Which graphics card is good for my pc?

Need to buy a new agp card but which one?

i am looking for 512mb mid range but can only afford up to 60 pounds.

i have xp service pak 3 non vista with dx 9.0c
p4 3.2 intel processor, 4 gig ram but 3 show as i think my os is 32 bit.

my motherboard is 865pe/g and says my 1 agp slot supports 8x/4x at 0.8v (agp3.0) or 4x at 1.5v (3.3v is not supported)

need it for gaming and watching films/tv shows like stargate etc also (afterdownloading)

what about ddr/2/3 what should i look out for and which is best?

thanks

 

For that price there's only one card you should look at

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/1GB-...600MHz-320-Cores-2x-Dual-Link-DVI-I-HDTV-HDCP

If you can plumb an extra £12 you can get this

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/1GB-...DDR3-GPU-750MHz-320-Cores-DL-DVI-I-D-Sub-HDTV

It will give you an extra 1FPS.

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/gaming-graphics-charts-q3-2008/Crysis-v1.21,748.html

 

Hi ricky

i have been doing sowm research and i might get a 256 if possible as it says its all about the gpu and not the memory and having more pixel piplines is far better

anyone confirm this?

so i am looking for something with 8+ pixel piplines if possible for agp and can be 256 or 512 hope to have some vertex piplines also like 4+

and would a ddr2/3 or gddr2/3 work on my machine?

now some say i have to work out my power first? how do i do this?

thanks

 

Its all about balance and ultimately you want the card that will give you the best bang for buck i.e the one that performs the best in the real world,forget about pixel pipelines,cores,memory speed,memory size,core speed,architecture ect.ect.

AGP is a dead technology they no longer manufacture these cards so you only have a very small number of 'new' cards to choose from and by far and above all the other AGP cards is the ATI 4650 or 4670,it is like 5-10 times faster than other AGP cards and that's real world not on paper.

For your power requirements you want a half decent 500W PSU,open the side of your case and read the numbers on the side of your current PSU,post the make and model and I'll tell you if its any good

 

ok the make of psu is fsp group
with teh following info
fortron/sourse
model fsp300-60pn (PF)
ac -115/230v - 10/5a 60/50mhz
pc 300w
03.3v
+5vsb
+3.3&1.5v = 200 watts

hope that helps

and i cant go pci as i dont have the funds to upgrade to pci-e. 70 quid is about the most i can do atm so need a good robost card that can do everything

thanks

 

maybe i should upgrade to a 500w psu but if i do will it cause problems?

 

You have to upgrade your PSU a 300w Fortron isn't gonna cut it.

Usually I wouldn't recommend a PSU as cheap as this but since your on a budget and tryna squeeze the last dregs of life from your old computer this one would be a decent choice,it has dual 12V rail 13 amps plus.

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/CIT-500w-Black-12cm-V22-Dual-Rail-Psu#ProductFeatures

So your total is gonna be £80,I'd wait till you have the extra £20.

No it won't cause problems?Other than installing it.

 

the psu it seems would have to be a atx 20-pin and then a atx 12v connecter with 4 pins.

now i note in some i have seen it says 24 pin or 20+4 so i am unsure if they are the same

so now looking for a suitable 500w psu with the pin needed so i could have more range in upgrading my card which then could give me more options

the current dimmensions are 150w 86h 140d the height and with will have to be the same also

 

All PSU's are of standard ATX type,it WILL fit your motherboard.

The 4 pin ATX 12v connector sometimes clips onto the side of the main motherboard connector you just unclip it.

 

brill so
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/NEW-INTEL-AMD...omputing_PowerSupplies_EH?hash=item19b683df39

should be ok then if bought from ebay? they have different connectors though

now that thats done we can co back cards.

what are my options now? i think i will have to put all this on credit card so lets say i have 75 pounds for a card whch ydo u feel is my best options?

many thanks also for your help and i have clicked thanks on each response

 

Yeah I suppose,one crappy generic PSU is as bad as another:-D It really is a gamble when you spend so little on a PSU.

I wouldn't buy one from EBAY personally as its tough to get refunds,Scan do credit and payment plans if you have a credit card.

 

ok well its only 6 quid so will do that so now for the actual card and my main reason for coming here and so far being very much worth it.

learned lots already.

so your thoughts on cards i shouls get now i will have a decent psu?

looking on http://www.gpureview.com/radeon-x1950-gt-agp-card-519.html so far and has some decent info as you can change the card on the top right portion

 

currently looking at

ATi Radeon HD 3850 AGP 80 pounds
but says it needs dx10 wil this be a problem? also has Super-scalar MADDx5 i have dx 9.0c so will the card work on my machine or is it a simple case of getting the dx 10 on my system? but i have never had dx 10 and ithought actually it was for vista

nVidia GeForce 6800 GT AGP 45 pounds
cheap option and seems ok

ATi Radeon HD 4650 AGP 60 pounds
newest but i dont think on paper it looks as good as the 3850 and pixel fill rate is at 40% of the 3850 but texture fill rate is almost double. plus its mem bandwith is only 16 GB/sec compared to 53 for the 3850, also half teh amount of raster operators

ATi Radeon HD 3650 AGP seems a cheap half version of 3850

should i be thinking though of a 3850?

any others to look out for?

thanks

 

No there aren't any better AGP cards out there the 4870 is the best,if you look at the link I posted you can see for yourself,the 3850 is in those charts and is slower than the 4870.

