Video card!

What should i get?

I have not got a new system for a few years, and I am thinknig of getting one. But what video card do I get, or what manufacturer even?

I have always been an ATI fan. (Had a Rage, Rage Fury Pro VIVO, Radeon 9500 Pro and Radeon 9800XT)
I once owned a VooDoo :P
I once owned an nVidia GeForce....

But things have changed. AMD owns ATI now. Is that good or bad?
I like AMD, but is it for for ATI, I don't know.

I had a friend with a new GeForce back in the day and BF1942 had bad graphics/texture issues. See picture.



Another friend has an AlienWare laptop. Get got it 1 year ago. It runs Vista. But the driver for ithas some issue as well. For example, in COD4 he cannot see people. He only sees their gun... not so useful.

So I did some 'research' :P Google searches.
Results 1 - 10 of about 207,000 for nvidia driver issue problem
Results 1 - 10 of about 1,100,000 for nvidia driver issue
Results 1 - 10 of about 956,000 for nvidia driver problem
Results 1 - 10 of about 348,000 for nvidia graphics problem
Results 1 - 10 of about 216,000 for nvidia graphics issue
Results 1 - 10 of about 37,700 for nvidia video corruption
Results 1 - 10 of about 258,000 for nvidia corruption

Results 1 - 10 of about 203,000 for ati driver issue problem
Results 1 - 10 of about 458,000 for ati driver issue
Results 1 - 10 of about 410,000 for ati driver problems
Results 1 - 10 of about 307,000 for ati graphics problem
Results 1 - 10 of about 214,000 for ati graphics issue
Results 1 - 10 of about 47,300 for ati video corruption
Results 1 - 10 of about 275,000 for ati corruption


So, some reviews to compair:
DirectX 10 Shootout: Nvidia vs. ATI
http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/10/09/directx_10_shootout/

ATI vs nVidia
"but nVidia really seems to be pretty flaky with Windows Vista"
http://chris.pirillo.com/2007/06/18/ati-vs-nvidia/

I don't plan to use Vista.
I do plan to use an nVidia chipset on the mothboard. But i have used the nForce chipset with ATI video cards before and not had issues.

Well, I don't need the best out there. So no 8800, or the 3870. So it's the 8600 vs the 3850.
Google....
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3151&p=8
http://www.incrysis.com/forums/viewtopic.php?pid=279416
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/247874-33-3850-8600gt

http://legionhardware.com/document.php?id=704
"Those looking at buying a sub $300 US graphics card should still turn to the GeForce 8800 GT, while those looking at spending anything less than $200 US should consider the Radeon HD 3850, no actually they should only consider the Radeon HD 3850!"

There we have it. I am set on the ATI Radeon HD 3850. I was actually looking at getting this card to start, and thatwas based solely on price and model numbering :D

Now to pick a manufacturer.... (ASUS, Sapphire, Colorpower, Diamond, ect)