ORIGINAL: bluemagic98
Ive been building p/c's for a while and i read a lot of reviews and none of them recomend a 256meg card your frame rates wont be more than a frame or 2 higher on the 256 the 128 meg cards are just as fast at 1/2 the cost very little software is writen to utilize the extra memory go to tomhardware.com and read the reviews go to newegg.com and buy the latest chipset you can get for a pci card as a rule of thumb Nvidia is a tad faster but pixilated and an ATI is smoother in my humble oppinion.
http://webpages.charter.net/snafu/ford.jpg
p4 3.2 running at 3.6ghz
ATI 9800 pro flashed to an xt 128 meg
1 gig ram all on a hydro cool 200ex 25 c to 35 c depending on load
No,not frames per second difference, but it stops swapping of the pagefile. Which will cause stutters during gameplay. You don't need it unless you like to play at high resolutions. No not for afp deluxe, but when it is needed he will be happy he spent the extra 50$ now.
And if you build computers then you surley know that Tom has pretty much lost the respect of the community since the "incident".
And you don't need software to use the memory. As soon as it is filled then it "spills" over to the page file. If you turn off the pagefile then it will go to system memory. It's automatic. And a game like DOOIII and HL2 you can tell it to use 256, 128, or 64 by typing in a command line in the console.
ATI is faster in the high end but got tromped in the low end. 6800gt>X800pro but X800XTPE>6800 ultra.
3Dmark 03 11,511
3dMark 05 5,489
Aquamark3 62,674
HL2 Time demo 1280x1024 everything maxed 6xaa 16x af, 97fps
DOOMII Timedemo 1280x1024, 4xaa, ultra quality, everthing maxed, 34 fps
Sapphire X800XT 256 VIVO
AMD 3000+ 64
1 gig Corsair XMS 3200 2-2-2-5-1t
Antec True 480
Soundblaster Audigy 2