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/gaming-graphics-charts-q3-2008/Crysis-v1.21,748.html

The 6800GT? look at the chart it barely makes 1FPS which is totally unplayable,the 4870 is 30 times better.:confused

In the link I posted at the top left go through the benchmarks and compare the cards,the 4870 beats practically everything.

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/...q3-2008/3DMark06-v1.1.0-3DMark-Score,794.html

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/gaming-graphics-charts-q3-2008/Call-of-Duty-4-v1.6,742.html

EDIT you just wont be able to use the DX10 features and optimisations in an XP environment it will still work,if you want to make full use of the card you will need to upgrade to Vista,some games may not work also but you can force games to run in DX9 using a program such as rivatuner.

 

thanks

ok is there a agp version and the cost? as i cant seem to find one.

remember i am on a budget lol. if its too pricy which next 3 would be your buy on my system?

thanks

 

on top of last reply i dont wish to yet go to vista and how hard will it be to use the dx10 card and which environments can i not use?

sorry for all these questions.

 

The one I linked you to from scan is AGP.

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/1GB-...600MHz-320-Cores-2x-Dual-Link-DVI-I-HDTV-HDCP

There aren't any other cards worth buying,maybe the HD 3650 if you can find one,this one is one pre order.

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/512M...z-GDDR2-GPU-725MHz-120-Cores-2x-DL-DVI-I-HDTV

Without Vista you can't use DX 10,some games will revert to DX9 and you can play them,some games won't work at all,there were a few projects that tried but they all failed AFAIK.

There's no free lunch,you wanna play the latest games your gonna need the latest operating system which is Vista at least.

 

so lets recap

4870 is really too pricy

and that link you provide is for 4650, so you would advise going for 4650 even though other forums say its mid range and x1950/7950gt and 3850 are better for power and performance? also looking at there stats on paper look better.

4650 though looks to be a fair price and easy to find also but why is it better than the other cards? also the bandwith on this is half then what is used now and lower than my older 9800pro

the 3650 looks also to be half of what the 3850 can handle. why did you chose the 3650?

regarding dx 10 i am confused now. you say without vista i cant use dx10 so will this now mean the card will not work?

or is it that any card that comes with dx 10 means i cannot play games that need dx9? most of my games play on or use dx9.

i am just sure if having a dx10 card is better than a dx9? i know it makes it better for when i will then go to dx10 and vista but could i not just get drivers for thr dx9 card to support vista?

at the moment i am pretty sure my system is not good enough for vista and i am not buying a new one. so i have to make do with what i have and now get a new agp card. some say that 256 is better than 516 as its not down to the mem size but all the other bits which after reading seems to meet others views.

what i really would like is without just the 3 choices on scan for agp cards and without the most expensive. your idea on what card would be best for around 80 quid?

a lot of games i do play are old by your standards and i like playing them. i also play eve online.

so if i get a dx10 card does that mean i cant play my games that normally used dx9? i know it wont change my pc windows settings unless i go full tilt for vista. u mentioned a programme that could let me if this happens but how effective is it?

sorry for the many questions. its just that i want to get it right and i have all day been looking and reading up on cards and trying to sort out which would be best.

if you could provide a top 5 list of agp cards relevent to my situation that would be grand one for dx9 and one for dx10?

many thanks

 

Because it performs better,I've give you the charts that prove this multiple times I can't do any more than that,PLEASE look at the links I have posted and compare the performance of the x1950/7950gt and 3850,4650 in various games and benchmarks.

Because its half decent and scan sell it,the 3850 and 3870 are also a good choice's.

The card will work period,some games may not.

I have no idea what your talking about :-D

I've already shown you 4 times:-D any on this page

http://www.scan.co.uk/Index.aspx?NT=1-0-94-268-0

No,DX9 games will work fine its backwards compatible.

Very ineffective the company that tried to implement DX10 into XP failed and went bankrupt.

http://alkyproject.blogspot.com/

The Radeon,HD 4670,HD 4650,HD 3850,HD 3870,HD 3650.

Also note that you will be CPU bound,you CPU isn't powerful enough to max out any of those cards and will be the bottleneck in your system,there is no way around this other than upgrading your CPU.

 

sorry i thought the lonk before was for the 4650 and not 4670. i just understood now that it was and its seems not that pricy. i had seem them over 100-200 quid on other sites and automaticlly thought no way. how come this one is so cheap?

sorry to have been hard work but i think we are there now

and to confirm u would buy a 4670 over a 4650?

going to get from scan also both the psu and the agp

many thanks for your help

 

For your system the 4650 is fine you won't be able to get the extra performance out of the 4670 to make it worth the money.

No problem

 

its only 12 pounds extra though so i can buy now and when i upgrade later i could still use it

thinking i will go on there finance bit and get a few extra items lol

will this psu be any good? http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/500w...er-80-Plus-CertifiedIntel-ATX-12V-6Serial-ATA

thanks

 

Yeah fine,I'd go for the Antec though at that price.

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/500W-Antec-Basiq-Power-PSU