Buy a $300 card once every 3 years, or $100 card once every year for 3 years

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beacon

Limp Gawd
Joined
Aug 11, 2005
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What would you do? Assuming you keep a rig for three years and then do a complete rebuild.

I'm really looking at these pricepoints +/- 25 bucks.

EDIT: Jim-H makes a good point. Let's also add the option of a $150 card every year and a half.

EDIT: Monolithic cards/boards only... so no Buying a $300 card in first year and then the same card down the road to run SLI/CF.

EDIT: Xeth makes another good point. Let's assume for now that you are not planning on reselling the card down the road

Discuss.
 
Well, lets say in mid 2006 you had bought an 7900gtx for around $300.

Compared to a 7600gs in 2006, an 8600gts in 2007, and a 8800gt now.

You would have gotten better performance this year, and been somewhat comparable in 2007.
 
How about a $150 card every 18 months is how I would do it if given $300 to span 3 years.
 
By the same logic applied above, a GTX280 or 4870 for ~300 give or take right now could conceivably be superior to ~$100 cards for around 2 years?
 
EDIT: Jim-H beat me to it.

I think somewhere in the middle would be a good medium, i.e. a $150 card every 18 months to 2 years.
 
What are you doing with the cards after you're done with them? I'd buy a $300 card, use it for 1 year, sell it for $200, then go buy another $300 card.
 
Xeth said:
What are you doing with the cards after you're done with them? I'd buy a $300 card, use it for 1 year, sell it for $200, then go buy another $300 card.
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That what I would do if you can.
 
I agree with Xeth....

I always buy the midrange..sell it when the new card comes out...ussualy comes out to about 150 every year and 1-2
 
The answer is probably somewhere in the middle. It all really depends when you are buying, what cards are on offer, what Microsoft are doing etc. The key is to get something good now that will last, and try to hold out until another good opportunity arises.
 
The reason I ask is that I may be building a new rig (my current one is about 3 years old now) soon and, while I don't do much gaming now, I may in the future with D3/SC2. Trying to figure out the best pricepoint I should be aiming for in terms of a card. Everything else I already have the price points pretty much nailed down.
 
Jim-H said:
How about a $150 card every 18 months is how I would do it if given $300 to span 3 years.
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Thats pretty much how I did it. The timeline wasn't intentional, but looking at my newegg orders, my 7600GT lasted just over 18 months. My new 4850 is arriving today. :D
 
bholstege said:
Well, lets say in mid 2006 you had bought an 7900gtx for around $300.

Compared to a 7600gs in 2006, an 8600gts in 2007, and a 8800gt now.

You would have gotten better performance this year, and been somewhat comparable in 2007.
Click to expand...

That's kind of how I'm doing it - although it's a $150 card each year for 3 years, rather than a $450 card I expect to last 3 years on its own.
 
beacon said:
The reason I ask is that I may be building a new rig (my current one is about 3 years old now) soon and, while I don't do much gaming now, I may in the future with D3/SC2.
Click to expand...

Doesn't seem like you need a $300 card right now. From what I hear of blizzard games you might be OK with a $150 or less card.
 
Tough choice. Seems like new cards come out every three months these days. 4850 is a solid choice if you can find it around $150 or less. Will it be able to handle tomorrow's games? I'm pretty sure it will be. Most of the popular games are cross-platformed any way...so if it can look good on the xbox 360, it definitely should look good on a 4850.
 
needmorecarnitine said:
Doesn't seem like you need a $300 card right now. From what I hear of blizzard games you might be OK with a $150 or less card.
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That's probably right. Right now I only play WoW and don't do any FPS or graphics intensive games... A $150 card every now and then will probably be my choice going forward. 4850 sounds nice...
 
Xeth said:
What are you doing with the cards after you're done with them? I'd buy a $300 card, use it for 1 year, sell it for $200, then go buy another $300 card.
Click to expand...

I bought a 8800GTS 320mb 1 year ago for $430AUD, now it'd be worth, mmmm, maybe $130-150AUD. That's in just 1 year. You'd have to have pretty good timing to get a card for $300US then sell it a year later for $200US.
 
