Video Card Upgrade Question!

Greetings all!

I'm running a GeForce4 MX420 64Mb video card in my system. I'd like to upgrade and have seen some good deals on the GeForce FX5200 128Mb card.

Would this be much of an improvement over my current card and will 512Mb of PC2100 DDR RAM be enough to run the new card?

Please keep in mind that I only have a PCI slot available, no AGP.

Thanks!

 

The ram doesn't matter, you can run that video card with 8 megs of ram (good luck running windows with 8 megs of ram though ).

Yes the card is better, although you may want to look for something else as the whole fifth generation of geforce cards doesn't have a very good reputation. The 6000 sieres are nice or you could go for something like a 9200 from ATI.

At any rate it's your call, the FX5200 should make a fair diffrence.

 

Stay AWAY from GE force 5 ANYTHING! search all my posts and see the problems and the conclusion I came to after doing the same upgrade you are thinking of doing... 6months of problems with a 5200... bought a new pc, then replaced almost all the parts before getting ah a new 5500 this week...Now after searching the web I find that most everyone else with one is having reboots, crashes, lock ups, etc... the same as I've been having. The Nvidia 5anythings (except maybe 5950's) are NOT compatable with DirectX 9 or higher... which you need to do anything you'd want a video card for. My new card is going back to the store tommorow and I want an ATI or anything besides Nvidia!!!

Feel free to google "Nvidea 5500 DX9 Conflict" or similar and read for hours and you'll see what I mean

(admins please feel free to delete this post if you deem it inappropriate after looking into my statements)

Thanks,

Blaine

 

My 5600 runs DX9 just fine ...........and my freinds 5200 runs DX9 almost as well ......

 

Never had any problems runnin DX9 on my FX 5200 256MB card.... its not the fastest card bu i can still play far cry with 25fps and half life with up to 70fps.... all on max details

 

Ahh... conflicting recommendations! I love it!

Okay... taking it all into consideration.

Question... perhaps I would be better off getting away from GeForce entirely and going with Radeon? Any thoughts?

Oh... BTW... the main reason that I'm considering this upgrade is that I have "Lord of the Rings; The Battle For Middle-earth" and it plays okay on my system right now, but at the lowest possible settings. I still get "refresh" delays. So I figure it's time for an upgrade.

So to recap... Radeon or GeForce?

Thanks!

 

Nvidia = faster......... ATI = better image quality........ More less.................

 

Just so you know, asking that question is a lot like asking windows or MAC (for some geeks they might have an easier time trying to answer a question like "which religion is right"). There are people on both sides who will argue it either way.

In actual fact, the two companies are fighting it out, and usually every couple months the one with the best card is in dispute again (and that's considering you ever consider the dispute ended).

Essentially, they both work, I myself perfer the nvidia line of cards but nvidia lost a lot of ground on the 5000 sieres simply because of problems which a lot of people had with them. Now that they're on the 6000 sieres they seem to have recovered fairly well. Although they have fixed many of the problems with the 5000 sieres which were common when they first launched them too (it's just once it's got a bad name it's very difficult to change).

So just pick the card you want, going with ATI (radeon) or nvidia (geforce) doesn't matter too much. Both will work, and you can find people on both sides of the fence who will argue the other is better.

 

Thanks for all the advice ya'll!!!

I ended up going with a Radeon 9250. Got a pretty good deal, I think... is $85 out-the-door a good deal???

Anyway, I've only played "Battle For Middle-earth" with it so far and I can see quite an improvement. I can actually play at 1024X768, whereas with my old card, I had to run at 800X600 at the lowest detail setting. So I guess it'll work!

Thanks again!