Getting a new video card
 

I already posted this in the thread, but just in case, I'm going to get Orange Box, but sadly I doubt my integrated 128 MB Vidcard can handle it. I'm willing to spend $100-$150 for an actual Vid Card, what do you guys recommend?

I imagine we'd need to know a bit more about your computer prior to recommending a specific card.

Crap. I'm far from my computer now, but I'll take a guess at its specs.

CPU: 3.4 GHz Processor - Pentium 4
RAM: 1024 MB
Windows XP

I have a feeling that's not sufficient information.

No. What graphics card slot do you have?
PCI? PCI-e? AGP?

Edit: Or a motherboard model will suffice.

Ah, my mistake. Anyways, again, I'm uncertain if this is the correct information, I'm a noob when it comes to computer, obviously.

I googled it, and apparently, someone has the same mother board as this, and has 2 PCI slots.

According to Intel, your board has a PCI-Express port, so for ~$100-120 I'd recommend a GeForce 7900GS or ATI Radeon X1950-ish card.

Is this good?

http://www.futureshop.ca/catalog/pro...34&catid=10524

You'd probably be better off with one of the following.

8600GT $119 *$20MFR brings it down to $99*
NCIX.com - Buy XFX GeForce 8600GT 540MHZ 256MB 128BIT 1.4GHZ DDR3 PCI-E Dual DVI-I HDTV Out DIRECTX10 Video Card - PVT84JUDF3 In Canada.

2600XT $103.99
NCIX.com - Buy Sapphire Radeon HD2600XT 256MB GDDR3 PCI-E Dual DVI-I TV Out Video Card Lite Retail - 11110-00-20R In Canada.

i'd like to recommend a 1950pro or something (even the 2900GT's are going for $179 atm), but if you want something closer to $100-$130 those are about what you need.

I'll second Garret's opinion. OrangeBox isn't very demanding so most any card over $100 will do a good job. But in the $100-150, you should at least be able to pick up a 8600GT.

Personally I have this
NCIX.com - Buy Sapphire Radeon X1950 Pro 575MHZ PCI-E 256MB 1.38GHZ GDDR3 Dual DVI-I TV-OUT Lite Retail Video Card - 11095-01-20R In Canada.
Sapphire X1950PRO, and it runs OrangeBox maxed with alot of AA and AF at 1280x1024. It's a bit over $150 at NCIX, but if you quality of visuals is more important to you, pick up one of these over the 8600GT.

I actually wouldn't be surprised if the Orange Box runs on your system as-is. I've got a $50 GeForce 8500GT, and Portal plays fine at 1280x1024 with most things on high and 2x AA. The rest of my computer has better specs though, so I don't know how much that would affect things.

Don't listen to the above posts. The 8600GT is weaker than the 7900GS and similarly priced Radeon cards, especially in the older Source engine games. I myself have an 8600GT, I wouldn't wish it on anyone else in place of my recommendation, especially since the prices should be identical after rebates and such. Although the 8600GT can run CSS fine at 1440x900 at max settings and 16xCS anti-aliasing on my Vista computer with an Athlon 64 X2 4800+ and 2gb slow DDR2 RAM, you can get better performance with a 7900GS.

Also, forget about the X1650Pro, it's weaker than the 8600GT by far.

Also don't go for any card with 512mb of video RAM at this price range, because the card will not perform better by any significant amount. If you look at the old, now obsolete 8800 GTS 320 vs 640, even those former top-line cards don't have that great of a performance difference at mid to low resolutions.

Outdated but general guide for all this:
VGA Charts 2007 | Tom's Hardware

Also a benchmark for Orange Box, though lacking directly applicable charts for said cards:
AnandTech: UPDATED Half-Life 2: Episode 2 CPU and Graphics Performance



Edit: You ARE in the United States, correct? I see that Garret is from Canada, so these price ranges don't apply to him..

If I had to guess, it sounds like you are comparing the 8600GT in Vista, to a 7900GS on WinXP. In this comparison, yes, the 7900GS will surely win because Vista sucks balls for video game performance.

I'm not gonna claim that one of these 2 cards is better than the other, but I believe they are in a very similar performance catagory, and either would be a good choice.

Firstly about the pricing, if you noticed, the link in his post to the 1650pro was from that of futureshop, which is a Canadian Electronics outlet store. His profile also reveals that he lives in Toronto, Ontario.

Second, while the 7900GS is a better card than the 8600GT, it is also $199cdn, and for that amount of money a better card can be had. I was keeping the price within the $100-$120 (so about $150 with taxes and shipping) area as he had requested. So please don't shoot down the suggestions of others in that manner, as you were somewhat off the mark.

Additional Spam:
NCIX currently has on a special for a 7900GS XT for $119.99
NCIX.com - Buy XFX GeForce 7900GS XT 480MHZ 256MB 256BIT 1.4GHZ DDR3 PCI-E Dual DVI-I TV Out Video Card - PVT71PUDE3 In Canada.

limited quantity though.

Thanks for the replies everyone!

