Video card advice

[romeyng]

Hey ppl, so i've picked out 2 video cards that i want to get for my pc. 1Gb xfx geforce 9500 and 512Mb xfx geforce 9600...im wondering, would the 9600 still be a better buy than the 9500, because of a faster core clock rate? would the 9600 out perform it although it has less memory?
thanks

[Rik_]

The clock speed will make quite a difference.

For an example. Some time back I had an ATI 9550 256meg. I tried out a 9600 128meg and it was a lot quicker because of it's higher clock speed.

One thing though, make sure your PSU is up to it.

[romeyng]

Hey i almost forgot to take that into consideration as well...Thanks...one more thing...if an item is labeled as recertified, what does that mean?

[Rik_]

That will depend on what it is.

[Suspishio]

Also, remember that 1 GB graphics card will top slice 1GB from your usable RAM. This, in turn, might (probably would) increase paging/swapping with noticeable lag on games that demand a high frame rate.

IMHO, 1GB cards should be used in an 8GB system RAM envuironment under 64 bit Windows.

[Ali.Ayam]

GF9500 has 32 stream processor and 128-bit memory bandwidth, while GF9600GT has 64 sp and 256-bit memory bandwidth and GF9600GSO has 96 sp and 192-bit memory bandwidth. So bigger RAM doesn't always mean higher performance, if you compare GF9500 with GF9600GT.

[Suspishio]

GF9500 has 32 stream processor and 128-bit memory bandwidth, while GF9600GT has 64 sp and 256-bit memory bandwidth and GF9600GSO has 96 sp and 192-bit memory bandwidth. So bigger RAM doesn't always mean higher performance, if you compare GF9500 with GF9600GT.

The issue to which I'm referring is the top-slicing of RAM according to Video RAM size and the knock-on effects that result in other areas of PC performance.