I do the $150-200 card every ~2 years option myself. I like to get some good life out of my card. It isn't exactly intentional, though, I just go for best bang/buck when what I have is no longer good enough (aka, can't run games at native res - I'm totally cool with dropping to medium graphics to keep it at native res, but if that isn't enough, then its new card time)
 
buy a 300 dollar card every 6 months, and sell the one you have for 200-250, so invest 50-100 every six months to enjoy the eye candy. because the longer you keep your card the more you will loose unless you plan on building another system with it.

that is what I do, and it works out fine and I get to enjoy the latest and greatest, but I usually buy the highend, and if you buy the highend they tend to have good value overtime specially with nvidia cards. Like if I wanted to sell the gtx 280 in six months I could probably get atleast 325 from it, and I plan on stepping it up if there is anything new within 3 months.
 
I know this much. The 8800GTX sitting in my main workstation is the LAST $600 card I'm ever buying.

I think the $299 Radeon HD4870 I just put in my gaming rig is the best performance/value card I've ever bought. Period.

I haven't used ATI in 6 years but they got me back with that one.

Now, fix the drivers and give us real fan control :)
 
Not to makes things more complicated, but a $200 card every 2 years probably makes most sense since it is generally the sweet spot for best bang for the buck high-end gaming.
 
If you're buying launch cards at $300 and $100 respectively I would suggest the $300 card and hold for 3 years. $100 launch cards suck. However if you plan on buying year old cards, every year a $100 goes a long way.
 
I actually did a similar anaylsis with some coworkers a few months ago, comparing the last several years.

During that time I'd gone GeForce 2MX -> Radeon 9500 (approx AU$200) -> X1800GTO (AU$300) -> 9600GT (AU$200).

Coworker had bought high-end as soon as they came out (can't remember the rest, but he'd bought an 8800GTS 320MB at around AU$500).

All up, I'd finished up with about the same performance card, but was about AU$500 better off.

At the moment I see the HD3850 512MB at AU$125 or the 9800GT 512MB at AU$145 as the best value right now, with the qualification that my CPU is also mainstream (actually out of date right now - E6300) and is bottlenecking my 9600GT (a mate with identical video card but E6750 gets much better frame rates). For the systems I build I doubt I'd look at higher than AU$150 ever again for a video card.

http://www.itestate.com.au/pages/pr...aces?BeanName=productDetailAction&pcode=06136

http://www.itestate.com.au/pages/pr...aces?BeanName=productDetailAction&pcode=05950
 
as everyone's said I agree mid-range $140-$190 is the best bet; plus you can typically get easy upgrades (HDCP, DX 10, "10.1", pci-e 2.0, etc.) as they filter down from the $$$ cards.

Of course, every now & then it's nice to splurge on a $300+ card for the extra boost. Plus, lately cards have been performing really well. If you look back to the ATI 26/29xx's & anything nVidia had below the 8800, the midrange cards sucked and were worth 1/2 their MSRP.
 
Cheffy said:
Not to makes things more complicated, but a $200 card every 2 years probably makes most sense since it is generally the sweet spot for best bang for the buck high-end gaming.
Click to expand...

QFT- Thats the sweet spot for me. Got my Radeon 9800 Pro and my x850 xt for almost exactly 200, they both lasted about 2 years.
 
I would choose 1 card per year since newer cards have better performance.
 
I like to get the high end, but not the best card (cause they gouge). I'll get like the second best card usually and hold it down for as long as I can. When you buy low-end stuff its just gimped. With low-end it goes from acceptable to obsolete. With the high-end you can at least remember when it was king. Even when its old, its never low-end. Its just vintage.
 
anime4u said:
I would choose 1 card per year since newer cards have better performance.
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Not necessarily in the $100 segment. Look at the 8600GT(S). The old 7600GT was able to keep up with it in most things, and the 7900GT was/is faster. I believe the 8600GT launched at $150, and the GTS at $200. Or there is the 9600GT, which met the performance of the 8800GTS G80 something like 1.5 years after the launch of the G80s.
 
I've done it with a $300 card every three years. It has worked, Geforce Ti4200, X800Pro, 8800GTS -> GT
 
buy a card when there is a game you want to play that pretty much requires it.
 
The former is indeed more logical.

9800 Pro -> 7800 GTX -> 2x HD4850

Each card was top of the line when I bought it and aged very gracefully.
 
DrStrangeBrew said:
as everyone's said I agree mid-range $140-$190 is the best bet; plus you can typically get easy upgrades (HDCP, DX 10, "10.1", pci-e 2.0, etc.) as they filter down from the $$$ cards.

