Video Card

I am going to get a new video card to meet the demands of my new games. My friend got a Gforce 5200 from walmart that has 256mb of ram. Now he is telling me that the ati there I was looking at is better. He said he got this one because he needed the extra ram for photo shop. Its an ait 9200 or a 9800(cant remember which) and it has 128mb of ram. Now the ati only cost like 80 bucks and i think the gforce was like 120+. IS the ati any good?? price wise i think the card will not meet my needs because if its that cheap i dont think its really all that fast. He did use his card for Guild Wars and it worked fine. Mostly because he could play the game with a small screen so he could close it and go to his desktop. I know both gforce and ati have good cards but the way he is saying it the ati will run better with the games and he uses the extra ram on the other for the photo stuff. Will the ati there run Battlefield 1942 on high grahics, 400% bots on single player and have no freezing or lagging??? I know ati's are a bit better but this one just doesnt seem so. I do though only have a limited amount of money to spend on this so i cant get something like a gforce 6800 or anything like that. Im looking for a good card that will run my games on high graphics. Such as Battlefield 1942, Warhammer: Dawn of War, and Painkiller. games of that sort.

I have the FX5200 256MB and it will run any game I put to it, doom 3, HL2, anything. The ATI is an alright card but the 9200 is out of date (so is the FX5200) but I'm partial to nVIDIA cards over ATI.

Both will run Battlefeild, The nvidia will run it a little better.

what do you have the graphics settings on when you play doom 3 or whatever??

what do you have the graphics settings on when you play doom 3 or whatever??highest setting, 4X antialiasing , 8X antisotropic. frames per second range from 35 to 75.

also what's your budget? around 150? if so get a Radeon 9800 256 mb, VERY powerful card.

Hmm. My friend pretty much has the same card as you and he cant run half life 2 without having it on lowest settings and have it freezing up and stuff. I really am not sure. I can go to about 150. Im going to try and check circuit city today because i was checking a ati they had. From what ive been reading about them they are more stable than the gforce.

how much ram and whats his processor speed? and processor make. And what kinda of computer, dell? emachines?

Hes got a good computer. Only had it for like a month so far. He has a AMD 3600. dont know the ram count. But just yesterday i got a ati All-in-Wonder 9600. It has 128mb of ram. I was looking at a 9600 on the circuit city site but i got the wrong 9600. But the one I got was on sale so im not going to take it back unless I have to. But the 9600 I was looking for wasnt even there. But does anyone know how well this card runs with games. If it is good can it run Half Life 2 fine. I wasnt looking for this card in particular but I got it anyways. It has a remote and connectors so you can play stuff from your TV. I didnt want all that but I got it now if I want to use it. Something that puzzles me though is if this card is designed to run shows and stuff from your TV and is (hopefully) good enough to run Half Life 2 fine then why doesnt it have a fan to cool it? All it has is a small heat sink near the back. Hopefully I wont have a problem of overheating.

nah you shouldn't have a problem with it overheating. Although to pretty much eliminate the problem and be safer I recommend getting a video card fan. I have one in mine and it works great all you do it mount it under the video card in a open PCI slot and plug it in with a 4 prong connector. They are around 15 bucks, some have leds like mine does . I only got it cause I have a acrylic window kit on mine.

http://img118.exs.cx/img118/7638/imag01239cs.jpg

You can get them at usually any computer store or even online prolly cheaper then 15.


The 9600 is a good card, I had it before but gave it to my friend when I got my FX5200. The 9600 was prolly a better card then my FX (performance wise , higher frame rate but not as good of graphics) but the graphics quality of the Nvidia card is was serpast the quality of the Radeon.

So will it be able to run Half Life 2 with normal graphics fine?? havent been able to test it yet. And yeah ill probably get a fan for it. Saves the trouble of having system lock ups if they happen.. Ill get one of those cool lighted ones. I need to spice up my boring ass compter.

I can't garrentee it will run HL2, I haven't tried it on a 9600 but I'm postive it will. My friend has a Radeon 9700 128mb and it run's it fine so I doubt a 9600 is all that different.

