Upgrading my existing ATI Radeon Graphics Card

[Paride]

Good evening everyone. This is my first post and I would appreciate some advice on upgrading my existing graphics card. I currently have an ATI Radeon X800 GTO PCI Express card with 256 MB of memory. Unfortunately it only has pixel shader 2 facility and most new games require pixel shader 3. I'm keen to play such games as Mass Effect and the upcoming Diablo 3 and would like to upgrade the card to a pixel shader 3 card with a similar amount of memory or greater. I'm not a massive gamer and don't have a lot to spend on a card ( up to £50) but would just like to upgrade to the next card up which incorporates pixel shader 3. I've seen details of the ATI Radeon x1550 and x1650 which seem reasonably priced but are they any good ?
Any advice and possible suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you in advance for your help and advice

 

[aaronkupen]

Try to stick to the ATI hd 3 or hd 4 series. I'm not sure how much it is in your currency, but don't bother with the x1 series or hd 2. How much is an hd 4670 in your currency?

 

[Paride]

Thanks. It's about £65.00 so reasonable but at the top end of my budget.
HD I assume is High Def.. does that add to performance generally ?

 

[aaronkupen]

No HD means nothing. It's just a random prefix they decided to use instead of sticking an x in front. But the hd 4670 is an extremely powerful card for it's price. If you aren't comfortable spending that much, you could always drop down to a 4650. Also, check out the prices on the hd 3870 and hd 3850. Hd 4670 would be the best bet though if you are willing to spend that much.

 

[zmatt]

You can't get much for 65 pounds. To get a decent video card you need about 75 pounds.

For that price you could get one of these:
Newegg.com - SAPPHIRE 100265L Radeon HD 4830 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card - Desktop Graphics / Video Cards

 

[aaronkupen]

If you can find an hd 4830 for the same price as that hd 4670 that you found then go for it, if not the 4670 will suit your needs more than fine.