Graphics Card Recommendation

[Dark-Sasuke]

Long story short, my beast of a graphics card manage to fry itself recently. Hours of crysis maybe, either way, i'm planning to get a new graphics card this week. I'm a pretty hardcore pc gamer, i hate playing a pc game unless its maxed out, my budget is £200-250. Any recommendations would be appreciated, specs would be a bonus ^_^

BTW, i like to play dragon age/crysis/The witcher, just chose the heaviest games to give you an idea of what im after. If its not to far off 250, maybe 300 or such then i'd love to hear off them, but preferably the refered price i mentioned would be my best option :/

[Ashminigun]

What's your previous (fried) GPU?

[JD_Himself]

I got a Radeon HD 4860 for like 130 bucks canadian off of newegg.ca a while ago. Great great card, overclocks like crazy, nice fan in it. Runs Crysis on Gamer Settings easy.

[Furore]

No clue on pricing as I tend to buy my stuff from a mate who gives me a killer discount but I'd greatly recommend the GeForce GTX 480. I haven't had it too long but it's handled everything thrown at it spectacularly and I'm yet to find a game I can't play at max settings.

Previously I was using an ATI Radeon HD 5870 which I'd once again recommend for the same reasons as the GeForce GTX 480 though it's just not quite as good as it.

Can't go wrong with either of those cards really though. :D

[Ashminigun]

According to one of UK-based online PC hardware retailer pricing, the given price range enable you to choose two or three of current models from both ATI and nVidia.

ATI
Radeon HD5830 -par/slightly better than former 4870 & 4890 and its rival with nVidia GTX260, GTX275 and GTX465*
Radeon HD5850 -par/better than its rival GTX280/5 and current GTX470*

nVidia
GTX 465
GTX 470

*depends on games and version DirectX

Both older high-end GeForce 200 series and HD 4xxx cards might available in lower prices but it might be scarce in the market. In the end, it's up to you to choose between two major GPU players.