So a 7600 GS, it is! Thanks!

I didn't see anybody suggest a 7600, but it's a decent card IMO.

And his country flag is the American flag, not the Canadian flag, when you click on his user name. That wouldn't be my fault.

Woops. I meant 7900! Mixed up the 6 and the 9...

Newegg.com - Foxconn FV-N79SM2D2-OC GeForce 7900GS 256MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 SLI Supported Video Card - Retail

"use promo code "EMC1102VGA07" for $10 OFF"
(you have to sign up for newsletter)

Ah, true. I wonder why it does that. Simple mistake though.
As for Newegg, they don't ship to Canada. They have been promising for 2 years+ now that they are coming to Canada, but still nothing.

Heh, I have still yet to get a card. But I will be getting one within the following week!

Someone suggested to me the new HD 3850. He must be crazy... they're over $200, from what I can tell. Or have I been looking at the bad sources.

7900 GS is under 200 now.

NCIX.com - Buy XFX GeForce 7900GS XT 480MHZ 256MB 256BIT 1.4GHZ DDR3 PCI-E Dual DVI-I TV Out Video Card - PVT71PUDE3 In Canada.

Or save 2 more hundred and get 8800 .__.

The 3850 looks to be retailing at around $180, while its beefier 3870 brother is roughly $220. From what I've been reading, the 3850 seems like the best card you can get at its price, beating out the GeForce 7900GS and 8600GT. That, or wait for the GeForce 8800GT 256MB model to come out.

HD 3850's are $179. HD 3870's are $219.

A 3850 looks to be a great value buy. I highly doubt that the 8800GT 256MB will be retail at the same price. The performance of the 3850 is good, and if you can squeeze an extra $30 bucks to your previously mentioned maximum price, I think it would be well worth your time/money/effort.

Linky:
NCIX.com - Buy HIS Radeon HD 3850 256MB 256BIT GDDR3 PCI-E Dual DVI-I Hcdp HDMI HDTV Out Video Card - H385F256 In Canada.

I bought my eVGA 7900GT off of eBay for $125 shipped. It's eBay, though, so I don't know if you wanna take that chance.

What's this about Power Supply? Do 8800GT or 8600GT take a lot of power?

And thanks for the posts, I'm still thinking of getting 8600GT. That's all the money I have, and I just want to play Team Fortress 2 xD

As long as you don't have a crappy, crappy, small little power supply, the 8600GT will be just fine. They barely pull power. The 8800GT is way out of your price range, and it does draw quite a bit of power, so if you did decide to get it, then I would say you should find out about your powersupply.

The HD3850 is great on low power consumption, and is the better card and will put you more future proof. But 8600GT will for sure do you good for TF2 right now.

Woot. Just got a XFX 8600 GT XXX... it was the cheapest one -- $100 ><'' Sucks that I can't get access to my computer until tomorrow night. But I was wondering if overclocking this card is advisable, or too dangerous for the card?

Anywho, cant wait to try out Team Fortress 2. Thanks for all the replies =)

It's OCed already. So there's a bit of head room, and it's probably worth it to try and OC it. It will play TF2 well. Be ready to be pretty happy :D

This is a review of your card and results of OCing.
[H] Enthusiast - XFX GeForce 8600 GT XXX Edition

Dude. Wtf. My computer has a PCI slot, but there isn't any room to fit the fucking card. AHHHHHH. I AM SO PISSED. Is there a way to somehow get it to fit?

Do you have a small Dell pc? If you have a smallish PC, that is gonna limit your options. I would send it back and get something else. Are you sure you cant fit the card, and that you can't open or disassemble the case any further? And is the card too long, too tall, or too fat?

Oh wow, I'm an idiot. I should have opened my computer first to check what video card it can handle (instead of relying on you guys). Yeah, it can only handle PCI. Is there any way to convert to PCI-E, an adapter to have an external video card? ><

So I guess... what's a good PCI card? =/ Fucking emachines/dell.

edit: Do you recommend buying a new mother board just for it?

You can't convert PCI to PCI-E, due to bandwidth and power differences. Don't waste your time with a PCI videocard, they aren't good for anything made in the last 3 years. Also, I'm not sure about getting a new motherboard, because you would also have to look at upgrading the Power supply. Not to mention the fact that the CPU in there is most likely using an old/budget socket, which puts a damper on any upgrading possibilities.

Lesson learned: Unless you fork out thousands of dollars, retail machines suck for upgrading. Your best bet is to build a new PC from scratch. If you don't know how, hire someone to do it for you.

Ah damn. After all this hype of playing Team Fortress 2. I'll have to wait another few months to even afford a new computer. I'm might just say fuck it, and just get a PS3. >.>

thanks =/

PC components are pretty cheap nowadays, so a PS3 would probably cost more than it would to put together a computer that's up to snuff. If there are a lot of PS3 games you want to play though, then yeah, go for it.

I'd personally go X360 if you don't want to PC upgrade, but yeah, sorry dude. That's the suck of having those more "budget" PCs.