Need some help picking out a new video card

lolwut?

lolwut?

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Ok, basically my PC is old as fuck. I realized I should probably upgrade the video card when I could not run Battlefield Heros (no Pixel Shader 2.0)

I haven't really been following PC hardware since the GeForce 6800 was the new hot shit, so I'm going to need some help :lol:

My current specs (from what I can gather) look like this:

AMD Athlon 64 3000+
1 GIG of RAM
Radeon 9250
WinFast Motherboard (NF4SK8AA?)

Obviously I could use another gig of RAM, a better card, and even a new CPU. Getting a new PC is not an option, and I'd like to just update the videocard for right now. I think my board uses PCI cards, but I'm having trouble finding that out. Any help would be greatly appreciated
 
I'm actually amazed that your socket 939 motherboard running DDR memory has PCI-Express X16 slots (motherboard specs here). Even if the slot is only 1.0, it's still sufficient to upgrade to something like ATI HD4850 or nVidia 9800GT (both around $100 each). Your CPU and memory will be your bottleneck, however. You might be able to find dual core 939 CPUs, but they're a bit costly for the performance they'll give you compared to all the new CPUs like Phenom and Core 2 Duo. Adding another 1GB of DDR will help when you play games, they're somewhat cheap now (around $35 - $40). So it really depends on how much you have to spend or willing to spend.
 
[quote name='Sokkratez']With that CPU I would aim low. Sub-$100... 9600GT or something. Depends when you plan on updating the rest of the system.[/quote]

That's what I was planning on,
 
Your problem now is that you're caught in the classic spiraling RAM cost thing, where old RAM gets more expensive because of demand/supply. To put 2 more gigs of DDR in, it'll cost you more than a good motherboard upgrade. 4 gigs of DDR2 can be had for around $35. If you have your O/S disk, I would get a new board and start all over.

For example I did this recently for around $150:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813186143

Threw on 4 gigs of memory for $40, and a dual-core 5000 for $55.

There are plenty of NVidia 9600 series cards for under $50, and the ATI 4600 series offers similiar performance for a little less. Here is a card I've been looking at and would buy if I wasn't so broke right now:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814161252
 
[quote name='lolwut?']
I'm going to look around for additional ram. Does it really matter what brand it is? I'm sure it has to be DDR2, but besides that I'm not sure.

EDIT: I feel retarded. So my current card is in the bottomost slot of the motherboard (going by the picture SOSTrooper linked to), and the two yellow RAM spots are used up. I'm thinking the main card would go in one of the green slots and the additional RAM would be placed in the blue slots, correct? I'd probably have to remove the RAM that's in there now though, as I remember reading that mixing and matching isn't something you really want to do.[/QUOTE]


You need to buy DDR memory, not DDR2. Your motherboard does not support DDR2. You can either get this or 2 of these. Don't get rid of the 1GB currently in your system, it's too expensive to buy 2x 1GB DDR. Just add 2 more pieces of 512MB to make it 2GB total.

As for 9600GT, they go for between $70 to $90, depending on the brand. This BFG 9600GT looks to be pretty decent deal. Or, if you want a little more muscle so in the near future when you do want to build your own you can use the video card again, then something like this EVGA 9800GT for $95 can do the job. As an alternative to nVidia, You can also get the ATI HD 4830 for around $80. I think the performance for this card falls betwen 9600GT and 9800GT.
 
I also think building a budget gaming system would be better then pumping money into your current system. As you need CPU, RAM upgrades as well; if you upgrade just the videocard you most likely will have bottlenecking and may end up questioning the upgrade.
 
I am hearing nothing but good things about the ATI 4770 at ~$100. I think HardOCP, ExtremeTech, and Tom's Hardware just did a review of the card, and it was nothing but glowing praise.

My recommendation though, along with most of the stuff people have to say about it, is waiting about a month, or until the card hits the $99 price tag before picking it up.
 
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