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#1 2006-09-22 09:11:18

Dr.U
Member
From: Ettlingen, Germany
Registered: 2005-03-03
Posts: 68

Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

I currently have an old ATI RageXL card and would like to get something that is cheap, easily available and presents no problems for use with Linux. I do not play games, but do like to do digital photography and would like to be able to view DVD films. Any suggestions?

I have been reading about how 'uncooperative' ATI is about providing open source devs with information about their cards. I would therefore prefer NOT to use ATI products.

Thank you for your time.

Regards,

  -- Dr. U

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
A man is only as old as the woman he feels. -- Groucho Marx

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#2 2006-09-22 11:31:55

chrismortimore
Member
From: Edinburgh, UK
Registered: 2006-07-15
Posts: 655

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

You can get some older nvidias pretty cheap the now.  Depends how much you want to spend.  I got a Gainward 6600GT for about £130 last year, it's quite a good card and can play newish games (HL2, UT2004, FEAR, Far Cry, that kinda thing) really well.

Or, you can get the desktop equivalent of my laptop, an FX5200 for around £20.  It only really does the older stuff (does Quake 3 Arena very nicely though), but if you're not into gaming it's a good buy.  I can play neverball at 1600x1200 without any slow down on it, so it meets my needs wink

Both cards (using the XV video out driver [in xine, mplayer, and many others]) give great quality DVD playback (and I have no need to use deinterlacing, yippee).

The only thing that would really affect the digital photography would be if you want video input ports on the card, but I find it's better to just get a separate capture card for that kinda thing.  A decent monitor is a lot more important, and even the cheapest cards give you a clear image (take that comment with a pinch of salt...)

And some background, I've had an nvidia TNT2 Ultra, a GeForce FX5200Go, a GeForce FX5500, and a GeForce 6600GT, and have never had any nvidia-related Linux issues (or at least none that arn't the fault of a misplaced config line).

I hear matrox cards are really good as well, but I've never actually used one before, so I can't comment other than round-the-watercooler-rumours.  The VIA Unichromes are also really good for DVD playback, but I've only seen these on mini-itx boards...


Desktop: AMD Athlon64 3800+ Venice Core, 2GB PC3200, 2x160GB Maxtor DiamondMax 10, 2x320GB WD Caviar RE, Nvidia 6600GT 256MB
Laptop: Intel Pentium M, 512MB PC2700, 60GB IBM TravelStar, Nvidia 5200Go 64MB

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#3 2006-09-22 11:38:42

JGC
Developer
Registered: 2003-12-03
Posts: 1,664

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

If you prefer opensource drivers, there's two options:
- ATI R200 or R300 based cards, where R200 has better support but R300 is more powerful
- Intel onboard chipset, these have 100% opensource support from Intel and Tungsten graphics

If you just want a good videocard and don't care about opensource or binary drivers, go for nvidia.

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#4 2006-09-22 11:45:48

chrismortimore
Member
From: Edinburgh, UK
Registered: 2006-07-15
Posts: 655

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

JGC wrote:

- Intel onboard chipset, these have 100% opensource support from Intel and Tungsten graphics

My brothers girlfriend had an Intel graphics chip (I forget which, but it was quite new at the time), and we had a lot of trouble getting it to work.  It kinda put me off them for life.  It worked, but there was no direct rendering, which was a pain for watching videos.  I forget how we got it working in the end, but I remember it took a few days of searching and tweaking...


Desktop: AMD Athlon64 3800+ Venice Core, 2GB PC3200, 2x160GB Maxtor DiamondMax 10, 2x320GB WD Caviar RE, Nvidia 6600GT 256MB
Laptop: Intel Pentium M, 512MB PC2700, 60GB IBM TravelStar, Nvidia 5200Go 64MB

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#5 2006-09-22 13:10:13

stavrosg
Member
From: Rhodes, Greece
Registered: 2005-05-01
Posts: 330
Website

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

I'd say an ATI R200/300-based card would be the ideal choice, since they are still fairly powerfull, and the easiest to set-up.

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#6 2006-09-22 13:14:25

Echo
Member
From: Ohio, United States
Registered: 2006-05-16
Posts: 239

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

The nvidia FX5200 can also use xvmc for vo as opposed to xv. You can't use xvmc on the newer graphics cards from nvidia. Basically, xvmc, allowed me to watch hdtv videos on an underpowered box.

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#7 2006-09-22 13:23:21

Romashka
Forum Fellow
Registered: 2005-12-07
Posts: 1,054

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

JGC wrote:

If you prefer opensource drivers, there's two options:
- ATI R200 or R300 based cards, where R200 has better support but R300 is more powerful
- Intel onboard chipset, these have 100% opensource support from Intel and Tungsten graphics

If you just want a good videocard and don't care about opensource or binary drivers, go for nvidia.

