Video Card upgrade suggestions?

So I've been with this computer for a few years and it has almost never failed me, it was a great deal and has great components with the exception of its video card which is an Nvidia GEFORCE 6150 SE, but it came with 3gb of RAM memory and has a great processor.But recently I've been attracted to better computer games like Medieval 2 Total War and Dragon Age Origins. So I was wondering what is the best cheapest video card out there? by cheapest I mean $80 or less. I've been checking on CompUSA.com and I saw a GEFORCE 9500 for about $60, would you recommend that to me? Can it run most modern games like CoD4? The game I'm the most interested about is Medieval 2 since I'm an RTS/RTT fan and I love big medieval battles. If you could recommend me another cheaper video card that can handle the game properly and reduce all the lag my current video card has I'd be VERY happy! but I would also like to play Dragon Age too. What would you recommend me?|||Actually, you'll want to avoid CompUSA and buy from Tiger Direct or NewEgg. Prices are lower there :)



The best card for under $80 is the GeForce GT240. The next-best choice would be the Radeon 5570 or 4670 (performance is almost identical between those two, the 5570 has lower power consumption).



http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as…

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as…

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as…



The cheapest card with decent performance is the GeForce GT220, which is about 10% faster than the GeForce 9500GT and Radeon 4650.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as…



But I'd definitely recommend spending a little more for one of the previously mentioned cards.



Here's how they compare:

http://www.techspot.com/review/245-ati-r…



Since RTS games don't need as much GPU horsepower as shooters like Call of Duty, any of those would be fine. But skip the 9500GT since it's slower than other $50ish cards.



For cards under the $120 mark, it's a waste of money to pay extra for 1gb models, because the extra memory only helps at really high resolutions (1900x1200 and higher) that such cards aren't fast enough to game at, anyway. There is absolutely no difference between 512mb and 1gb cards when running at 1680x1050, 1440x900 or lower.



Note: All of the cards listed above should work fine with a standard 300W power supply.|||ya i recommend that Geforce 9500GT (the 1GB version) for its price range.and ya that graphics card can play COD4 but not at higher resolutions like 1920 x 1200 (it will lag pretty much).If u dont turn on anti-aliasing and the AF (i dont want to spell it the word is pretty long) the card will work just fine.i recommend playing COD4 at 1024x868 resolution.besides playing Medieval 2 and those type of games u dont need so much graphics card memory.512MB is still ok for those games.|||you need to check your power supply as well.|||Your best card in that price range is an ATI Radeon 4670