Help me buy a new graphics card

[Mozenrath]

My PNY Geforce GT (somethingorother) has a dead fan and is pretty much unusable. I'm ready to buy a new graphics card.

Here are my criteria:

- Preferrably an Nvidia card.
- Most compatible with Linux Mint 13.
- Around the price of $200.
- Won't have tearing issues(nearly every graphics card I've used with multiple versions of linux has some video tearing).
- For someone who does a moderate amount of animation/editing/compositing.
- Something I can overclock fairly easily/safely.
- PCI-Express x16
- Preferrably 2GB ram, unless a card with a smaller amount of ram performs better.
- Two DVI ports for multiple monitors(I think this is standard now, though).
- GDDR5 ram.


So can anyone help me out here? I've noticed that people asking similar questions on the internet are always told by graphics/gaming snobs to get the best card in existence, but all I want is something that has the best performance for what I can afford(best value).

[grepnix]

Like you, I would choose nvidia. As for best value I would look at the following list:-

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu_value.html

Then I would run the top cards on that list through google, checking for linux problems before making a final decision.
The GeForce GTX 660 is rated best value of the Nvidia cards...

Regards,
Grepnix

[Mozenrath]

Wow, thanks! I've never seen that site. Nifty!

[Mozenrath]

The GeForce GTX 660 seems like a pretty good deal, and a lot of the cards that fit most of my criteria on eBay are around the $200 range.

Now I have a follow-up question for anyone with some input:

Are there any manufacturers I should go for or avoid? Years ago I had a BFG card that was pretty good; my last card was a PNY that I was never that happy with. It was just alright, but the fan made noise and eventually broke down. The card I am using now is an EVGA, which has a Geforce GT 610. Not very good, but I needed a cheap card as a stop-gap because I need my computer for my occupation. It's actually pretty good with games, but when it comes to rendering video with Nuke, it's a piece of trash. Well, maybe not trash, but it takes longer than it really should to render out a video that's just a few minutes long.

EDIT: Also, what about Zotac? I came across a few of those on eBay and I'm wondering if anyone here has experience with that manufacturer.