Best PCI card available on the market

I am writing this review because when I spent a week researching what PCI slot video cards were capable of, there weren't any reviews that flat out said "Hey, buy this card, it will work for you" so here it is. I am running a pentium 4- 3ghz with 1gb of ram and a 200gb hard drive. I bought this card to play games like Half Life 2 and Counter Strike:Source, as well as to improve my response and clarity in photoshop and illustrator while working on my graphic design projects. Let me just say this card is excellent. It performs above my expectations by far. I went from 24 fps in Counter Strike with video settings on low, up to 60-80 fps with the video settings on high! I couldn't believe it. The card has DirectX 8.1, but runs my DirectX 9.0 games without a problem. Just make sure you keep the 9.0 installed on your machine. Also, I haven't had any lag or slide show issues and am completely satisfied with this card. I was on the verge of buying a motherboard with AGP or PCIexpress slots so I could buy a better video card, and use my new games, but I figured I would give ATi a try, and thanks to ATi I saved myself a couple hundred dollars and a heap of trouble. It isn't as fast or crystal clear as a new $300 PCIe video card; as long as your system isn't too old or low on RAM the average gamer/user will be stoked on this card. I would say go for it!