graphics card

[lionofjudah]

[maximus7001]

You will get answers like no it will not work, why would you do that?. But I assure you, you are doing the upgrade in the right order. It would depend on the mobo. I have a customer with a pIII450, asus p2b, 512mb sdr, that used to have a 16mb tnt and is now using a r9700pro in it until next months upgrade of the rest of the system. It actually plays quite well, like 10 times better than the tnt would with the upcoming new system.

The r9700pro was a wise choice for a first step in upgradeing is this situation. And was a well deserved xmas gift to himself. As far as the rest of the system goes, income tax returns come in handy for that.(around march/april in Canada)

edit... I noticed you refered to the upgrade in terms of #mb of the gfx. Lots of people are easily fooled into thinking more mb=better as the main factor in gfx performance. I see this all the time as customers constantly ask why their gfx suck so bad after a downgrade.(bought from somewhere else)

Examples of common disgusting downgrades...
going from r8500 64mb 128bit to r9200se 128mb 64bit
going from gf2 gts 32mb 128bit to gf fx5200 128mb 64bit
going from gf4 ti4200 64mb to gf fx5600 256mb

[lionofjudah]

thanks. I am not sure what the motherboard exactly is. This was a ready built system (tiny), but am thinking of getting an asus one and building an amd system. it is a 16mb TNTgraphics card in there at the moment. We tried to acertain what the mobo on this system was

http://forums.tweaktown.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=14961

and the reason for doing the upgrade in this way is that I want to get Return of the King (the game) but my graphics card is too low for the game. of course the game would run really slow but would be acceptable for a couple of months before I upgraded.

[maximus7001]

3d mark '01 score of 771 with that guys old setup
The above score was obtained in 800x600 oced as high as it would go since the tnt would not run the bench(or anything else for that matter) in default(1024x768).
That was a year ago when I replaced his hd. Since xmas, he gets over 5000 in default with the r9700pro @2x agp. His favorite games are rotc and cod. I expect it to do about 15000 default after I upgrade the rest for him next month.

I don't know what gfx cards go for where you live. Post links of some of your good options within your budget. I am thinking you might find a r9700pro or a gf4 ti4600 in that range.(both about $300cdn) Basically stay away from ati "se" and nvidia "xt" cards respectively, most of these are real sorry cards.

[lionofjudah]

http://www.xfxforce.com/product_view.php?sku=PVT34KNAhttp://www.xfxforce.com/product_view.php?sku=PVT34CNShttp://www.asus.com/products/vga/v9520ht/overview.htmhttp://usa.asus.com/products/vga/v9570td/overview.htmhttp://usa.asus.com/products/vga/r9600xt/overview.htmhttp://www.sapphiretech.com/vga/9600.asp

[maximus7001]

Some links from where you would buy from/what is available with prices in your currency was what I meant, maybe we could recomend something better(or neater) for the same price. The asus r9600xt vivo is a great card with a 3 year warranty and half life2, thats if you need or have a use for vivo(like I do) which always adds cost to a card. This is the exact card I would have got if I made my last personal card purchase 2 months later.(there are other minor considerations like bundle, reputation, features like vivo and warranty that are often overlooked in a card purchase)

note... a fx5200 would leave your games unplayable now and barely playable after the rest of your upgrades. Same goes for r9200 series. You are on the right track.

edit... I looked around at some tt user recomended uk sites and found this Gainward GeForce FX5900 128MB DDR 2.8ns AGP, "Ultra/1100TV-DVI", Retail for cheaper than that 9600xt, it is a fair bit faster, on par/> r9700pro or r9800(both over 200LB) for cheap. This brand uses confusing names like ultra where they shouldnt. This model has 400core 710mem(hard to find out)and is not an xt. Over here in Canada the pricing is way different and I would not go with this $450cdn card here. Instead I would go with something like a ti4600 or r9700pro both $300cdn.

Can someone tell me how to use the pound symbol?

[lionofjudah]

[Black Rain]

Three things I must say-
1. I wouldn't get an XFX- I have heard that XFX is a trade brand of PC Chips (shudder).
2. I couldn't agree with maximus7001 more re. the 5200- very, very slow card.
3. The 5900XT's are probably in your price range- not as nice as the 5900 maximus7001 found, but still nice. (I would never touch any other nVidia card with XT in the name- esp. the 5600).
Anyway, good luck with the upgrade.

[Wiggo]

[Rogue]

for the nvidia cards, what are the so to speak way of decoding the names?
I remember a few years ago that MX="crappy cheap card" but now they got this FX thing going and this XT thing going....
tell me if this is correct:

if XT at end of name then it is a cheap crappy card
5200=bad
5300=bad

5600=ok
5700=all right(better than ok) ULTRA is even faster

5900=good
5950=if I was rich, but top speed

is the above about correct?

[maximus7001]

fx5600xt is so bad, the worst 64bit ones are right down there with r7200, gf2, and r9200se.
fx5600=bad
fx5600ultra=ok, but just barely
As with all cards recently, don't run out and buy without making sure it's not some crap model.

[Black Rain]

Don't get a FX5700 ultra, the 5900XT's are about the same price and way faster.