video card buying

Lou

Lou

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Sep 2005

Colorado Springs colorado, denver when I'm not in school

Looking

W/

I don't really no anything about computers at all but I have a
64MB SDRAM NVIDIA GEFORCE4 MX graphics card and I'm wondering whats something thats a little better in performance for under 150 dollars.

D.E.V.i.A.N.C.E

D.E.V.i.A.N.C.E

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Aug 2005

Mo/

Do you have a PCI-E x16 slot?
APG?
or a Regular PCI card?

dimirpaw

dimirpaw

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2005

Canada/Alberta/Edmonton

If you have PCI go with BFG GeForce FX 5500 256mb OC, the best possible card for PCI out.

Old Dood

Old Dood

Middle-Age-Man

Join Date: May 2005

Lansing, Mi

W/Mo

Quote:
Originally Posted by Azeroths Hammer
I don't really no anything about computers at all but I have a
64MB SDRAM NVIDIA GEFORCE4 MX graphics card and I'm wondering whats something thats a little better in performance for under 150 dollars.
Depends...what are your specs? Like the poster above me...do you have PCIe...AGP....or no video card slot at all(regular PCI)?

Assuming you have AGP I would look at the Nvidia 6600 cards or the ATI 9800pro cards. If price is your main "buying point".

Lou

Lou

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Sep 2005

Colorado Springs colorado, denver when I'm not in school

Looking

W/

I have a PCI.

dimirpaw

dimirpaw

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2005

Canada/Alberta/Edmonton

Then go with what I said, it's the best you can get with PCI. I paid $300 for mine, well over priced, but I'm sure it's around 100-150 now.

Loviatar

Underworld Spelunker

Join Date: Feb 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by Azeroths Hammer
I have a PCI.
all have PCI.

do you confirm that you do NOT have a separate AGP slot along with the PCI slots.

it would be with them but offset about an inch higher on the board

if you do have an agp slot the 6600GT is now in that price range and is still listed as the best value/dollar

the *GT* is the difference over just 6600

dimirpaw

dimirpaw

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2005

Canada/Alberta/Edmonton

Some computers just came with only PCI nothing else made around 2004, so if he bought some pre made computer like a, COMPAQ, eMachines, ect... he would only have just PCI. Hopfully he at least has AGP, much faster.

Loviatar

Underworld Spelunker

Join Date: Feb 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by dimirpaw
Some computers just came with only PCI nothing else made around 2004, so if he bought some pre made computer like a, COMPAQ, eMachines, ect... he would only have just PCI. Hopfully he at least has AGP, much faster.
true

that is why i was hoping he would check and say i have PCI and i just found AGP as well

Lou

Lou

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Sep 2005

Colorado Springs colorado, denver when I'm not in school

Looking

W/

I have seperate AGP slot sorry for all the confusion.

dimirpaw

dimirpaw

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2005

Canada/Alberta/Edmonton

Alright, since you have an AGP slot, I'm sure your going to get a lot more help now since we all know what your looking for. I'm not a big infomation person on AGP but I would go with Loviatar said, good price and good value. Besides that it's 100% up to you what you wish to do.

Old Dood

Old Dood

Middle-Age-Man

Join Date: May 2005

Lansing, Mi

W/Mo

Quote:
Originally Posted by Azeroths Hammer
I have seperate AGP slot sorry for all the confusion.
Big world of difference. I was wondering if you had a Dell 2400 or something along those lines(NO VID CARD SLOT AT ALL).

Since now you have determend what you do have the Nvidia 6600GT is a great choice and would serve you very well. I think there are two flavors...one with 128Mbs of video memory...and one with 256Mbs.

lord_shar

lord_shar

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: Jul 2005

near SF, CA

This relevant thread should be stickied:

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...ad.php?t=75775

Alias_X

Alias_X

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Apr 2005

Umm, I have an AGP, and for a little over $100 i got an ATI Radeon 9550, and it works like a dream. I am coming from a GeForce 2 MX 400, and this card blows that one away. In Guild Wars, I am seeing effects that I never new were there, and I can easily run Guild Wars.

My system specs:
Slow old RAM, 256mb of it
ATI Radeon 9550 - Only current thing in my computer, well pretty current.
Crappy MOBO.
P4 1.7 ghz

Guild Wars runs pretty smooth, the only thing that would help me is if I upgraded to 512mb of ram, but since my ram is so slow, I would have to upgrade mobo, then the socket type is going out, so I would get a new processor, so I am building a new computer, and keeping my ATI Radeon 9550 in it. It runs this game amazingly, and I havn't tried it due to my ram, but people say it runs Half Life 2, Doom 3, and games like that fine. In my new build with a AMD Athlong 64 X2 4200 and 2gigs of ram, that I will be able to run Battlefield 2.

Lou

Lou

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Sep 2005

Colorado Springs colorado, denver when I'm not in school

Looking

W/

thanks for all the help.

D.E.V.i.A.N.C.E

D.E.V.i.A.N.C.E

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Aug 2005

Mo/

Alias_X

DDR333
and
DDR400

66mhz clock faster, not that big of differance
but for a intel board it would be 533 max if its even new...

DDR333 is on par for older proccessors...

Unless its like my old emachine from the 90's PC100 :S where 256mb of RAM is all it can handle

Alias_X

Alias_X

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Apr 2005

LMAO! That is great, maxx'd out at 256mb of RAM.

Tommy

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Oct 2005

Grotto,The Paradise of GW Afkers

Afkers Never [CRY]

W/Rt

get a 6800GT AGPit is decent card for the money.you cannot find anything better for AGP

Loviatar

Underworld Spelunker

Join Date: Feb 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by Alias_X
LMAO! That is great, maxx'd out at 256mb of RAM.
ummmmm......i go back to the radio shack home pc which was an amazing pc back then with 4 kilobytes memory but could be expanded to 16 KILOBYTES of memory

MAX AT 16K

http://www.kjsl.com/trs80/model1info.html

Dex

Dex

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Dec 2005

Chicago, IL

Black Belt Jones

R/Me

Quote:
Originally Posted by Loviatar
ummmmm......i go back to the radio shack home pc which was an amazing pc back then with 4 kilobytes memory but could be expanded to 16 KILOBYTES of memory

MAX AT 16K

http://www.kjsl.com/trs80/model1info.html
Hehe. Ahhh yes. The first computer I ever used was a TRS80. Gotta love 'em. Typed in that Road Race game out of a book when I was 7! I thought it was the coolest thing ever. The first computer I had at home was a Commodore Vic20. 20k RAM! Woot!