Ok, new question. What would be a good motherboard to get? The one I have now has no freaking agp port. Im still going to run the ati All-in-Wonder 9600 card. So of course it needs a agp port. But it probably will have to use intel cpu because i cant afford a new cpu now. Ill just have to use the intel i have now. But if possible have the motherboard support a large hard drive much more than 100GB, and lots of ram(more than 1GB). I plan on getting those upgrades for later.

highest setting, 4X antialiasing , 8X antisotropic. frames per second range from 35 to 75.

are you sure it was that fast? i really doubt it

http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/20041004/vga_charts-08.html

the 5200 isn't exactly high end, its a bit below average, because i was looking into buying one, expecially with the new geforce series and pci express coming out

i don't see how u can get those kinds of results/fps with the settings u say u put, my friend has the same videocard and with most settings off or on low, its still laggy as hell

also for $150 i would recommend....
ATI 9600 ALL IN WONDER
ATI 9600 XT 128MB
ATI 9600 256
Nvidia Geforce 6200 128/256
Nvidia Geforce 5700 128/256
and maybe the
Nvidia Geforce 5900

most of these cards are pretty good, the reason the price is the same for all these cards, is because of the features that they come with, i wouldn't really go to any retail stores to buy these tho, they always overcharge, try buying online, or find a computer fair

Yeah my friend tried Half Life 2 with his gforce 5200 and he had to have the graphics on lowest and it still lagged a lot. I know the All-in-Wonder is designed to do things with your tv and other stuff. So how well does it run with games? Is it powerful enough to run the newer games fine?

Mine doesn'y lag at all and runs great, why would I lie about my framerate/settings?

There test's are performed on a 128mb model of the 5200, the extra 128mb of ram on mine help alot.


I rarely see 75fps but I've done it, normally it around 35-38 solid, in pitch black places it jumps to around 45-55 and sometimes well into the 70's. I could never run constant 70's unless I was on prolly low or medium quality.

Do you know what kinda of setup your friend has?. (ram, processor speed, mobo) doom 3 is pretty evenly processor and video card dependant.


Also I forgot to add one thing, My card is not stock, It's overclocked. Core speed is now 400mhz, memory clock speed is now 485mhz, so it's alot faster then a stock 5200. Stock is about 266, 333.


Mastercheif, what kind of CPU do you have. When you say intel I hope you don't mean celeron.

Unfortunatly i have a pos celeron. But since you have overclocked equipment then that explains you being able to run games that well. I do plan on getting a new cpu but I need to get a new motherboard so i actually have a agp port. But if i am able to get a pentium 4 with the motherboard then i wil most likely overclock this 2.66 celeron just to see what i can get out of it. I plan on trashing the motherboard i have now because it doesnt have crap on it. Also i may be able to overclock because my heat sink for the cpu is FREAKING HUGE. It takes up HALF of the surface on my motherboard. Even if i had an agp port I would not be able to fit the card.

nah I wouldn't mess with a celeron, get a asus a7n8x-x (what I have) or a a7n8x deluxe motherboard (400mhzFSB) and a good 3200+ AMD athlon, You won't be sorry. That with a 1024mb of DDR will be a monster.

Mine doesn'y lag at all and runs great, why would I lie about my framerate/settings?

There test's are performed on a 128mb model of the 5200, the extra 128mb of ram on mine help alot.


I rarely see 75fps but I've done it, normally it around 35-38 solid, in pitch black places it jumps to around 45-55 and sometimes well into the 70's. I could never run constant 70's unless I was on prolly low or medium quality.

Do you know what kinda of setup your friend has?. (ram, processor speed, mobo) doom 3 is pretty evenly processor and video card dependant.


Also I forgot to add one thing, My card is not stock, It's overclocked. Core speed is now 400mhz, memory clock speed is now 485mhz, so it's alot faster then a stock 5200. Stock is about 266, 333.


Mastercheif, what kind of CPU do you have. When you say intel I hope you don't mean celeron.


no wonder u have that huge fan next to ur video card

my friend has a 2.4ghz p4
512mb ddr
geforce 5200 256mb (not overclocked)
and he barely manages to get 20+ on d3 on normal settings

me on the other hand, my pc sucks, im looking into buying a new one, and i have bad experience with overclocking

first time, burned cpu after +100mhz
second time, burned geforce 1, i forgot the settings but i found out something on the cooling fan melted lol

and also overclocking (if done wrong) can effect the way your cpu/graphics card works later, like if u want to "un" overclock it, it'l be different, well.. it happened to me

Yeah my stock card barely managed 20fps (about 15-17 solid) stock, but then I overclocked it and added that fan.

