Advice on upgrading graphics

whotook316

I'm thinking abut getting a graphics card to upgrade my PC's video performance - currently I'm stuck with the integrated 32MB graphics chip which doesnt produce good quality DVD playback and doesn't seem to support any games from this millenium.

My problem is that I only have PCI expansion slots - no AGP and no PCI express - and I've been told that PCI graphics cards are generally very poor.

I have managed to find a couple of cheap ones at SVP - an nvidia geforce FX5500 256MB card at £32.75 and a MX4000 128 MB card at £21.29.

My question is this - would either of these cards increase performance sufficiently to justify buying them or should I just stick with what I've got until I can afford a new PC?

Or would any of you recommend a different card?

Current system specs:

Intel Celeron 1.7Mhz
512MB RAM
ASUS P4SC motherboard with integrated VIA graphics

I mostly use it for watching DVDs and would like to play some games - a few RTS, Sim City, Civ etc.

Advice appreciated.

viru.doshi

They're regarded as being poor next to AGP and of course pci-e. However, the processing load will be lifted from your cpu and the onboard gpu, so yes you'll definately get and see an improvement. And for just over £30 i'd go for the upgrade. However, if you're planning on playing games that have been released lately you just wont be able to. Games from around 6/7 years ago would probably work ok though.

gaming_guy

Intel Celeron 1.7Mhz
i think you mean 1.7GHZ, otherwise you have a slow computer