New Video Graphics Card..NEED HELP

O.K., here is the situation, my parents went away on a weeks vacation and they left the keys to the brand new Porsche, should I...well...of course I should. Never mind that now. As the title states I am in the market for a new graphics card for my system. You can see the specs in my signature. I can only use PCI. Not PCI-E or AGP or anything else, just plain old PCI. I have browsed and browsed again, and I cannot determine what the best type is. To be honest, all of the different aspects of them confuse me. If I want to be able to play Far Cry and and other high end games, which would be the features I would look for? I am interested in staying in the 100-125 dollar range.

I truly appreciate ALL ideas and feedback on this.

Thanks!

 

Go sell the Porsche... any buy a new computer, which is honesty, the only way i can see you being able to play any of the newer high end games. I "think" the last nvidia graphics cards that are PCI are the Geforce FX 5500, wow, thats old. I think u should be able to play the newer games at all low settings, as I have a 5200 in my moms old computer (although it is AGP) and it can play BF2 at low low settings. Honestly though, PCI is extremely outdated, u might consider saving up for a new mobo that atleast supports AGP... just my 2cp.

eVGA 5500 PCI card runs at $99 on their website, so less other places i would imagine

 

Or you could try a 9250
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814131411

 

Bump and, at the top of the page on this link there are numerous spec choices. What do each of them mean to me and which are the best. I am looking for a solid gaming card that can manage Far Cry.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...E&Subcategory=48&ATTR10=2010380048+1069609642

 

Bumparama

 

You'll have to be a little more specific about what you mean by 'managing' Far Cry. What resolution do you run at? What detail levels?

If you run it at 1024x768 and Medium/Low settings, a 5500 or so should do OK. I wouldn't expect it to do much more than that though. If you want to run at 1280x1024 with Medium-High settings, you'll probably need to upgrade your motherboard and graphics card (at minimum) to get a decent framerate.

 

http://www.tomshardware.com/2004/10/04/vga_charts_iv/page10.html

Here are some benchmarks with Far Cry and AGP cards. The PCI equivalent of these cards should be fairly even, maybe about 10% lower. Keep in mind that these benchmarks are running at Very High quality @ 1024x768.

 

Unless you want to settle for low frames per second and low quality graphics, you may want to consider upgrading. There aren't any good PCI cards that can handle intense games.

 

Assuming I decide to replace my motherboard, do I have to then replace my processor and any other stuff? I might consider replacing my motherboard if I can keep my current processor (no the best but good enough for now). Are there compatibility issues I should think about? I am looking myself, but ideas are always helpful.

Thanks!

 

Is your computer the same one in your signature? If so, it looks like it might not be a problem. Give us the make/model of your computer and we can tell you more.

 

Dell Dimension 3000