Video Card Rehashing

[Net Llama!]

On Tue, 7 Nov 2006, Matthew Carpenter wrote:
> Hello all,
>
> I just recently smoked my primary entertainment computer's video card.
> Cooling fan died
> I have been using a Nvidia TI 4200 for quite a few years (6?) and have been
> extremely pleased with performance.  The prospect of replacing it is
> daunting.
>
> I run this machine on Kubuntu, running MythTV, Xine, Quake3A, and other games.
> This card must at least have VGA- and TV-Out.
>
> I'm not a hard-core gamer, so I don't want to spend an arm and a leg.  Still,
> I'd hate to lessen my video experience by downgrading too much.  The only
> place I found a GF4-TI card on Pricewatch had it for $76.  Not bad when
> comparing against the $200-300 range.  But when seeing the MX and FX cards
> going for $35-40, it does make one take pause.  Can anyone explain the lower
> end cards and just how much I'd be giving up for use a MX440 or MX4000?  or a
> FX5200?
> Or does anyone here recommend running a Linux box (Xinerama) on ATI?

Well, I wouldn't recommend ATI, but that's just me ;)

As for downgrading to an older GPU, I'd strongly recommend against that, 
not so much for performance reasons (for TV-out its not going to make any 
noticable difference), but more because of driver support reasons.  The 
1.0-9629 driver that was released today, is possibly going to be the last 
driver that supports NVIDIA GPUs older than NV3x.  Your Ti-4200 and the 
MX4xx line are NV25 and NV18 respectively, so you're going to be in legacy 
territory within 6 months time.

Is there a good reason why you aren't considering something newer?  You 
can get a GeForce 6 series graphics card on newegg for under $50:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?Submit=ENE&N=2010380048+1069609639+1305520548+106790703&Subcategory=48&description=&Ntk=&srchInDesc=
All of them have TV-out.

-- 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Lonni J Friedman                        netllama at linux-sxs.org
LlamaLand				http://netllama.linux-sxs.org