Of course, every now & then it's nice to splurge on a $300+ card for the extra boost. Plus, lately cards have been performing really well. If you look back to the ATI 26/29xx's & anything nVidia had below the 8800, the midrange cards sucked and were worth 1/2 their MSRP.
Click to expand...

I thought 400 dollars was midrange? Maybe I payed too much for my 6800gt.
 
beacon said:
What would you do? Assuming you keep a rig for three years and then do a complete rebuild.

I'm really looking at these pricepoints +/- 25 bucks.

EDIT: Jim-H makes a good point. Let's also add the option of a $150 card every year and a half.

EDIT: Monolithic cards/boards only... so no Buying a $300 card in first year and then the same card down the road to run SLI/CF.

EDIT: Xeth makes another good point. Let's assume for now that you are not planning on reselling the card down the road

Discuss.
Click to expand...



this logic is totally flawed, such an sli config is not likely to out gun a more powerful single card for 300 bucks, you are better off buying the best bang for your buck in a single card, the ati radeon 4850 is a good price/performance bargain for less than 200 bucks and certainly smokes anything else in that price range the 4870 can be had for just less than 300 bucks, also a good price/performance choice at this time. As for reselling a card? dont plan on getting very much for a used video card, people are always disappointed in how much the market is willing to pay for used computer hardware. If you are a gamer, one card every three years is not likely to quench your thirst either. larger lcd monitors with high resolutions need something powerful to run them and should certainly be a consideration in your purchase.
 
I spend roughly $120 to $160 every 1 to 1 1/2 years on my cards.
Bought my 7900GS for $120 last year in April. Got my 8800GT for $150 in May. So roughly $270 altogether.

The only card out last year in April for close to $270 was the 8800GTS 320MB. Yes, the GTS 320MB was faster than the 7900GS. But by getting something cheap then and getting another card later on, I got a significantly faster card as well as a spare card for roughly the same price.
 
$100 cards are usually crap and don't get much better year over year so that's a bad choice. $200-$250 every 1.5 years seems to be a good approach.
 
I think the $150-200 price range is a good place to buy. Upgrade accordingly. At $300 you are paying extra for "newness." At $100 the card is a bit weak if youre trying to game.
 
needmorecarnitine said:
Salesmen must love you...
Click to expand...
Honestly the last time I bought a video card the prices must have been somewhere around 200-300 for low end, 300-400 for midrange, and 500-600 for the best.

However this time I got a 4850 for 150. I feel like the prices for a mid range card have skyrocketed down from around 300 dollars to 150-200. Of course that was really the first time a videocard from a salesman however the fact that I had to force it out of them to give it to me makes me feel that they didn't entirely love me.
 
^^^ That 6800GT for $400 is what it cost when it came out IIRC, and it wasn't mid-range by any means it had like 50mhz lower clock than the 6800 ultra

I usually buy a $250-300 card every year and plan to sell my old one, but how things usually turn out I always want to keep a good PCIe card as a backup just in case so half the time I never sell :(

Oh well.
 
beacon said:
What would you do? Assuming you keep a rig for three years and then do a complete rebuild.

I'm really looking at these pricepoints +/- 25 bucks.

EDIT: Jim-H makes a good point. Let's also add the option of a $150 card every year and a half.

EDIT: Monolithic cards/boards only... so no Buying a $300 card in first year and then the same card down the road to run SLI/CF.

EDIT: Xeth makes another good point. Let's assume for now that you are not planning on reselling the card down the road

Discuss.
Click to expand...
You realize you've now eliminated two great options afforded by the graphics card industry? CF/SLI extends the life of older hardware, especially after prices drop when a new generation comes out. Also, not selling a card when you're done with it (unless it'll be difficult to sell because it is so old) is taking a guaranteed loss, which is foolish; really you're just throwing that money away. All that said, none of the options listed is going to get you the best performance for your dollar. It is highly unlikely that a $300 card will last you three years of great gaming (granted it will still work, but by the third year you'll be hurting), and 3 $100 cards each year also keeps you at the bottom of the barrel. The $150 dollars every 18 months is the best option of the three, but the only reason is you have cards like the HD4850 in that range due to the intense competition between nVidia and ATi. If history is any proof, it won't stay that way for long. Either way, all three aren't that great.
 
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