Author Topic: Basic graphics card for a minimal gamer?  (Read 381 times)

Offline Simaril

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Basic graphics card for a minimal gamer?
« on: January 14, 2007, 07:46:02 PM »
Well, I need some rescuing.

My dads a 70 year old retired mainframe systems analyst. He has a 2 year old,  off the shelf economy 3.0 Ghz Cpu computer, and is using onboard graphics, which has worked just fine.

Up till now. He got a Civilization expansion pack or something, and it wont work with onboard video. So, he called up his gamer son asking "What's the best video card for me?" He's looking to spend around $100, and he assures me he has a PCI-E slot available.

THIS  card looked reasonable to me, but what do you think? He's not going to be pushing any graphical envelopes, and he doesn't play simulations at all.

Thanks!
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Offline Apeking

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Basic graphics card for a minimal gamer?
« Reply #1 on: January 18, 2007, 06:43:16 PM »
At least in my part of the world, the typical "bog-standard usable graphics card" is anything by Nvidia that costs roughly fifty pounds and is at the top of its respective range. E.g. the most expensive Geforce 7300 rather than the cheapest 7600. I recently upgraded my own machine, and I generally use it for things other than games. I bought a 7300GT from Dabs.com for about £46. In theory that's about $70-80, but it could also be $46, because computer manufacturers tend to exchange dollars for pounds on an arcane basis.

The 1650 is faster, but also £20-30 more expensive. The reviews I have seen tend to pit the 1650 against the 7600, which is much the same price; I cannot determine if there is a clear winner, they seem to be much of a muchness.

Offline Noir

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Basic graphics card for a minimal gamer?
« Reply #2 on: January 21, 2007, 11:38:25 AM »
That Radeon X1650 will work ok on current games.
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Offline 96Delta

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Basic graphics card for a minimal gamer?
« Reply #3 on: January 22, 2007, 12:31:43 PM »
I am in the same boat.
NVIDIA Ti4600 was working very well for me until
the onboard memory failed.

Need a new AGP video card but I only have a 250 watt
power supply.  Still looking.

David

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Offline Krusty

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Basic graphics card for a minimal gamer?
« Reply #4 on: January 22, 2007, 12:41:32 PM »
For your dad the x1600 might be overkill. It'd be like getting him a 2005 mustang just to get the groceries.

You could go down to an X800 or lower. For the nVidia line, a budget 6800 would probably work as well.

I don't know what the major ATI variant before the X800 was, but it would probably be effective as well.

Offline Noir

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Basic graphics card for a minimal gamer?
« Reply #5 on: January 22, 2007, 05:57:43 PM »
Quote
Originally posted by 96Delta
I am in the same boat.
NVIDIA Ti4600 was working very well for me until
the onboard memory failed.

Need a new AGP video card but I only have a 250 watt
power supply.  Still looking.

David


My 2nd PC is a Xp2400+ with a X1600 and 2 hard drives, I have no problems with an old Fortron 250W PSU.
now posting as SirNuke

Offline Nemeth

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Basic graphics card for a minimal gamer?
« Reply #6 on: January 22, 2007, 05:58:20 PM »
I have a GeForce FX 5500 before installing, i had a GeForce 4 MX intergrated and in AH I could only run the resolution at a max of 1024x768 and 128 texture size and it only ran at 20-30 FPS, now after installing i can run at 1280x1024 and the texture size 1024and i get anywhere from 30-75 FPS (note i am only using 384 MB of 166 MhZ ram)

http://www.tigerdirect.com (or .ca for Canadians) have reasonable prices, a while ago they had a GeForce 6600 256 Mb cache for $70 (Canadian)
also remember to make sure the card is compatable (just saying cuz of the GDDR2 Vid card u posted)
« Last Edit: January 22, 2007, 06:01:57 PM by Nemeth »