New graphics card opinions.

Well, I need a new graphics card apparently. Like others, I have problems at Yatendi Caverns.

I have a Dell Dimension 3000. And I think my current graphics card is a Intel 82865G Graphics Controller (Thats what DxDiag. says.) And im assuming it's a PCI card, since AGP is disabled.

Alright, my questions. Whats the difference between PCI and AGP? I know some of the higher graphics games like Lineage 2 need an AGP card, but not what for. Also which is the better type for gaming?

And I would like to know if anyone can tell me of a good graphics card that will meet and exceed all of the guild wars series requirements, hopefully under 150$.

Thanks in advance.

the intel graphics controller is actually not a card at all: it's built right into the motherboard. it shares memory with system memory, which drags your system performance way down. it's also very slow.

the difference between PCI and AGP: their bandwidth. AGP 8x (the most current incarnation) has a bandwidth of 8 gb/s, while PCI only has 126 mb/s. or in other words: AGP can handle 80x the amount of data as PCI.

check to see if you have an AGP slot or not (you probably don't).

A quick search shows that the Dell Dimension 3000 doesn't have an AGP port, so I'm guessing that you'll need to look into getting a PCI graphics card.

Sadly, having only PCI severely limits what you can install. You'll need something like this :-

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814139010

Yes you dont have AGP you can go with nv 5200/5500 PCI or radeon 9200 PCI
you can also try x1300 pci but from what i see on the forum ppl are not happy with it. Good luck.
But i think 6200/x1300 are overkill for pci :S

Best thing to do is buy a new PC, honestly. PCI cards are so obsolete. You'll be basically throwing away money. Sell your comp and buy something new with whatever you can get out of it.

I just bought this computer last year brand new -.-

Most Dells were not manufactured with 3d-intensive games in mind. You would have had to plan your upgrade path before hand to get a decent gaming Dell.

I put a PCI (not PCI-X or PCI-express) card in my girlfriends computer just to get it so she could do some sort of play on her computer. However it doesn't do a very good job and with her Sony it won't let the add-on graphics card override her onboard. It would have been better for us to have purchased a cheap motherboard with the 6100 video onboard, and new CPU and memory for only $50 more than we spent on the video card AND it would have been faster than the FX5500 PCI card we got.

Well, I just read an old review on the Dell Dimension 3000's, and it says it has no AGP OR PCI slots.. What do these slots look like so I can check? lol

they have PCI slots, but no PCI-e slots. both AGP and PCI-e are longer than PCI slots, and they are usually a different colour. PCI cards are relatively short, and are usually beige coloured. you should have 3 of them.

anyway, you and i are in the same boat. i bought my HP pavilion last year, and it does not have AGP or PCI-e. fortunately, i found a decent enough PCI graphics card to run the game. personally, if you have the money, you can go buy some new components, and strip off some stuff from the dell to build your own system. PCI cards are obsolete and mostly a waste of money.

My computer runs all the games fine, except Factions was laggy as hell around the city. It ran Nightfall smooth as can be. Then I try to zone and I get a message saying basically my graphics suck too bad to go through.

And all the games I run all the graphical options pretty high and it runs smooth. If i turn all the graphic options down as low as they can go it still doesnt work at that one area. Pisses me off.

EDIT

How much of an improvment would the Radeon 9200 make for a guy with no graphics card? lol. GW requirements are Radeon 8500 or better, so it must be quite a bit better than what I have now..

Another one I was looking at is the Geforce 6200 that Azagoth reccomended. Im assuming the Geforce one is better, since theres a 55$ difference.

Also, are these compatable with Windows XP?

Thanks in advance for your opinions.

you'll probably see an improvement of around 10 fps. so if you're going at 15 fps, you'll get over 25 fps with the radeon 9200.

one thing to be aware of is the "bandwidth crunch". yes, the geforce 6200 will make the game look amazing (my geforce fx5500 pci, on max settings, makes me drool), but it's trying to force all that down a bandwidth of 126mb/s. it will be good enough if you're just walking around by yourself, but with a full party, it will slow down quite a bit.

and yes, they are compatible with windows XP. i don't think a card that doesn't support winXP exists.

