video cards - AGP

[Bender]

my kid has a nVidia GeForce 6200 card (256MB) in his computer, and he wants something a little better.
He has an AGP slot for video cards, not pci express.

What are some AGP cards out there that are better than his 6200? Are they still making AGP cards?

[kumar.]

AGP Asus 8600GT

http://www.ginger6.com/images/fullsize/big/285857.jpg

[Cry Havoc]

AGP Asus 8600GT

http://www.ginger6.com/images/fullsize/big/285857.jpg

If he wants a 2 year old graphics card.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3855381&CatId=318

That's the way to go.

[Bender]

that radeon looks pretty good. kind of expensive though. It would be a major step up in performance from what he currently has, right?

[Cry Havoc]

that radeon looks pretty good. kind of expensive though. It would be a major step up in performance from what he currently has, right?

There is no comparison.

You're looking at going from a card that can handle World of Warcraft just "ok" (if that) to one that can play Crysis on medium settings.

The 3850 is a fantastic card, especially for the money. He's also future-proofing himself against newer games. But for now, it will run games like Fallout 3, Mass Effect, etc. with no problems at all on higher settings.

[TDMVPDPOY]

why not switch over to PCI-e board, the lowest end with a PCI-E card...

[Fernando TD21]

What processor does the PC have? I assume it is an old processor since the motherboard have a AGP slot. If the processor is too slow, it probably will bottleneck the VGA performance.

[Bender]

I gave him one of my old computers a couple months ago. It was a box that I put together myself: it has an AMD 64 processor and 1GB of RAM.

My computer I am using myself is also home-built, and also has an AGP video bus. However, I'm not much of a gamer. My box just has an nVidea 5200 with 128MB on it. Plus, one of my 512MB memory strips went bad so I had to pull it out. Now I only have one strip of 512MB left. On Monday I'm picking up another 1GB RAM for my machine.

My kid (11 yrs old) mostly just plays some Steam games on the computer - HL2, Day of Defeat, Team Fortress 2. The nVidia 6200 actually plays most of what he plays OK. He told me that the games that his machine plays "worse" are HL2 episode 2 and Team Fortress 2. He wants those to play better.

He plays the newer games on his xbox 360.

edit: Next time I put two machines together, I will have pci express. That's why I wasn't sure I wanted to spend big money on an AGP card.

[Cry Havoc]

I gave him one of my old computers a couple months ago. It was a box that I put together myself: it has an AMD 64 processor and 1GB of RAM.

My computer I am using myself is also home-built, and also has an AGP video bus. However, I'm not much of a gamer. My box just has an nVidea 5200 with 128MB on it. Plus, one of my 512MB memory strips went bad so I had to pull it out. Now I only have one strip of 512MB left. On Monday I'm picking up another 1GB RAM for my machine.

My kid (11 yrs old) mostly just plays some Steam games on the computer - HL2, Day of Defeat, Team Fortress 2. The nVidia 6200 actually plays most of what he plays OK. He told me that the games that his machine plays "worse" are HL2 episode 2 and Team Fortress 2. He wants those to play better.

He plays the newer games on his xbox 360.

edit: Next time I put two machines together, I will have pci express. That's why I wasn't sure I wanted to spend big money on an AGP card.

I'd highly recommend building a new machine. Or look for one on craigslist. I found a hell of a deal last year that ended up being about a 60% discount than if I would have built the rig myself, to say nothing of buying it from a manufacturer. A Radeon 4850 is an amazing card that only runs about $120-130 on newegg.

[Bender]

well, 4 months later I finally buy the ATI Sapphire Radeon HD3850 for my son that Cry Havoc recommended.
Son says games play way smoother, the frame rate is more than twice what it was. But it has sort of a 'fuzzy' look in general though (he says the graphics are worse than his old nvidia 6200).

The installation "manual" (ha ha) is the WORST I have even encountered. The pics of the card did not even look like the card I got, plus the instructions were plain wrong in some cases. Plus there was no mention at all that the card needed to be connected to the power supply with 2 molex connectors.

while googling, I read that many people don't like the ATI drivers and use other ones.
Plus, my son's Antec case has a 300w PS, and I read that for this card 450+ is needed. Huh?

