Looking for cheap, but good graphics card...

well depending on your budget, i could advise you with some good cards. You could go with the Radeon 9XXX series. I'm not sure if the GeForce 6 series has any AGP cards in it. If it does then go with that.
 
[quote name='Synergyi']well depending on your budget, i could advise you with some good cards. You could go with the Radeon 9XXX series. I'm not sure if the GeForce 6 series has any AGP cards in it. If it does then go with that.[/quote]

Well, first, i think i can only buy/install PCI cards. No AGP or PCI Express :( Second, my budget is around $50 considering DX 10 cards will be out soon, i dont mind waiting for prices to drop even more. I just need to know what will work on my computer. I doubt i can play F.E.A.R. or Neverwinter Nights 2, but its always worth a shot. Civ 4 would be nice :)
 
[quote name='SynGamer']Well, first, i think i can only buy/install PCI cards. No AGP or PCI Express :( Second, my budget is around $50 considering DX 10 cards will be out soon, i dont mind waiting for prices to drop even more. I just need to know what will work on my computer. I doubt i can play F.E.A.R. or Neverwinter Nights 2, but its always worth a shot. Civ 4 would be nice :)[/quote]

Dude no way you can play those games with a PCI card....
 
[quote name='PenguinMaster']It's too bad you didn't ask a few weeks ago. Newegg used to have this card for $30.

http://3dfuzion.com/cards_6200_pci_128.asp

You won't find a better card with PCI. I have it and can run F.E.A.R. perfectly with medium settings 800x600. I'd suggest searching around online for that one.[/quote]

Is it compatible with my system? I know it has 512 MB RAM and 2 Ghz CPU, and im pretty sure the power supply is 300 watts. I actually couldnt care less if i can play F.E.A.R., i wouldnt mind Civ 4 though :)
 
[quote name='SynGamer']Is it compatible with my system? I know it has 512 MB RAM and 2 Ghz CPU, and im pretty sure the power supply is 300 watts. I actually couldnt care less if i can play F.E.A.R., i wouldnt mind Civ 4 though :)[/QUOTE]

I'm sure the video card will work fine with yours. What type of CPU is it (Celeron, Pentium, Athlon, Duran)? I have a 2.6 Ghz Celeron and 768MB Ram. Civ 4 doesn't interest me though, so I haven't tried it. But the only games that I can't run decently are the games that can't go below 1024x768 (so far Call of Juarez and Dark Messiah of Might and Magic).
 
Are you planning on getting a completely new system when DX10 cards come out? I doubt you'll be seeing any AGP DX10 cards, much less PCI.
 
[quote name='Vinny']Are you planning on getting a completely new system when DX10 cards come out? I doubt you'll be seeing any AGP DX10 cards, much less PCI.[/quote]

Nono, no new system. I just want to play some games other than...Diablo :p I cant find the specs on my computer, like how much the power supply is, or if there's a limit on the MB that the graphics card can be for the system to handle.
 
Something's bothering me... I just don't get why it doesn't have AGP. If you bought it within the last 6 years, it should have AGP. Our old Gateway from 2000 had an AGP slot (which could be used as AGP Pro as well) and that thing has a P3 733MHz. With a 2GHz processor in a Dell, I'd think you have a P4 mostly.

Take a look at the top left area of this picture.
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/13-157-092-04.jpg

It has 4 PCI slots (beige), 1 PCI Express 16x slot (purple), and 1 AGP slot (brown- AGP slots are usually brown). Are you sure you don't have an AGP slot?

As for the Power Supply, if you open your case and look at the side of the power supply, there should be a sticker on there. If there's a table, then you might have to add the bottom most watts.

Take a look at this PS.
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/17-341-002-04.jpg
This one has a table with the watts... sometimes they'll tell you the total watts the bottom (700W). Sometimes they won't have that in which case you'll need to add some numbers like the Max Combined field.

Or sometimes they'll just tell you the total power as they do in this one.
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/17-103-931-05.JPG
As you can see, that PS outputs 550 Watts.
 
[quote name='Vinny']Something's bothering me... I just don't get why it doesn't have AGP. If you bought it within the last 6 years, it should have AGP. Our old Gateway from 2000 had an AGP slot (which could be used as AGP Pro as well) and that thing has a P3 733MHz. With a 2GHz processor in a Dell, I'd think you have a P4 mostly.

Take a look at the top left area of this picture.
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/13-157-092-04.jpg

It has 4 PCI slots (beige), 1 PCI Express 16x slot (purple), and 1 AGP slot (brown- AGP slots are usually brown). Are you sure you don't have an AGP slot?

As for the Power Supply, if you open your case and look at the side of the power supply, there should be a sticker on there. If there's a table, then you might have to add the bottom most watts.

Take a look at this PS.
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/17-341-002-04.jpg
This one has a table with the watts... sometimes they'll tell you the total watts the bottom (700W). Sometimes they won't have that in which case you'll need to add some numbers like the Max Combined field.

Or sometimes they'll just tell you the total power as they do in this one.
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/17-103-931-05.JPG
As you can see, that PS outputs 550 Watts.[/quote]

Well, my GF's mom bought the computer for 'us' about 6 months ago from Dell. Its a baseline and she didnt even consult me about anything...we're talking about a person who calls me up often asking me about components of her home computer :| So yeah, i had no sa yon the situation. This PoS came with a 2.53 Ghz Celeron, and 512 MB RAM. And then Intel Extreme Graphics (i believe) with 96 MB of its own.

Ok, i opened it up and all i have is bad news. First, max power output is 250 watts. Second, i saw 3 beige slots, and the middle one was the dial-up modem, so im assuming those are the PCI slots. And third, there were no PCI express (prurple) or AGP (brown) slots :( So yeah, this is just a shitty-ass computer that pisses me off even more now that i've actually had a look inside. Oh, and another thing, max power was 250 watts, but it also said that with the power on, max power was 170 watts...
 
Damn! I honestly didn't think they made any PCs anymore with only PCI slots. Then again, it is a major brand PC who usually cheap out on certain components. And since you can only use PCI cards, that 250 PS should be plenty.

But on the plus side, Civ IV requirements aren't that high. It only needs a GeForce 2 or a Raedon 7500 with 64MB of memory.

If you can save up a bit more, this card should be more than enough to meet the recommended requirements. It seems like a fairly solid card on its own.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814143059

It's not too much more and it probably won't run the game past minimum settings but it's probably the best you'll get sadly.:whistle2:(
 
[quote name='Vinny']Damn! I honestly didn't think they made any PCs anymore with only PCI slots. Then again, it is a major brand PC who usually cheap out on certain components. And since you can only use PCI cards, that 250 PS should be plenty.

But on the plus side, Civ IV requirements aren't that high. It only needs a GeForce 2 or a Raedon 7500 with 64MB of memory.

If you can save up a bit more, this card should be more than enough to meet the recommended requirements. It seems like a fairly solid card on its own.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814143059

It's not too much more and it probably won't run the game past minimum settings but it's probably the best you'll get sadly.:whistle2:([/quote]

Im thinking of jsut saving my money and building a computer from scratch. Start with a case and Motherboard, and go from there.
 
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