Help me decide on a new budget graphic card

[AnimeminA]

i like to purchase my parts in person at the retail instead of ordering parts online unless desperate. I would like to spend roughly $220(CAD) +tax(14%), a lot less if there is shipping cost.

At the moment, I'm deciding between:
sapphire ati radeon 4870 1gb (CanadaComputers: $183.99 cash +tax)
sapphire ati radeon 4870 1gb vapour-x (NewEgg: $189.99 +30$ shipping +tax)
sapphire ati radeon 4890 1gb oc (CanadaComputers: $209.99 cash +tax)
xfx ati radeon hd 4890 xt (TigerDirect: $229.97 +tax)

[Liteninja]

Well, if your looking for a budget card. DONT EVEN THINK ABOUT buying the factory OC'ed versions.. thats kinda stupid in my opinion. When you can just raise the fan speeds manually and manually overclock the gfx card yourself for free. Just get the normal 4870 without overclock, but a true "budget" card would really be the 4850. It's all up to how much your willin got spend for performance, but let me say this again. Don't buy cards already overclocked...please?

[AnimeminA]

sadly that is the only sapphire 4890 graphic card at that store. if i purchase it elsewhere, i wil be paying +280 +tax >_>

PS: i already own a 4850 512mb, but i need to send it in for rma. was hopping to get a new graphic card and use the 4850 as backup since i can't always have the time to wait for an rma replacement

[Liteninja]

Well, i hope you know that you won't see much of a big improvement with those cards if you currently own a 4850. You could buy a 4870 or 4890, but whats the point? Wouldn't it be considered a waste of money to even have a "spare" videocard? And the 4850 is a fairly recent one at that. This is just my opinion, and just to let you know, by the time windows 7 gets fully released, dx11 cards will probably be released.

What's a "backup" card anyways lol.

Also, the 4890 is currently the highest-end single card ati has to offer, so im not really sure if it could be considered as a "budget" card. xD

[Ronin]

When you can just raise the fan speeds manually and manually overclock the gfx card yourself for free.

You are like one of those guys that occasionally mods a gfx-card bios or are you one of those who just heard of the existence of those other guys?

How do I raise the fan speed on a gainward 7600GT golden sample AGP over factory settings?
Does it have the standard cooler or not?
Does it have the same ram as the nvidia version?

Your blanket remark is so broad that it doesn't apply anymore.

[endrien]

You are like one of those guys that occasionally mods a gfx-card bios or are you one of those who just heard of the existence of those other guys?

How do I raise the fan speed on a gainward 7600GT golden sample AGP?

Download speedfan? Shits not hard, I could literally teach my nan how to overclock a card.

[Ronin]

Download speedfan? Shits not hard, I could literally teach my nan how to overclock a card.

The fan will technically not run over stock speeds....

People have the weirdest ideas.

I am dead sure that you can teach your nan how to ruin equipment and to get literally nothing for it.
Who cares about freaking noob Oc's they are as pointless as they expensive and ineffective and increasing failures and degrading your visual image and possibly destroying all your data.

[AnimeminA]

its capable with nVidia cards, but ATI cards runs at 74C on load avg >_> i have to have my ati fan run on manual 95% full power, lmao. also, when getting a new graphic card, i rather no downgrade XP