4. ATI Radeon HD 3850
Editors' rating: 8.0
The good: Fastest 3D card under $200; solid home-theater capabilities; supports multiple card configurations with up to four cards in the same PC.
The bad: CrossFire performance remains sketchy depending on the game; despite DirectX 10 support, actually switching those features on remains too challenging; newer, potentially faster Nvidia cards in the same price range are supposedly just around the corner.
The bottom line: Despite the usual caveats of an ever-fluctuating 3D market, for the moment, at least, ATI's new Radeon HD 3850 graphics card delivers the best bang-for-the buck in PC graphics hardware. Until now we haven't had an acceptable sub-$200 option for PC gaming this year. Thanks to AMD, now we do.
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