PBL PCI-E
3.4g P4
2g ram
Asus EN5900 128meg video board

The above computer was a gift and I’m happy with everything except for the video card. I originally had an ATI 9500pro 128meg AGP card and that seemed to perform better than my current card at high resolutions. Also, I’m a little leery of NVIDIA because I’m seeing some artifacts with my current card. I tried changing the drivers without success. I probably have a bad card so I don’t want to eliminate NVIDIA.

Currently I’m considering the following two cards but at this point in the search I willing to switch choices:

eVGA 256-P2-N516 Geforce 7800GT 256MB

POWERCOLOR X800GTO16256MBDDR3 Radeon X800GTO 256MB

Thanks in advance for your help.

 

[the_guru]

My vote goes for the 7800GT.

 

[margag_]

7800GT = VERY GOOD CHOICE.

 

[raven_87]

I have an eVGA 7800GT @ 470/1100....mhmm lub lub lub.

If your looking for the best card stock specifications...the GT is your choice.
If you like doing a wee bit of tweaking, the X1800XL (stock cooler) can almost make XT speeds, provided you up the fan speed to %100. Like I said that 90nm process really shows itself. The problem, the X is a few bucks more...
but I found this, with the rebate...its in your price range.
Either way, both cards are great, and you'll have a good time playing WoW.

X
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814161148

GT
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814130249

EDIT: Wait, were going for AGP or PCI-E? Becuase if your looking at these cards, then your going to need a new mobo...provided you dont have a PCI-E 16x slot.

 

[cleeve]

WOW is one of the easiest games on the videocard. I've seen a Ti4200 eat it up and spit it out.

More than an X800 GTO or 6800 GS/GT might even be overkill, even at high resolutions.

But if you have the cash, and want to play it safe for future upgrades, sure... get a 7800 GT, 7800 GTX, or X1800 XT.

Reliability isn't really an issue with either company. Just buy a name brand with a good warranty, no matter who makes it a dud comes out of the factory every once and a while.

 

[raven_87]

Very true: You reminded me as well...

WoW is actually a very RAM intensive game...the more you can throw in your machine, the better. You might want to consider going with a little less of a GPU and take that cash to throw in some more RAM.

 

[sylvez]

i was a WoW player and yes, i had a Ti4200 P4 2.4Ghz 1GB ram and it worked like a charm

i even cranked it all the way up at 1024 768 max details (minus the AA / AF of course)

it will do better with a better vid card but u definitely dont need a 7800GT

on the other hand, 7800GT seems to be value for money now