Cheat Engine

[atom0s]

My old card died last night due to the fan failing two weeks after buying it. (This is 3 years later, I rigged my own cooling to it to make it last.) It eventually (last night) died to memory errors and failing to POST.

Anyway, long story short I'm looking for a new card. I'm not tech retarded so you don't need to get into details about the card(s) you recommend, I want personal opinions and reviews mostly. I am looking for a card that is going to last so I'd like to see some reviews of cards you personally own and have had for a length of time.

Requirements:
- The card must fit a PCI Express (x16) slot.
- This is for a Micro ATX board so it needs to fit into a smaller case.
- Needs to be at least 256MB GDDR3 to match the old card or better.
- Needs to handle Direct3D 10 (DX10) applications.
- Under $100, this is just a replacement part.

While this system is my work computer I do game on it too, so it does need a little bit of power.

Some more info if you need to know about my system:
- PCI Express x16 slot
- Micro ATX case and motherboard.
- 450W power supply.



My previous card:
CHAINTECH GeForce 8600 GT 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16

My personal review of this card:
Overall rating: 2/5

Poor manufacturing; the fan on the card died within two to three weeks of receiving it. The fan itself is very thin and cheap. The ball bearings locked up and were rubbing loudly shortly after starting to use it. The card also heats up fast due to the poor fan choice.

Poor marketing; the company CHAINTECH sold this card on Newegg with a rebate. It was more of a scam as you were forced to send in the original UPC (not a copy) to obtain the rebate. So this caused me to be unable to return the product as I needed the original to return it so it was more or less so a trap/scam. 3 years later I've still yet to receive my rebate.

However, if the company used better fans and actually followed through with their rebates the card could have turned out to be decent. It survived three years with my personal rigged cooling to it after the original fan died so I'm not displeased with the card itself. But the other points outweigh the value of the card.

[Yezhik]

Small, gaming card, under $100?


www.newegg.com

search video cards, then click $100 and lower, then read all the great reviews from ACTUAL owners, not people who just say they own it.

[atom0s]

[kls85]

Getting a new graphic card depends on your needs. For basic use even onboard will get the job done, but for games that is a different story.
Depending on the games you play will determine the type of video card you should look at. But jumping from a 8600GT to any of today's modern mid-range cards will provide a huge performance boost.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102935

As for the PCIe cards I've personally owned
-6600GT: 2 years, very solid, but fan was loud so I has to manually lower it via ntune.
-HD2900XT: Got the OEM model which has 1GB of ram runs on GDDR4 instead of the regular 512MB with GDDR3. Lasted 3 years until it died due to artifacts.
-HD5850: Current card, been 1-2 year since date of purchase. Can play today's
triple A games and it's a lot cheaper than my previous HD2900XT.

[TraxMate]

You probably want to have a look at the HD 5670. Best graphic card under $100 according to tomshardware (link).