graphic card upgrade

bubbapump

Hi,
want to upgrade my graphic card (nvidia geforce4 mx 420 agp x 4) would like some advice to which one to choose

cheers mike

GoofyGAT

What's your system spec? Please do include CPU, motherboard make & model, amount of RAM, power supply wattage & OS.

Why are you upgrading? In other words, do you really need to?

What's your budget? G

Edit: Would you consider secondhand? If you would, there's a potential bargain to be had from eBay. All my 4 graphics cards have been from there

Blacksheep1979

Why do you want to know his cpu - there's unlikely to be compatability issues? However we will need to know why you want to upgrade and how much you want to spend.

GoofyGAT

Blacksheep1979 wrote: »

Why do you want to know his cpu - there's unlikely to be compatability issues?

It's not about possibility of compatibility issues, but rather to get a good balance with the components.

I'm sure you've heard that an underpowered CPU (compared to the GPU) could create a bottleneck during gaming. Apart from that aspect, we wouldn't want to stick a 'high-end' GPU in a 600Mhz Celeron system for example. G

bubbapump

Thanks for replies guys,
would consider second hand. Mainly for game playing, not sure about the price until i see what options i can get

cheers

Manufacturer : Fujitsu Siemens Computer
Mainboard : Gigabyte GA-8STXCFS
Chipset : SiS 645DX
Processor : Intel Pentium 4 @ 2533 MHz
Physical Memory : 512 MB (1 x 512 DDR-SDRAM )
Video Card : Nvidia Corp GeForce4 MX 420 [NV17.3]
Hard Disk : Maxtor (82 GB)
DVD-Rom Drive : HL-DT-ST DVD-ROM GDR8160B
DVD-Rom Drive : PHILIPS DVDR1628P1
Monitor Type : Samsung SyncMaster - 19 inches
Network Card : Realtek Semiconductor RT8139 (A/B/C/810x/813x/C+) Fast Ethernet Adapter
Operating System : Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition 5.01.2600 Service Pack 2
DirectX : Version 9.0c

bubbapump

can anyone help please?

GoofyGAT

bubbapump wrote: »

can anyone help please?

If you can wait a while, I'm in the process of putting some suggestions/info together . G

bubbapump

cheers mate

Blacksheep1979

What sort of games? Realistically for games you are looking at £70+ - the more you spend the better the card and generally the better the frame rate and or quality of graphics.

bubbapump

Blacksheep1979 wrote: »

What sort of games? Realistically for games you are looking at £70+ - the more you spend the better the card and generally the better the frame rate and or quality of graphics.

soldier of fortune,call of duty ,tomb raider and similar shoot em up games

GoofyGAT

Yeah, spec looks OK for a reasonably good upgrade for the majority of games (except the most demanding ones).

A few things to note:

1. The present PSU (250W I think) will not be sufficient for the card I've suggested, so you'll need to upgrade this too. Is it a regular size case or one of those 'slim' cases?
2. Consider upgrading the RAM too by 512Mb at the very least.
3. The motherboard (mb) has AGP 4x, while the GPU has 8x. There shouldn't be any compatibility issue, but the card will perform slower - in real world terms you probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference anyway. According to this info & the mb specs the 7600 should work with this particular mb (see lower down). If your mb had 8x you could have gone for a much better upgrade (budget permitting) - I feel it may be wasteful to spend more for only 4x bandwidth.

Gigabyte GA-8ST (close enough!) specs for reference.

This is what I would suggest...

Retail total = ~£114:

- Point Of View 7600GT 256MB DVI AGP Graphics card = £66 (with free delivery) - 7600GS for £54, but it may be worth paying the extra for the GT
- Antec EarthWatts 380W PSU = £30 / Coolermaster eXtreme Power 380W PSU = £33 - choose one of these good quality ones. Or, there are many ~£15 & above mark that'll do the job - read the user reviews to see the systems they're running. Don't get anything less than 380-400W. Entire list of PSUs on eBuyer (sorted by ascending prices)
- Kingston 512MB DDR PC2700 = £18

eBay total = ~£100(??):

- Graphics card search (make sure to get an AGP one!) - many of these will do nicely, but a 7600GT would be ideal (I purchased a X800XT PE for ~£60 some months ago, & am very pleased with it)
- PSU search - included the good/better brands only
- 512Mb PC2700 search - avoid 'high density' modules & stick with good/standard known makes (included in the search)

If not sure about anything, ask us before purchasing. G