Why not nv driver? No 3D acceleration but it is not needed for photo & video anyway.  :?


to live is to die

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#8 2006-09-22 19:56:17

iBertus
Member
From: Greenville, NC
Registered: 2004-11-04
Posts: 2,228

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

I switched from a Radeon 8500 to a GeForce 5700 (about the same on Windows) and found that the GeForce was much faster on Linux. While both ATi and nVidia provide binary drivers for their hardware, nVidia has been the best performance wise for me. I suppose YMMV.

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#9 2006-09-22 20:37:06

Lone_Wolf
Member
From: Netherlands, Europe
Registered: 2005-10-04
Posts: 11,868

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

I have a feeling we overlooked something. the OP talks about having an ATI RageXL , which is a available as PCI and AGP videocard.

I think most cards named sofar are PCI-e cards.

Dr.U , what kin dof card are you looking for : PCI - AGP - PCI-e ?


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#10 2006-09-22 21:27:00

iBertus
Member
From: Greenville, NC
Registered: 2004-11-04
Posts: 2,228

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

Both cards named in my post are AGP versions. I don't have PCI-e on my socket 754 mobo.

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#11 2006-09-23 11:46:22

chrismortimore
Member
From: Edinburgh, UK
Registered: 2006-07-15
Posts: 655

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

Lone_Wolf wrote:

I think most cards named sofar are PCI-e cards.

Unless I missed something, all cards named so far are available as AGP, and some as PCI (such as the FX5200).


Desktop: AMD Athlon64 3800+ Venice Core, 2GB PC3200, 2x160GB Maxtor DiamondMax 10, 2x320GB WD Caviar RE, Nvidia 6600GT 256MB
Laptop: Intel Pentium M, 512MB PC2700, 60GB IBM TravelStar, Nvidia 5200Go 64MB

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#12 2006-09-23 11:47:32

chrismortimore
Member
From: Edinburgh, UK
Registered: 2006-07-15
Posts: 655

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

Romashka wrote:

Why not nv driver? No 3D acceleration but it is not needed for photo & video anyway.  :?

Last I saw, it doesn't support direct rendering, which I thought was needed for XV.

As for XvMC (someone mentioned it), VIA Unichrome seem to have the best XvMC support.


Desktop: AMD Athlon64 3800+ Venice Core, 2GB PC3200, 2x160GB Maxtor DiamondMax 10, 2x320GB WD Caviar RE, Nvidia 6600GT 256MB
Laptop: Intel Pentium M, 512MB PC2700, 60GB IBM TravelStar, Nvidia 5200Go 64MB

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#13 2006-09-24 00:34:48

Moparx
Member
Registered: 2006-02-05
Posts: 136
Website

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

the Nvidia FX5200 is definately worth looking into.


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#14 2006-09-24 02:40:10

skottish
Forum Fellow
From: Here
Registered: 2006-06-16
Posts: 7,942

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

You can get an NVidia 5200 or 5600 for super cheap. I just bought a 7300GS 256 meg card for $50. I can only imagine what kind of deals you could get on the former cards.

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#15 2006-09-24 02:42:01

iBertus
Member
From: Greenville, NC
Registered: 2004-11-04
Posts: 2,228

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

I wouldn't get a 5200 if you can put out a little bit more for a 6200, which is much better.

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#16 2006-09-24 02:47:22

skottish
Forum Fellow
From: Here
Registered: 2006-06-16
Posts: 7,942

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

iBertus wrote:

I wouldn't get a 5200 if you can put out a little bit more for a 6200, which is much better.

That reminded me...

My old FX5600 card and newer NVidia drivers didn't play nicely together. The video had pretty bad flickering. I ended up keeping an older, patched driver around so it would work properly.

Also, maybe someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that Wine needs OpenGL now.

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#17 2006-09-24 06:02:19

iphitus
Forum Fellow
From: Melbourne, Australia
Registered: 2004-10-09
Posts: 4,927

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

skottish: does it work with the nvidia-legacy driver?

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#18 2006-09-24 10:50:26

chrismortimore
Member
From: Edinburgh, UK
Registered: 2006-07-15
Posts: 655

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

skottish wrote:

My old FX5600 card and newer NVidia drivers didn't play nicely together. The video had pretty bad flickering. I ended up keeping an older, patched driver around so it would work properly.

Also, maybe someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that Wine needs OpenGL now.

