What's a good VIDEO card for Audio Production?

[tocsin]

ok so then you've got to check what your motherboard is capable of dealing with. mine's an asus p4p800 deluxe. quite old now, but after a quick google i can see it's capable of agp 3. therefore i can get an 8x agp card (.8V is the voltage requirement of 8x AGP cards utilizing AGP specification 3.0).

First off, if you're not planning on upgrading the CPU or anything, that motherboard is great. I had the exact same thing and would have been fine keeping it. Only reason I didn't was because I snagged a quadcore chip and the motherboard didn't support it. If you are not a hardcore gamer at this point, and just use your system for audio production and basic video, that motherboard is a powerhouse. PCIe doesn't really offer any advantage to anyone who isn't a gamer.

now, for me in the studio, fan noise is a really important consideration. thanks for the tips so far on silents with a heatsink, but they were pci so, after a quick google i've found

gigabyte geforce 7600 GS AGP

then i found:

Gainward BLISS 7800 GS+ 512MB AGP Silent

ok there's dan's 6 series one, but i personally think these might be too old. plus i don't like reading bad review from tocsin ;) i didn't even consider 8 series cause i'm sure they're way too good for what i need the card for - oh and darn expensive!!!

Even PCI may not be an issue for you if you aren't a gamer. Truly, the only difference bwteen an AGP and a PCI video card is that the AGP has a faster and dedicated bus. That's it. While you'll definitely be getting a near Dodo Bird of a card if you go PCI at this point, it may work for you just fine. Before I did my most recent upgrade, I had a second video card in my machine that was PCI which powered the monitor I used for all my FX and VSTi windows.

Also, for Series 6, I don't want you to think I'm giving it a bad review. It's a solid chipset and I never encountered any compatability issue with it until just about a year ago. For a studio setup, if all you're doing is audio, it's likely fine. However, from what I've seen, you only save about $20-$30 USD if you go with a Series 6 instead of a Series 7 over here in the States. If it's not the same in the UK, it may be worth considering if you don't plan on gaming and don't generally view graphics demos.

As for Series 8, if you're not running Vista, don't bother. Only real difference between series 8 and series 7 for the most part is Direct X 10 support. Direct X 10 is barely even used by games at this point. If you're not a gaming enthusiast, you just won't need it which makes the price overkill. And if you aren't running Vista, then your machine doesn't have Direct X 10 at the moment.

what do you guys think - am i on the right track with these two???

Unfortunately, I know nothing of those cards. Before you pick anything up, try just browsing through newegg.com. You don't have to buy from them, but they are a great resource to browse because they encourage reviews from their customers. So, you have a reliable database of reviews there from actual customers, and not companies trying to pitch a product.