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Graphic Card Help

Y

yELLOthar

Member
I need to upgrade my friends computer with a better graphics card, but he is on a very tight budget ($50), and I want your opinion!

I found this one, which was best rated for under $50 on Newegg.com

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814150041

However, I have heard from various sources that this card blows, despite it getting good reviews. Could someone help me out here, I don't want to get him a crappy card, he helped me hook some stuff up in my car, so I figured I'd help him out too. He is completely computer illiterate, so I agreed.

Anyway, someone tell me if thats good?

P.S.
He mostly plays things like Sims 2, Warcraft 3 and stuff like that. He doesn't care much for FPS, at least I have never seen him play or buy a FPS before, so no need to run HL2 or Doom 3 or nothing.
 
He has a GeForce MX400 64MB (is this worth anything...?) right now, so I'm pretty sure he has an AGP slot. His computer is also a Dell, but I don't think that matters.
 
Originally posted by: yELLOthar
He has a GeForce MX400 64MB (is this worth anything...?) right now, so I'm pretty sure he has an AGP slot. His computer is also a Dell, but I don't think that matters.
Click to expand...

Those also come in PCI versions, and Dells tend to not have AGP - I'd check first.
 
Er, alright. I guess I'll check tomorrow...

If he does have AGP, would that be a good card for the money? I couldn't get to that PCI card linked to above, the page never loaded. What card was that?
 
yeah, low end intel boards used to love omitting AGP slots for some reason. They've gotten better about it with newer PCIe chipsets, since now they usually at least include 1 PCIex1 and 1 PCIex16 slot.

Anyways, that MX400 is totally worthless, it doesn't even support anything newer than DirectX 7, and can barely even handle 3d at all. The FX5200 might get the jog done, but it's pretty much universally understood that the FX series is the worst in nvidia's history. Its basically a hack job, using brute force to try and make up for a terrible core. It doesn't even implement DirectX 9 correctly, and HL2 won't run properly in DX9 because of it (i know hes not playing HL2, but i'm sure it will be an issue with other games, too). For ~$50, there are better cards around. I think 9600 non-pros are in that range, and perform a lot better, in addition to having a better feature set. Even the low end 9200 would probably be a better choice, and they start well south of $50 if you check online (pricewatch, pricegrabber, etc.). If you can stretch your budget to $75 or $100, then there are much more appealing options, like a geforce 6200, or even possibly a 6600 non-GT or Radeon 9700/9800.
 
I'll ask him if he can go any higher, but I doubt it. I'll check out some of the ones you just said, thanks for the info!
 
Ok, he does have an AGP slot, which is good. He said $50 was it too, so I guess I'm getting the XFX Geforce FX5200 128MB DDR AGP 4X/8X Video Card - Retail. Thanks for your help guys, and I'm not ordering til tonight if anyone has a last minute suggestion.
 
Honestly, there isn't much of a step-up from the MX400 to the FX5200. But for $50, I guess what else can you do if you want to buy retail. I would try to see if he can squeeze a few more bucks out of his pocket and look for at least a 9600pro. Maybe check the FS/T forums here or ebay if you're comfortable buying used.
 
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