My computer isn't all that good either. AMD Athlon XP 2200+ (1.8ghz), ASUS A7N8X-X motherboard (400mhz FSB) 768mb of pc3200 DDR (400mhz). I plan on upgrading my processor to a Athlon 3200+ someday, But for now this is good enough for the games I play.

wow, this thread is filled with alot of misinformation. I have an exteremly hard time beliving that you 5200 can get that. what res are you running the game at, and what are your quality settings in doom3? I want a screen shot to prove you are getting that kind of frame rates with those settings. also, doom3 is capped at 60......

please dont say the geforce fx wa sa good series, it was such sh*t. you took a huge step down in going from teh 5200 to the 9600. if it doesnt look as good as the 5200, you were doing something wrong. The 9600 all in wonder isnt a bad card, but a 9600 pro would be a better card. The 9600 pro has a 100 mhz clcok higher on the core and 75mhz more on the ram. Yes, the 9600 will play halflife 2 decently. HL2 is more forgiving than doom3 is. Also, i feel sorry for you if you think your 5200 with 256 megs of ram is actually helping that card. teh only time that much ram is helpful is at very high res and with high AA and AF settings. The 5200 would choke at high res.

^high quality, 1024x768.. i just loaded the game and took the shot.. beleive what you want man.. why would I lie about my graphics card? I already know its a low end POS but it's good enough for what I use it for. I plan on gettin a 6600GT sometime soon but I'm gonna hold off because this card works fine.

http://img151.exs.cx/img151/9245/doom30ik.jpg

and no, that 51fps is NOT photoshopped.

ive seen it run that fast at skater in NY's house

hmm, 1024*768 you say. odd as that screen shot is 800 X 600. i SERIOUSLY doubt it runs that good at that res. a radeon 9800 XT can barely do that, which is much more powerful then that card would ever be. what is the memory bus of your card, 64 bit or 128 bit or 256 bit.

What kind of processor are you running as well? also, how about proff of that OC? Also, here is a link to one of the most trusted review sites out there, and they got substainually different results with a 5200. http://www.hardocp.com/image.html?image=MTA5MDc4NzE0M1RPNjJBTU9FV1hfNl80X 2wuZ2lm

Sorry, but i still dont believe you, specially since you didnt even post a 1024X768 pic. I'll believe you when you can prove that perforamnce is close to a 9800 pro or xt. An easy way to do that is download 3dmark03, run it, and then post it on ORB and link it here. That will also provide all of your system specs. So in short, I still dont believe your statements, give me better proof.

I mostly got the 9600 all in wonder because it was on sale. I really didnt mean to get that one though but i wasnt lookin close enough. hmm, Dont know how I missed that. I was looking for the regular 9600. Didnt mean to but since i got this one with 50 bucks off im not complainin. But the circuit city i went to really didnt have a huge selection. I would have gotten the 9800 but im short on $$$. My friend can run half life 2 a bit better now since he upgraded his drivers. When he first tried half life he had to have it on lowest settings and it lagged a lot. but he can now up the graphics some and have less lag. But he definitly cant run that or doom 3 on highest. Thats for sure. He has a amd 3200 with 512 mb of ram. His card has 256mb on a gforce 5200. And another reason i chose ati is because most of the people that i have asked said they are more stable. maybe thats why mine doesnt have a fan.

hmm, 1024*768 you say. odd as that screen shot is 800 X 600. ever heard of resizing a pic? apparently not, I resize ALL my pics to 800x600, just look in my previous posts.

Sorry, but i still dont believe you, specially since you didnt even post a 1024X768 pic. I'll believe you when you can prove that perforamnce is close to a 9800 pro or xt. An easy way to do that is download 3dmark03, run it, and then post it on ORB and link it here. That will also provide all of your system specs. So in short, I still dont believe your statements, give me better proof. My computer isn't all that good either. AMD Athlon XP 2200+ (1.8ghz), ASUS A7N8X-X motherboard (400mhz FSB) 768mb of pc3200 DDR (400mhz). I plan on upgrading my processor to a Athlon 3200+ someday, But for now this is good enough for the games I play. reading helps..


seriously you want a unresized pic ill get it. I dont have to prove a damn thing to you but I will, i seriously dont understand why you don't beleive me..

