Hi,
I was wondering if it is worth paying extra to get 128 Mb of video RAM… or if it doesn’t make much of a difference to the framerate in games…
It depends entirely on the game. If a game requires less than 64 meg of space to store textures, you’ll see little to no difference. If it needs more, then you’d see a definite benefit to 128 meg.
If the price isn’t huge, I’d go with the 128 to future proof yourself.
Most stuff doesn’t need it at the moment, but the next generation of stuff can probably put it to good use.
If you’re a gamer, yes, it’s worth it. With the newer, polygon-intensive, games the more video RAM, the better. I’m sure some of the resident gamers will be along with recommendations of specific cards, soon.
Dave
Ex-gamer
Get the biggest card you can get now. In three years it will be too small for the biggest, baddest games of 2006. That’s gaming life!
CBCD said it, buy the best you can afford.
Hold on a moment! Like earlier posters said, its all in what you want. Even so, I wouldn’t buy the top of the line cards. Buy the second or thrid string; in the long run you’ll come out better for an even amount of money, or you can hold on to it almost as long as someone could keep their shiny new GeForce Three Million and save money overall.
Thanks everyone…
For the price of the best cards I can get about 3 or 4 of the pretty good cards… (which are good for the current games) and I could just get an upgrade every year rather than only being able to afford a new one every 3 or 4 years…
Getting an expensive one now wouldn’t make things that much noticeable faster I think… unless you’re running it in a really high resolution… and in a few years when the expensive card is really needed, there would be cheap ones that are just as fast or faster than the expensive one at 1/3 or 1/4 of the price…
Anyway, I’d rather stay with mid-range things and constantly upgrade than get the absolutely fastest stuff every couple years. (Actually I’d rather have the fastest stuff all the time - but that’s just a dream)
Btw, geforce 4 TI4200 128 meg cards are probably the best value out there right now. You can probably find a deal for one for around $120 somewhere, or get them anywhere for around $150.