It's been some time since I've been using an ATI card, but you could very well be right, ATI may still have the better image quality...
Sounds like a good deal, $130, I paid a lot more a few months ago, EUR 188,=
Here's my settings, based on a balance between performance and IQ... (GTX260 Core 216, Intel C2D E6600@2.4Ghz)
Conf.ini:
[Render_OpenGL]
TexQual=3
TexMipFilter=3
TexCompress=0
TexFlags.UseDither=1
TexFlags.UseAlpha=0
TexFlags.UseIndex=0
TexFlags.PolygonStipple=0
TexFlags.UseClampedSprites=0
TexFlags.DrawLandByTriangles=0
TexFlags.UseVertexArrays=1
TexFlags.DisableAPIExtensions=0
TexFlags.ARBMultitextureExt=1
TexFlags.TexEnvCombineExt=1
TexFlags.SecondaryColorExt=1
TexFlags.VertexArrayExt=1
TexFlags.ClipHintExt=0
TexFlags.UsePaletteExt=0
TexFlags.TexAnisotropicExt=1
TexFlags.TexCompressARBExt=1
TexFlags.TexEnvCombine4NV=1
TexFlags.TexEnvCombineDot3=1
TexFlags.DepthClampNV=1
TexFlags.SeparateSpecular=1
TexFlags.TextureShaderNV=1
HardwareShaders=1
Shadows=2
Specular=2
SpecularLight=2
DiffuseLight=2
DynamicalLights=1
MeshDetail=2
VisibilityDistance=3
Sky=2
Forest=2
LandShading=3
LandDetails=2
LandGeom=3
;LandGeom=2
TexLarge=1
TexLandQual=3
TexLandLarge=1
VideoSetupId=17
Water=4
Effects=1
ForceShaders1x=0
PolygonOffsetFactor=-0.15
PolygonOffsetUnits=-3.0
Using Nvidia driver: 190.38_desktop_winxp_32bit_english_whql.exe