The instructions showed a pic of the card, with one DVI output and one TV out and one VGA out. The actual card has 2 DVI outs and one TV out. It did come with a DVI to VGA adapter, but does that degrade the video in any way?

why would the card play games better and faster, but look fuzzier that his old card? (I'm updating the drivers right now)

thanks!

[Cry Havoc]

well, 4 months later I finally buy the ATI Sapphire Radeon HD3850 for my son that Cry Havoc recommended.
Son says games play way smoother, the frame rate is more than twice what it was. But it has sort of a 'fuzzy' look in general though (he says the graphics are worse than his old nvidia 6200).

The installation "manual" (ha ha) is the WORST I have even encountered. The pics of the card did not even look like the card I got, plus the instructions were plain wrong in some cases. Plus there was no mention at all that the card needed to be connected to the power supply with 2 molex connectors.

while googling, I read that many people don't like the ATI drivers and use other ones.
Plus, my son's Antec case has a 300w PS, and I read that for this card 450+ is needed. Huh?

The instructions showed a pic of the card, with one DVI output and one TV out and one VGA out. The actual card has 2 DVI outs and one TV out. It did come with a DVI to VGA adapter, but does that degrade the video in any way?

why would the card play games better and faster, but look fuzzier that his old card? (I'm updating the drivers right now)

thanks!

If the display isn't running at it's native resolution, there is a chance that things will be "fuzzy". Though it also could be something else entirely. How bad is it? Could you post a screen shot? Press "print screen" on the keyboard while in-game, then open paint and click edit > paste. Then use an online photo site to upload it here.

[Bender]

it's not bad at all, it's just not quite as nice 'in general' as the prior card. however, my son says he can see more detail in some cases (things he did not see before), and games play way smoother with a way faster frames per second.

I'll try out the screen cap...

[Bender]

just restarted after updating video drivers thru the ATI updater...

it looks better than before. Guess problem is solved! There are still some weird happenings though:

on restarts, it occasionally ends up with just a blank screen. The computer power light is on, but the screen is blank. When that happens, another restart will correct it. Not sure about that one.

so my son really likes it and is playing HL2 right now... he says it plays way better than the old nvidia 6200.

Thanks!

PS: I put his old 6200 in my machine... its a step up for me... ha, I'm not a gamer...

[Bender]

ok, on Age of Chivalry, he says on some maps he is getting 10fps, which is the same as what his old 6200 was getting. However, on some maps he is getting way better, and on HL2 he is getting way more fps than with his old card.

any ideas?

[Cry Havoc]

Glad to hear it! :tu It really is a fantastic card. I hope he gets a lot of use out of it. =)

[Cry Havoc]

ok, on Age of Chivalry, he says on some maps he is getting 10fps, which is the same as what his old 6200 was getting. However, on some maps he is getting way better, and on HL2 he is getting way more fps than with his old card.

any ideas?

Did you patch the game? Occasionally games will not be optimized for certain cards. Make sure it's fully updated.

[Bender]

also, he says it is still slightly fuzzy, although a little better that at first.

[Bender]

time to spend some time with the little woman...

tomorrow's another day... thanks!

[Heath Ledger]

sorry did not see the thread had progressed so much.

[DarkReign]

FPS is not always related to VGA.

Someone mentioned it before, the rig could be bottlenecking. Plus, DVI to VGA will degrade the signal.

You need to play with the settings. General question: doesnt ATI have a similar program to nvidia's nTune?

[Bender]

I'll mess around with it more tonight after work. Since I'm not home to be able to look at the monitor and the computer, I wonder if my son's monitor has a dvi input. Maybe I can buy a dvi cable. His monitor is not very old, an LCD 17".

I just googled it, and I think this is it:

monitor (http://www.pacificgeek.com/product.asp?c=232&s=945&ID=48304&P=F)

looks like it has DVI.

[DarkReign]

Connections:
•Dual link DVI-D
•VGA (15-pin Dsub)
•3.5 mm audio in

Sure does.

[Bender]

I'll make sure the connections on both ends are dvi-d, and then pick up a cable. Hopefully that will help the slight graininess of the picture.

edit: card supports dx 10, but I guess XP doesn't...