Silver Tipped are awesome, they should be called Orange Tetras really as the silver is only on the tips of their fins and the rest of them is Orange and some black on the back fin. They were my first ever fish and I still have 3/4 (out of 6) after 2 years and my tank isn't even that great. They are very peaceful (when their not zooming around chasing each other) and you have to be careful since once I was feeding them and one jumped to high, luckily I saw it fly out of the tank and managed to pick it up in time.
I wouldn't reccomend Cardinals as mine all died from whitespot as soon as I got them.