$1500 dollar PC and the 3850 radeon Video card
Well i was approached today to build a new pc. As usual i brought out the most cost effective standard system i could find (look back to $550 PC) and added in my infamous Benq 22" (read the review if you like) then went on to make it more stable, reliable and most importantly, better for games. Oh and it needed an OS.
This is the system specs:
CPU: 3.0ghz Dualcore Intel
MOBO: Gigabyte p35-ds3
RAM: 4GB ddr2 800mhz
Monitor: Benq 22"
Case: Antec Sonata III (includes 500watt psu)
HDD: 320GB raid 0 sata II Samsung. (2x160's in raid 0 meaning 2x the bandwidth for faster loading times).
VIDEO CARD: This is what i want to talk about.
I found the Radeon 3850 and to be honest, I'm incredibly impressed. This video card is the latest offering from AMD (gpu wise) with just a couple of models that are faster. But dont think that just because it has faster siblings, then this is slow. Its not.
Remember old 8800GTS, second fastest card from nvidia, costs around $400-500 AUD? Well this video card is almost identical performance. Okay so maybe you are thinking "Yay an equal to okay card!". Good point. However, the next point is the price. the 3850 is currently retailing for somewhere around 260 dollars Australian.
Okay so now the case is solved, and noone will buy nvidia's GTS in australia while this happens. But thats not really the end of the story, its just the latest chapter. News is: Nvidia are re-releasing the 8800GTS much like they did the 8800GT. New manufacturing process, cheaper production, faster performance. But until its out, for the love of god, buy the 3850, or wait. The old GTS is just that. Old.
This is the system specs:
CPU: 3.0ghz Dualcore Intel
MOBO: Gigabyte p35-ds3
RAM: 4GB ddr2 800mhz
Monitor: Benq 22"
Case: Antec Sonata III (includes 500watt psu)
HDD: 320GB raid 0 sata II Samsung. (2x160's in raid 0 meaning 2x the bandwidth for faster loading times).
VIDEO CARD: This is what i want to talk about.
I found the Radeon 3850 and to be honest, I'm incredibly impressed. This video card is the latest offering from AMD (gpu wise) with just a couple of models that are faster. But dont think that just because it has faster siblings, then this is slow. Its not.
Remember old 8800GTS, second fastest card from nvidia, costs around $400-500 AUD? Well this video card is almost identical performance. Okay so maybe you are thinking "Yay an equal to okay card!". Good point. However, the next point is the price. the 3850 is currently retailing for somewhere around 260 dollars Australian.
Okay so now the case is solved, and noone will buy nvidia's GTS in australia while this happens. But thats not really the end of the story, its just the latest chapter. News is: Nvidia are re-releasing the 8800GTS much like they did the 8800GT. New manufacturing process, cheaper production, faster performance. But until its out, for the love of god, buy the 3850, or wait. The old GTS is just that. Old.