New Graphics Card

[slimjimer]

Well I am finally going to get a new computer to replace the 200mhz piece of crap I have. Thankfully I use my dad's computer for everything and don't even bother with the other anymore because it freezes every 5 mins. I am probly going to get a $700-$800 computer, and then buy a video card afterwards. I'm not looking for high end video cards or anything, just something that won't let photoshop or painter lag much and be able to do 3d games like halflife 2. I have heard that gforce 4 mx's are good but I am confused because I see that on lots of different things ranging from 30-90 bucks or so. I am looking for a card under 100 bucks, can anyone help?

[thomasaurus]

oh boy, you want a new card under 100 that can play Half-life 2? The things your talking about, you might as well double that price.

[slimjimer]

yeah, i saw a few screens of half life two and it looks amazing so how about a card for something like warcraft3? I'm not talking about full resolution 50fps or anything, just 800x600 at least at a decent frame rate in battle scenes.

[Pontemonti]

Whatever you do, DON'T buy a GeForce 4 MX card. I don't know why they're calling it GeForce 4 since it doesn't have all the features of the _real_ GeForce 4 cards. But most important of all is that the MX card uses some cheap, slow memory. The non-MX cards should be at least twice as fast.
You would do better buying an older GeForce 3 card with DDR memory (minimum 64 MB)...or maybe one of the cheaper GeForce 4 Titanium cards...Maybe there are some cheap ATi alternatives as well - I don't really. Check out some video card comparisons - the benchmarks are quite an easy way to see which video card you should get :D
http://www.anandtech.com/

[KARL]

Heres some cheap pieces of poo poo you might be interested in:
ASUS v9520td 128mb ddr geforcefx5200 (http://www.directron.com/v9520td.html)
Gigabyte GV 128mb Radeon 9000 pro (http://www.directron.com/gvr9000proii.html)
they're both under $100 and might, dare i say MIGHT be worth your time.
Glad tah help, and make that computer a cheap shoebox on steroids :D

[slimjimer]

Wow, thanks a bunch to all of you! Those are some helpful links. Yeah, I've seen the geforce 4 MX on a lot of cheap computer systems, and it would make sense because a lot of people see the 64 and think its a really good one. Is it very hard to add the card to a new system or should I try to find a system with the card already installed on it?

[KARL]

Originally posted by slimjimer
yeah, i saw a few screens of half life two and it looks amazing so how about a card for something like warcraft3? I'm not talking about full resolution 50fps or anything, just 800x600 at least at a decent frame rate in battle scenes.

Well, if you want something that'll run War3 good, dont fret.
Im running a:
P3 750mhz
428 ram
radeon 7200 64 mb
on Windows 2000

i always run Warcraft3 and Battlefield 1942 on 1024x768 at 32bpp and im fine, usually running at lowest 40fps but i average at around 55-70

and to answer your question adding a card to a new system is easy, as long as your operating system is working fine and your bios are ok, your set