3D Cards and WoW – the 7300 GT TDH
I recently upgraded to a 22″ widescreen monitor. To drive this monitor in a Digital fashion, I jumped from a Geforce 3 series to a Geforce 7 Series with a Dual Link DVI connector. It turns out the monitor wasn’t dual link, but this review is on the card, not the monitor. The old 3D card was some major brand, I can’t remember which, and since I was upgrading an existing AGP card, I had to choose a replacement AGP card as well. The new one is one of the last AGP models available in the shops for an “entry level” card. It’s a Leadtek 7300 GT TDH.
The visuals of this card are a vast leap in terms of what the old one offered. I can also drive my 22″ screen at 1650 x 1050 resolution, practically full HD (though the computer struggles decoding 1080i). One of my other strong factors in buying a new card was for the World of Warcraft (WoW). I play it casually, to unwind from the real world 
. I have seen the in game visuals jump from slow and nice to fast and brilliant with the 7300 GT TDH. Below is a set of in game screenshots, showing what the game looked like before and after the upgrade. The lack of motion does the pictures no justice at all.
| Before | After | After Battle |
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In the both after shots, a good deal of the quality comes from the fact that this card is fast enough to allow AntiAliasing to be always turned on, even at high resolutions.
The only problem I have had with the card is that it requires a dedicated Molex power connector attached to it, and even though I exceed the mandatory minimum 400Watt PSU, I still get the occasional error saying “Your card is not receiving enough power”. In fact it drew so much power initially, I had to take one of my HDDs out and put it in a USB enclosure.
If you have an AGP slot, a decent computer and a powerful enough PSU, $130AU for this card is worth the upgrade to tide your system over until you are ready to enter the realm of PCI-Express motherboards and 3D cards.
