Hamburg  - Graphics cards suitable for PC gaming need not cost several hundred dollars, according to a recent test of 10n current models by the Hamburg-based Computerbild Spiele magazine.

The Sapphire HD4670, an 89-dollar unit offering 512 MB of onboard memory, may have only achieved eighth place in the rankings, but that was enough for the same "Good" grade as the other graphics card in the test.

The winner was the Zotac Geforce GTX260 AMP2!. The 249 dollar device was the quickest card in the bunch, the magazine found. Second place was held by the MSI R4870 - T2D512OC for 229 dollars, followed by the BFG Tech Geforce 260GTX OCX for 269 dollars. The experts criticised every tested model on at least one point: overly high power consumption. Most cards consumed significantly more than 200 watts, making them expensive solutions to operate. (dpa)