"Best Fit" Graphics Card

[GNucks]

Salutations, men and women of the cartoon sky.

A long time ago, in a land far away, I was a spoiled brat with a father who played these games called "Air Warrior" and "Aces High" under some variation of the name "Nux" or "Nucks" every night in the basement. Today, after seeing this Titanic Tuesday Video and the numerous videos by Flash4rt on YouTube, and witnessing how incredible the community is on these forums, I can't wait to dive in and revive the Nux/Nucks family name in Aces High.

I've only recently revived an old and dusty HP desktop that has seen better days. On the lowest graphics settings I can run the game okay, but the visuals are kinda' "glitchy" and leave much to be desired.

The processor is a 2.4Ghz AMD and I've got 1.5GB of Memory. What would be the "best fit" graphics card for this setup? I'd like to spend less than $50, but it's more important that I meet or slightly exceed the recommended requirements for the game.

Thanks in advance fellas. Looking forward to getting my rig up off the ground.

[FLS]

It would be helpful to know if you need an AGP card and your power supply capacity.

[GNucks]

It would be helpful to know if you need an AGP card and your power supply capacity.

PCIe x16 or PCI
300W

[zack1234]

Its christmas soon buy a new gaming PC, i will pay for it

[Masherbrum]

Spam it up zack!!!!

The 300W PSU should be upgraded if you're swapping out the VC. 

[GNucks]

Its christmas soon buy a new gaming PC, i will pay for it

Thank you! Let me PM my PayPal to you!  

The 300W PSU should be upgraded if you're swapping out the VC.  

Yeah, when I opened her up and looked inside I was like, "300W?!  " I seriously rubbed at the sticker hoping it was smudged or something.

I'll upgrade the PSU as necessary, right now I'd like a recommendation on a Video Card though. I don't want to get too overzealous on the purchase because every penny spent on this baby is money that isn't getting put toward the sweet rig on my wishlist.

[MonkGF]

I just recently bought a GT240 card for my wife's Dell with underpowered PSU. Doesn't require extra power, and fixed all her low framerate issues in Borderlands.

The specific one I bought was: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130542, but that one may be discontinued. Try http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130533 instead. The GDDR5 GT240 cards are faster and the ones to get.

You can also probably find an equivalent ATI with similar power needs (no extra power connector), but I don't have any ATI recommendations.

[Masherbrum]

Go to newegg or whatever site you prefer and put "low power video card" in the search and see what comes up.

[GNucks]

The specific one I bought was: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130542, but that one may be discontinued. Try http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130533 instead. The GDDR5 GT240 cards are faster and the ones to get.

Forgive my relative lack of knowledge of computer hardware, but am I wrong in assuming that a PCIe 2.0 x16 card will not work in a PCIe x16 slot?

With a quick search I found this puppy http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814500165
It says it has 512MB with "TurboCache", I haven't a clue what that is. Only cons I see are that it's a pretty hot card because it uses a crappy heat sink instead of a fan.

[FLS]

Ati 4650 for about $50 is a good card for your needs.

[Ghastly]

Forgive my relative lack of knowledge of computer hardware, but am I wrong in assuming that a PCIe 2.0 x16 card will not work in a PCIe x16 slot?

With a quick search I found this puppy http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814500165
It says it has 512MB with "TurboCache", I haven't a clue what that is. Only cons I see are that it's a pretty hot card because it uses a crappy heat sink instead of a fan.

2.0 cards (and slots) are backwards compatible to 1.0 slots (and cards).  If both are 2.0 you will possibly get higher performance from the card if the rest of your system could keep up.  With an "old and dusty AMD 2.4-based HP basement revival" it's not going to be able to any way, so it won't make any difference what's 1.0 or 2.0 - except that a 1.0 card would be harder to find - and would limit performance in the better system you might eventually replace this one with.

<S>

[GNucks]

2.0 cards (and slots) are backwards compatible to 1.0 slots (and cards).  If both are 2.0 you will possibly get higher performance from the card if the rest of your system could keep up.  With an "old and dusty AMD 2.4-based HP basement revival" it's not going to be able to any way, so it won't make any difference what's 1.0 or 2.0 - except that a 1.0 card would be harder to find - and would limit performance in the better system you might eventually replace this one with.

<S>

Thanks a million, brother. 

With this information, I think I'll go for this http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=14-125-251&SortField=0&SummaryType=0&Pagesize=10&PurchaseMark=true&SelectedRating=-1&VideoOnlyMark=False&VendorMark=&IsFeedbackTab=true&Page=2#scrollFullInfo
It's got excellent reviews and a perfect price.

Ati 4650 for about $50 is a good card for your needs.

Thanks for the suggestion, FLS, but the $20 saved here can go towards a stick.

Thanks for the help guys!

[TilDeath]

The 4650 suggested does not meet your current system specs.  It requires a 400watt PSU.  IMHO here are your two choices http://www.newegg.com/Product/Productcompare.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=40000048&IsNodeId=1&Description=4350&bop=And&CompareItemList=48|14-125-251^14-125-251-TS%2C14-150-495^14-150-495-TS  One has a faster core clock, but the other has a faster memory clock.  One does not use a fan, but I don't think heat is going to be an issue here.  Both end up being with-in $5.00 or so of each other.

TD

[GNucks]

The 4650 suggested does not meet your current system specs.  It requires a 400watt PSU.  IMHO here are your two choices http://www.newegg.com/Product/Productcompare.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=40000048&IsNodeId=1&Description=4350&bop=And&CompareItemList=48|14-125-251^14-125-251-TS%2C14-150-495^14-150-495-TS  One has a faster core clock, but the other has a faster memory clock.  One does not use a fan, but I don't think heat is going to be an issue here.  Both end up being with-in $5.00 or so of each other.

TD

Thanks, TD. The Gigabyte is actually the one I referenced in my above post 

In the future when I'm ready for a new system I'll definitely hit you up if I decide not to build it on my own.

[FLS]

The 4650 suggested does not meet your current system specs.  It requires a 400watt PSU.  IMHO here are your two choices http://www.newegg.com/Product/Productcompare.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=40000048&IsNodeId=1&Description=4350&bop=And&CompareItemList=48|14-125-251^14-125-251-TS%2C14-150-495^14-150-495-TS  One has a faster core clock, but the other has a faster memory clock.  One does not use a fan, but I don't think heat is going to be an issue here.  Both end up being with-in $5.00 or so of each other.

TD

Good catch, I was assuming he'd go with the earlier advice to upgrade his power supply.