OK, I'm about to take the plunge on upgrading (not replacing) my current rig. See system specs in my signature below.

I can upgrade the CPU to a quad core for ~$300 US. Beyond that, I have another $250 US to spend on a new graphics card.

For the money I'm looking to spend, what's the best card that I can get for RoF?

I've been with NVidia forever, but I'm willing to switch if it makes sense for this sim. My other sims are...

IL-2: 1946
Battle of Britain II: Wings of Victory
LO:MAC/Flaming Cliffs

...but I hardly fly any of these anymore in the wake of RoF. WWI aviation has always been my first love. Nevertheless, I don't want to run into any graphics issues with these other sims. For example, at one time there was an issue with ATI cards and the "new" water graphics in IL-2's "Pacific Fighters."

No flame wars, please...let's keep it civil. Just looking for everybody's input!

what's the best card that I can get for RoF?

The Flamebait 9000 with free fire extinguisher addon

Ming

Does it come with a warranty?

dumbo checkout tomshardware.com on cpu and gpu bestfor the money

Dumbo

what's the best card that I can get for RoF?

Nvidia 285 here with a GTX 480 in mind on the refresh but more CPU power is also good. Intel CPU of course

Single GPU, no multiple GPUs they are prone to micro-stuttering

Not to mention Coventry

Ming

Given your budget you are going to get more performance from an ati card. I currently use a 5870 and an amd phenom II x4 965, those two together allow me to get 80 - 90 fps with all eye candy on full at 1920 x 1080 4x AA and 8x ansio, running trackir and a ffb stick ( Logitech g940) under win 7, were it partnered with an I7 I am sure it would perform even better.

I also own the other titles you list and have no trouble running any of them with all the details maxed. One caveat atm, text is buggered in il2 under opengl but this is fixed in the next driver set, it does run at over 200 fps in directx however and looks almost the same, only perfect landscape is unavailable.

For the first time ever, I am able to run fsx at well over 60 fps with Rex 2.0,utx, Fs global and other graphically intensive add-ons installed; by comparison my previous Intel Q6800 quad core + nvidia 260 barely managed 30 and would completely choke around major airports.

Here's a GTX 260 with 898mb RAM.
I have this card and it's great!
It's within your budget at $210

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...0-433-_-Product

There's a 275 for $255
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...3-183-_-Product

Dont know how much more "umph" that gives you, as I dont know the card, but as much power as you can get is the card you want.
More video power is essential for RoF.

ATI seem to be better bang for buck, but their Catalyst software sucks. I'd check around forums for favourite games to see if there's any issue with ATI.
I had problems with almost every game (except HL2), and even a conflict with joystick software that took a couple of weeks to figure out.
Nvidia software has been 1000% improvement, won't be buying ATI card again.

I currently use a 5870 and an amd phenom II x4 965, those two together allow me to get 80 - 90 fps with all eye candy on full at 1920 x 1080 4x AA and 8x ansio

I've been seeing lots of benchmarks including that card and it looks amazing compared to Nvidia's latest kit

Where's the catch there must be one

Ming

Fear not Ming I'm here. What is it you wish ?

Regarding ATI drivers-been using ATI cards for a some time and haven't had a single issue with the drivers. Crossfire works fine-in the games that support it, that is! Using the newest (10.3) drivers.

Currently playing ROF, IL2, COD 4, WAW and Modern Warfare 2 using an Asus ATI 5970 with all the game goodies cranked to the max. Also running Track IR5 with no issues.

Thanks for the input, everybody.

Upon further thought and review, I've decided to go with a 1GB NVidia GTX 250. Yeah, it's not the latest and greatest, and yeah, it's a repackaged 9800+...but the reviews I saw over at Tom's Hardware were generally positive for a "casual" user like me.

The way I figure it, that plus the CPU upgrade to quad core will enable me to enjoy this game a lot more than I am now without breaking the bank, and it should tide me over for a good while before it's time to designate this rig as the "family" computer and build something new.

I am going to take the plunge. I'll report back when I'm up and running with the new guts!

Look around a bit you may be able to find a good deal. I picked up my GTX280 1GB on Ebay for $204 US new, and a friend over at CA picked up a GTX275 1792Mb card for $177 US.

Good advice, Cameljockey...and I certainly have time to do that. Although the wife has approved this, she's asked me to hold off for another month or two while we pay off some other unexpected bills.

A fiver says Titletown Wines and Spirits called in the tab

Ming

You could get the CPU new for about 300 bucks, but 250 bucks for a graphics card is a bit of a small budget for a completely new card, I recommend you source up a Nvidia GTX on ebay (No worse than 8800 GTX.)

Edit: Ah, I see the suggestion has already been made!

I bought an Nvidia GPU that was nearly the best at the time and I still regret it. Its a buggy, slow piece of u-know-what. I went against my AMD-ATI creed, I sinned, and I am paying for it.

But I was in a hurry and my local crappy "worst buy" retailer didnt have much selection.

Of course afterwards I learned that ATI had cards that showed nearly TWICE the performance for around 1/4 less money. DOOOH !

As far as CPU goes, I am an AMD man, and I would get a single very fast cpu rather than a dual or quad, since dual and quad only help you with multi-tasking, not with performance of a single program. I suspect this is changing though

Actually from what I have read STILL very few games are written to use multi-threading, so dual-core and quad-core processors won't help you there.