The rise of the low-end graphics card

I've become aware that relatively cheap (under £40) graphics cards can provide a great 3D graphics experience with translucency, shadows and reflections in modern games at a playable refresh rate. I've just been playing the new Anno 1404 demo on my new Windows 7 system with an ATi Radeon HD3450 (£25, 256Mb DDR2, 3Dmark06 1800) on my 1680 by 1050 resolution monitor. A bit jerky but a beautiful picture.

So let me see what I can get if I pay a bit more. Say for an nVidia 9500GT (£37, 512Mb GDDR3, 3Dmark06 5875) Over three times the performance for just £12 more. Now the game runs smoothly and pretty. What a bargain! These cards are low on power and run cool and quiet too. Without the need for extra power leads and hefty power supplies. Great for decoding and playing DVDs as well.

They are a perfect upgrade of the integrated graphics in most basic systems. They improve the Aero Glass interface in Vista and now Windows 7. My Windows Experience score for that jumped from 3.1 to 5.9 with this latest graphics card.

Low-end graphics cards used to be just for playing retro games. This new generation offers adequate performance for today's games especially if you are happy to lower the detail level slightly or the screen resolution. And your whole system could feel a lot faster as well.