Is This A Good Card????

[Yawgm0th]

Re: Is This A Good Card????

na man my ram isnt a problem...I just put in my friends nvidia geforce 2 mx 400 and it runs cs:s preety good and it runs half life 2 ok...so im sure my radeon 9700 pro will be fine.

I'm not taling about the video card RAM... Your system RAM will give you really slow loading times and you won't be able to even come close to using the 9700 Pro to its full potential. I've got 768MB and a 9800 Pro, and HL2 loading times are practically unbearable for me. Anywhere from 15 to 40 seconds between areas is common... And that's on a well-tweaked system.

You can run HL2 and CS:S smooth on any machine that will play it (GeForce 2 machines are well above minimum specs, too), with low enough settings. The goal is to get nicer image quality (higher settings and resolution) while maintaining nice framerates ("smoothness"). But even with smooth gameplay and nice graphics (which I doubt youll have with 256MB of RAM), it can really get annoying if it take 15 seconds or more to reload every time you die, change areas, or start up the game, and it'll take your system a hell of a lot moret han 15 seconds if it's only got 256MB of RAM.

[netro_club]

Re: Is This A Good Card????

so are you saying that i should buy a complete new 512 mb or just a 256 mb and add it on to my current memory...

[Grunty313]

Re: Is This A Good Card????

You could get away with getting just 256mb and adding it to system that will improve your loading times and smoothness etc but if u have the money get a 512mb that will be even better for your system and you will also then be able to increase resolution or detail levels etc to improve the visuals.

[KoolDrew]

Re: Is This A Good Card????

Get whatever you can afford. I recommend at least 512MB for any system.

[Yawgm0th]

Re: Is This A Good Card????

Get whatever you can afford. I recommend at least 512MB for any system.

Me too.

I was just suggesting that you add more; how much more is up to you. Having a GB is best, but 512MB or 768MB (meaning you'd buy a 512MB or 256MB stick) would be better. I have slow loading on 768MB of RAM, so I'd say get a 512MB stick if you can afford it. Ideally, you would get two 512MB sticks and run them in dual-channel, if your board supports it, but any increase in RAM is going to make a noticable difference in performance and loading times.

Maybe my loading times will improve when I build my new system and have the game installed on a WD 7200RPM drive with 8MB cache instead of my 7200RPM Maxtor with 2MB cache, not to mention a Barton at 2.4GHz over a 2.0GHz Northwood, but RAM should play the largest role when it comes to loading times.