With a restriction of PCI, I would go no higher then a Radeon 9200 or 9500 series card. Just like Moriz said, you will end up with bus crunch, and any more powerful of a GPU will be a total waste.

You will be able to turn the graphics and AA up full with a PCI X1600, but you will be crawling at around 3 fps because of the amount of data trying to go through the PCI bus, and that will be a waste.

i'd get a cheap motherboard and a new agp card, these are a good example
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130262
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813138262

I would assume installing a new motherboard would be a task that an average joe like me would screw up. And I dont feel like dumping 100$ to have it installed, lol.

Hardware-wise, it's not a big deal. You just have to move all the components over.

There's just two issues:
You'd probably need to get a new case because Dell's are proprietary (all my Dimensions were, had to buy new cases).
You'll need to reinstall Windows.

You're literally better off buying a new computer, simply because.

OEM PSU's are shit, I would barely trust it running the system its in currently, let alone with upgrades.

OEM Motherboards / Cases are proprietary, meaning that if you change one you must change the other.

That means your sinking a fair chunk of change into an old system, and buy the time you went through that hassle, you could build a new computer that would blow the old one away for alittle more money.

More then that, he would have to buy a new copy of WIndows.

The XP stickers that come with "Name Brand" computers (Dell, HP, Gateway, Alienware, etc) have a special key. They do their own validation by looking at the BIOS of the system. If they detect that the motherboard has been changed, they will not validate.

With the low-end Dimensions, I find that about all that is salvageable is the processor, memory, and drives. To do a total rebuild, you need a case, motherboard, CPU cooler, and an OEM copy of Windows. All told, is runs anywhere from $350-450, depending on the items chosen. You can knock that down to $250-300 if you are willing to use substandard quality parts.

And of course add another $50+ for a decent video card.

Well since u have PCI id reccomend the Graphics card i have. Its the GeforceFX 5500 256 MB but yea

What you bought was not built with gaming in mind. I recently rebuilt my entire PC for under $500 shipped. I saved only my peripherals, media drives and HDD. I already had a registered, valid copy of Windows, so I didn't have to drop $ on a new OS either. An OEM copy will run you $100 or so. I get 45-60fps in most cases. Here's what I am running:

Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe
Athlon 64 3200 CPU (It's ~2ghz proc)
1Gb of Corsair Value-Select Dual Channel RAM
nVidia GeForce 6600 PCIe (It was a very inexpensive card. <$100)
Ultra Aluminus Case (This thing is HUGE, but not terribly heavy. Tons of room for fans, water cooling, etc. It also came with a decent, not great, power supply.)
2xThermaltake 120mm case fans
Gigabyte GH-PDU21-MF Ball CPU Cooler (This thing has a huge 110mm fan on it.)

I can upgrade my processor, RAM and video and keep the rest of my set-up for quite a while. I intend to buy a new processor, another gig of RAM and a new video card after the prices come down just a bit on the latest, greatest GPUs. Depending on my choice for video, I might have to upgrade my power supply.

If you want to upgrade your CPU, you better do it fast.

AMD stopped manufacturing the 939 processor last year, and the supply is drying up fast. Because of this, the price is actually increasing in many areas.

We deal through wholesalers (I work for a computer store), and the Socket 939 3800 is actually $12-15 more expensive then the AM2 3800.

And for RAM, you will likely see the same thing. Because the DDR2 is now the "standard RAM", most of the manufacturing capacity is being shuffled into making those. This is making the DDR supply stagnante. And once the supply drops much more, expect those prices to start to climb as well.

This is fairly normal in the industry. Once the "new generation" takes over, the prices of the last generation tend to fix for 6-12 months. Then those prices tend to increase, as people scramble to buy up the shrinking supply of older chips (to upgrade or repair existing last-gen systems).

So if you have a socket 754 or 939, don't wait much longer to upgrade your CPU if you are planning on it. DDR RAM will still be good for a few more months, but expect it to start increasing in 3-6 months.

And with Vista now out, a lot of people are upgrading old systems. This is making the supplies shrink faster then they would normally.

Yup. It's on the "buy soon" list.