Purchasing a VC

[boondokk]

Heya. I'm buying a new Video Card for my current setup.

Cooler Master CM-Stacker Case ( w/ extra stealth fans)
FSP Fortron Source FX700-GLN (Quad-SLI support)
AMD Athlon 64 3700+ (Oc'd around 12%)
DFI LANparty NF4 SLI-DR Mobo
2GB OCZ Platinum PC3200 Ram 2-3-2-5.
x2 Seagate 7200.10 320GB (RAID-0)
x2 Nvidia GeForce 6800 Ultra PCI-E


I was wondering what video card would be the best upgrade i could get right now that would be good for my system. I was planning on dropping about $450+ on it and it is kind of hard to read the market and find out what cards i should wait for and what i should go ahead and buy now. i was planning on getting the Radeon x1950xt in the next week or so, but I don't want to buy too far behind the curve. Would that be a good choice? Or is there something else out there for me?

[flanzig1]

The Nvidea 7950 series and the ATI x1950 series of cards are the top dogs in your price range. The 8800GTX cards are in the $600+ range and bleeding edge.

[boondokk]

The Nvidia 8800GTS is only like 30 to 40 more dollars than the x1950xt and supposedly is newer technology, right? The clock speed on the 8800gts is only 500 while the x1950xt is 650. Which one is faster in real world applications? I play a lot of WoW, Oblivion, and Medieval 2. Which one would get me the framerates I'm looking for?

[flanzig1]

Look here for some 3DMark benchmarks: http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/11/08/geforce_8800/page6.html

[boondokk]

Looks like I am getting a 8800GTS. DirectX10, better FPS (in most cases), and superior image quality. I think the extra bucks will be worth it and I won't have to spend even more money when I have to buy "Vista Ready" hardware.