New Win7 video card for Mom

[lifeblood]

My 82 year old mother decided she wanted to upgrade to Windows 7 when it comes out. Why I don't know, but ok. She's my Mom and I will comply.

She currently has a Socket 754 / AGP motherboard with a AMD Athlon 64 2800+ CPU running XP Pro. She uses email, browses the web, and plays solitaire. No 3D games, no high end apps, etc. If I can get the RAM to 1GB+ then I think it should work ok with Win7. I would like to get her to Win7 Home Premium because she would probably like the Media Center capability.

Her current video card is a Geforce 2 MX. I figure that needs to be upgraded to a Dx9 or 10 video card. The question is, should I get a AGP or a PCI video card? Obviously PCIe is out of the question. I will pay for this so the budget is however much I can save by skipping lunches. A new system is just not an option.

 

[Creig]

Why upgrade the video card at all? You don't need anything fancy for email, browsing the web or playing solitaire. Unless you're looking for heavier video decoding capabilities for DVD/Blu-Ray. Then I would suggest you find a faster AGP card.

What kind of price are you looking at?

 

[Sam25]

Why would you want to upgrade to a DX 10 supporting video card if you are not going to run any games on it except for Solitaire and use it for simple operations?

 

[lifeblood]

I'm expecting the Media Center portion will require a better video card. Her PC is in her bedroom and she has expressed a desire to watch movies on it. She also probably wants Aero turned on.

 

[superunknown98]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814121273

The cheapest agp video card I could find on newegg that has DX 10 support. Radeon 3450. Should even pass audio through the hdmi converter, if your grandmother has such a t.v.


Edit: you might want a faster CPU though. maybe ebay?

 

[lifeblood]

This would be much easier if my current MB wasn't flakey. I'm planning on upgrading my rig soon so it would be simple to give her my old CPU/MB/RAM. Unfortunately, the controller on my board has recurring "issues" so I can't pass it down. I guess I can get a used S939 MB off of ebay. That way I can get a cheap PCIe card for her. Still, it's just making this more and more expensive (Kinda like how the stimulus bill seems to be getting bigger).

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

Originally posted by: lifeblood
My 82 year old mother decided she wanted to upgrade to Windows 7 when it comes out. Why I don't know, but ok. She's my Mom and I will comply.

She currently has a Socket 754 / AGP motherboard with a AMD Athlon 64 2800+ CPU running XP Pro. She uses email, browses the web, and plays solitaire. No 3D games, no high end apps, etc. If I can get the RAM to 1GB+ then I think it should work ok with Win7. I would like to get her to Win7 Home Premium because she would probably like the Media Center capability.

Her current video card is a Geforce 2 MX. I figure that needs to be upgraded to a Dx9 or 10 video card. The question is, should I get a AGP or a PCI video card? Obviously PCIe is out of the question. I will pay for this so the budget is however much I can save by skipping lunches. A new system is just not an option.

God bless your mom, little technophile that she is!

Don't worry about the upgrades until Win7 is actually released - that's months away yet, and who knows what's coming down the pike for ya.

 

[will889]

There are several options. You could wait it out like mentioned. You could give her your 939 Biostar/setup and pop in a cheap DX10 PCIe card if you plan on upgrading later. you could find a used 6600 AGP card or something - at least it has SM3/DX9. I think there are also some AGP 6200 cards as well. DX9 should be all that's needed for her uses.

 

[tcsenter]

Originally posted by: lifeblood
I'm expecting the Media Center portion will require a better video card. Her PC is in her bedroom and she has expressed a desire to watch movies on it. She also probably wants Aero turned on.

Vista sucks with XP compatibility drivers and I expect Windows 7 to suck a bit more unless you have supported WDDM drivers. I'm not even sure the Windows games work without WDDM, I know there are problems with Windows DVD Maker and other apps if you don't run WDDM drivers.

Problem solved:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814131070

Radeon X1650 will handle advanced SD and HD decoding OK but stuff like Blu-Ray will probably be glitchy unless you have a stronger CPU than S754 Athlon 64. I'm running the PCI Express version of the same PowerColor Radeon X1650 PRO on an older Celeron D 3.06GHz with 2GB DDR2. WEI index scores aren't too shabby:

Aero Desktop Performance - 4.6
3D Graphics Performance - 4.9

 

[sportage]

I just talked to your mom. She wanted a toaster...
But seriously... 82? I'd pay to have her come over and educate my 70 year old parents
on how to get involved with computers.
You're so lucky to have a tech savvy 82 year old.
My mom calls the bank EVERY DAY to see what checks went thru.
"MOM... you can do all that online with a pc....!"
"Why would "I" want a computer??? "

 

[taltamir]

windows 7 = faster than XP and Vista... so why upgrade the video card?
Most the graphics effects don't need anything... if some DO, then ask us in 6+ months when win7 is actually out... because the market will have certainly changed by then.

Remember that windows 7 is basically vista second edition... MS even admitted as such, they are renaming it because of vista's bad press...

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

Originally posted by: taltamir
windows 7 = faster than XP and Vista... so why upgrade the video card?
Most the graphics effects don't need anything... if some DO, then ask us in 6+ months when win7 is actually out... because the market will have certainly changed by then.

Remember that windows 7 is basically vista second edition... MS even admitted as such, they are renaming it because of vista's bad press...

Because the Geforce 2 MX can't do Aero.

 

[aka1nas]

Originally posted by: tcsenter

Problem solved:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16814131070

Radeon X1650 will handle advanced SD and HD decoding OK but stuff like Blu-Ray will probably be glitchy unless you have a stronger CPU than S754 Athlon 64. I'm running the PCI Express version of the same PowerColor Radeon X1650 PRO on an older Celeron D 3.06GHz with 2GB DDR2. WEI index scores aren't too shabby:

Aero Desktop Performance - 4.6
3D Graphics Performance - 4.9

Also, for Windows 7 consider spending another $10 and getting this:

Newegg

Windows 7 has a Dx10 version of Aero that is supposed to use half the resources(including VRAM) and doesn't take nearly as much as a performance hit as you open more windows.

 

[lifeblood]

I was considering the cards linked to above, but did you notice the ratings? Most of the AGP cards are not rated well at all. Still, it's not like I have much of a choice. The good thing is that, as mentioned a couple of times above, I do have 6+ months to wait and watch for a really good deal to come along. Or I might win the lottery and just buy her an all new Quad SLI system (I can dream, right?).

 

[sfmedic]

I put one of these in an older socket A system Athlon XP 2400+ with only 768mb RAM and it was very impressive what that system could do. It probably means skipping a lot more lunches than you want to go without. Still this thing is a great card.

AGP 3850

 

[tcsenter]

HD 3850 AGP would be a monumental waste of money for a non-gamer. A completely new AM2+ setup wouldn't cost much more.

 

[Denithor]

My suggestion:

Cheap AM2 dual-core cpu + cheap 780G motherboard + 2GB cheapo DDR2

You can build this for <$100 and it will handle all of her needs beautifully.

Plus it will consume less energy than her old S754 setup so she can save a buck or two a month on the power bill.