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General discussion

Need Advice Please!!!

Dec 6, 2003 4:59PM PST

Hi...Looking for some advice please and some input into buying a new video card...my grandson uses my pc often(has none at home)and loves playing online pc games, call of duty,rise of nations,half life etc...he's 16) I would like to get him a better video card for Christmas and I am lost as to the many that are out there to chose from and I don't have a clue which are the better ones as they change so fast. right now I have an (Nvida Geforce 4 MX 420 64mb sdram)would like to spend around $100 and maybe put it in myself to save(retired person) bestbuy charged me $90 for this video card+instillation last year...Guess what i'm asking is which is my best choice that would be compatible to my system for this amount, thank you so much
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Msi kt3 ultra2 motherboard
Windows xp home
nvida geforce 4 mx 420 64mb sdram
amd 2400+cpu
kingston 512 ddr
80 gb hard drive

Discussion is locked

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Re:Need Advice Please!!!
Dec 6, 2003 10:31PM PST

First off, the price issue kills the conversation since this is a global web site. I picked up some 79USD DVD recorder, but Mick in some other country will pay in local currency and more.

Disregarding this, I have to first write that I don't know what prices are from region to region or at your point in the world. ADVICE? Absolutely and part opinion.

1. WAIT! Till January when all the hub-bub is over and the dealers will be slashing prices again.

2. Look at the Radeon 9800 or better.
Look at the Nvidia 5900 series. Compare which don't have video capture... You can do without and cheaper..

3. Look at http://www.tomshardware.com to compare your current card to the new card. You don't want to go for less than double the performance and at best, I'd want to see 4 times. In reality you'll get less than the benchmarks, but unless you really move, the results are often "Hmm, is it faster."

4. Consider housecleaning and installing latest drivers for what you have.

Bob

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Re:Need Advice Please!!!
Dec 6, 2003 11:13PM PST

For $100 or less, you're not going to find a video card much better than that. One thing that might help however, is buying additional RAM. Prices are still a bit high, but you should be able to get an additional 512MB for under $100 easily, and that will greatly improve performance in a lot of games where the video card really isn't the limiting factor.

Also, this part is free. Download a spyware removal tool and run it. Ad-Aware, Spybot or whatever will work. As part of a former job, I would scan people's computers for this stuff, and would average around 150 items per computer. If you use Internet Explorer at all, it's almost a guarentee you'll have some spyware on your system. (Consider using Mozilla (http://www.mozilla.org) as your web browser and email client. It will greatly reduce the risk of spyware getting installed on your system without your knowing it, it's also free and has a built-in popup blocker) Cleaning this junk off of your system can free up valuable resources which will improve the efficiency of the games. Just note that it's not a one time deal, you need to be sure to keep the program updated and scan weekly to monthly.

The other free tip, is to scan your system for Kazaa. If it's there, delete it. While it does have legitimate uses, currently it's primary use is to deal in illegal content, for which you'd be liable if ever traced back to you. It's also littered with spyware of the variety that runs programs on your computer that will slow it down.

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Re:Need Advice Please!!!
Dec 6, 2003 11:57PM PST