You should probably report that to nvidia, my FX5200 works fine with the latest (non-beta) drivers.


Desktop: AMD Athlon64 3800+ Venice Core, 2GB PC3200, 2x160GB Maxtor DiamondMax 10, 2x320GB WD Caviar RE, Nvidia 6600GT 256MB
Laptop: Intel Pentium M, 512MB PC2700, 60GB IBM TravelStar, Nvidia 5200Go 64MB

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#19 2006-09-24 19:48:03

skottish
Forum Fellow
From: Here
Registered: 2006-06-16
Posts: 7,942

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

iphitus wrote:

skottish: does it work with the nvidia-legacy driver?

Never tried it. I kept a driver around that worked, so I never had a need.

chrismortimore wrote:

You should probably report that to nvidia, my FX5200 works fine with the latest (non-beta) drivers.

The only responce I got back was that my Xorg setting were off. This was the same Xorg file that I used for years; The one that worked perfectly until the NVidia drivers went greater than 8174.

Either way, it doesn't matter for me anymore, I no longer have the card.

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#20 2006-09-25 12:27:52

Dr.U
Member
From: Ettlingen, Germany
Registered: 2005-03-03
Posts: 68

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

Hey, Guys! Thanks for all of the suggestions and discussion!!

I am not very up on video cards (obviously) and am not sure whether my ATI card is PCI or AGP, but something tells me it is PCI. Can someone tell me how to tell the difference by just looking or using some sort of utility?

I will look around for either the FX5200 or a GeForce 5700 once I know what sort (PCI or AGP) I will be needing.

Again: thanks a million for the great help!

Regards,

  -- Dr. U

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog
it is too dark to read. -- Grouch Marx

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#21 2006-09-25 15:46:30

chrismortimore
Member
From: Edinburgh, UK
Registered: 2006-07-15
Posts: 655

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

Here is a good picture I just found.  This is what you'll end up with if you try and put an AGP card into a PCI slot: http://media.hardwareanalysis.com/artic … /10924.jpg

This might also help: http://www.cnet.com.au/i/r/2005/desktop … 00x225.jpg
In this picture, the PCI slots are white and the AGP slot is that icky brown-ish colour.


Desktop: AMD Athlon64 3800+ Venice Core, 2GB PC3200, 2x160GB Maxtor DiamondMax 10, 2x320GB WD Caviar RE, Nvidia 6600GT 256MB
Laptop: Intel Pentium M, 512MB PC2700, 60GB IBM TravelStar, Nvidia 5200Go 64MB

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#22 2006-09-25 15:58:18

iBertus
Member
From: Greenville, NC
Registered: 2004-11-04
Posts: 2,228

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

You could search in your Xorg.0.log file for references to AGP graphics. Also, the output of lspci may prove useful. If you post a picture someone in the forum would be happy to help you ID that card.

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#23 2006-10-07 13:42:48

Dr.U
Member
From: Ettlingen, Germany
Registered: 2005-03-03
Posts: 68

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

iBertus wrote:

You could search in your Xorg.0.log file for references to AGP graphics. Also, the output of lspci may prove useful. If you post a picture someone in the forum would be happy to help you ID that card.

Xorg.0.log reports:

   PCI:*(1:0:0) ATI Technologies Inc Rage XL AGP 2X rev 39

So, without opening the box, I assume it is AGP. If so, I've found that it is easy to buy a new GeForce FX5200 with 128 MB DDR for about 45 Euros.

Next question: I guess that the last time I logon before putting the new card into its slot, I should edit xorg.conf and replace the line about the driver being ati -- but what is the correct driver for the FX5200? Are there any other changes that are needed? Perhaps in other files?

Thanks in advance,

  --  Dr. U
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My wife wants to have sex in the back of the car
and she wants me to drive. -- Rodney Dangerfield

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#24 2006-10-07 14:16:28

stavrosg
Member
From: Rhodes, Greece
Registered: 2005-05-01
Posts: 330
Website

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

There are two drivers; the open source one (no 3d acceleration), the package named xf86-video-nv , and the nvidia-provided binary with acceleration, in the 'nvidia' (or 'nvidia-beyond', depending on your kernel of choice) package.
For the former, you have to replace 'ati' with 'nv' in your xorg.conf, and for the latter 'nvidia'

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#25 2006-10-07 14:27:52

Dr.U
Member
From: Ettlingen, Germany
Registered: 2005-03-03
Posts: 68

Re: Looking 4 a good but cheap graphics card

Thanks, Stavros! Just the information that I was needing. Have a nice weekend.

Regards,

  -- Dr. U

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