I mostly got the 9600 all in wonder because it was on sale. I really didnt mean to get that one though but i wasnt lookin close enough. hmm, Dont know how I missed that. I was looking for the regular 9600. Didnt mean to but since i got this one with 50 bucks off im not complainin. But the circuit city i went to really didnt have a huge selection. I would have gotten the 9800 but im short on $$$. My friend can run half life 2 a bit better now since he upgraded his drivers. When he first tried half life he had to have it on lowest settings and it lagged a lot. but he can now up the graphics some and have less lag. But he definitly cant run that or doom 3 on highest. Thats for sure. He has a amd 3200 with 512 mb of ram. His card has 256mb on a gforce 5200. And another reason i chose ati is because most of the people that i have asked said they are more stable. maybe thats why mine doesnt have a fan.I don't understand why your friend has so much trouble running on high setting? mine ran BETTER on high then it did on medium.

anyways here's what psman asked for:

heres it on the highest setting with 8X antialising (i USUALLY use 4x) but wanted to see how it goes.(ill post it on 4x too if you want)
http://img134.exs.cx/img134/7640/doom322fs.jpg

settings screen for you:

http://img154.exs.cx/img154/530/settings1iu.jpg

proof of overclock:

http://img154.exs.cx/img154/7897/overclock0hy.jpg

so, what else do you want.

You act like I'm saying this card is the best ever, I get prodf, you call it a lie. I already proved myself enough and Dirtyone can account for it as he was near me for vacation and he came to my house. Beleive what you want. I'm done with this thread.

Hmm. your using overclocked equipment then i see y. but also i never seen him trying to run those things though. he only tells me. well if hes lyin...

I said my card was overclocked along time ago.

Yeah you did but now I see by how much your overclocking it. Maybe that dumass just doesnt know how to get the most out of his equipment. I know if you can do it he can.

Im not a dumbass, far from it. I do knwo how to get the best out of my equipment. I just found it hard to believe that a low level 5200 fx could perform at the same level as a 5950 ultra. I also did ask for one more thing, i did ask for a 3dmark03 ORB link which will settle all doubt if it can get a score that resembles it performance. I asked before and you posted a screen shot with teh frame rates no where close to what you claimed (and you still havent). I would still like to see an ORB link though. Congrats on getting a diamond in the rough 5200fx that can actually eb turned into a somewhaqt useful card, unlike most of them. I still find it strange that it is able to perform that well.

Im not a dumbass, far from it. I do knwo how to get the best out of my equipment. I just found it hard to believe that a low level 5200 fx could perform at the same level as a 5950 ultra. I also did ask for one more thing, i did ask for a 3dmark03 ORB link which will settle all doubt if it can get a score that resembles it performance. I asked before and you posted a screen shot with teh frame rates no where close to what you claimed (and you still havent). I would still like to see an ORB link though. Congrats on getting a diamond in the rough 5200fx that can actually eb turned into a somewhaqt useful card, unlike most of them. I still find it strange that it is able to perform that well.
Sorry if you took offense. but i was calling my friend a dumass. He knows his stuff about computers because he is in a A+ computer repair class with me. We just dont get into cards a whole lot now. But if it is that easy to get that much out of a 5200 I dont know why he wont do it.

Ah, i took that as you were calling me that. 5200's usually dont OC very well, and are stuck performing very poorly. I would still liek him to awnser my questions though. I am still skeptical about a 5200 running doom3 that well. It is definatly not ordinary. And just because someone is A+ certified, that doesnt mean they knwo that much. most people who say they are A+ certified are idiots. not all, just most.

One comment here, there will be a huge difference between the frame rate of a static scene such as the one in the picture and the rates of a dynamic one. Nothing will choke your GPU faster than having a bunch of monsters running around some explosions and such. It's there that fast videocards separate from the slow ones, and you know how anoying is to have a choppy action scene.

Oh and just a side note, in case you guys haven't heard yet gigabyte will release soon a dual GPU card based on nvidia sli tech.

http://www.tomshardware.com/hardnews/20041216_115811.html

Ya, thats why I was asking for a 3dmark03 score as that will be mainly motion will will choke that GPU. Its a program he should ahve as its a great card to test system stability with an oced graphics card.

edit: I want to see it to see if his 03 score matches the performance that he claims to ahve and his score will tell that.

Oh and just a side note, in case you guys haven't heard yet gigabyte will release soon a dual GPU card based on nvidia sli tech.

http://www.tomshardware.com/hardnews/20041216_115811.html

That card's a beast. :) Currently I'm running a P3 1.2ghz and a nVidia Geforce4 Ti 4600. I've been really happy with my setup. I've overclocked the card to 315mhz core and 665mhz RAM (don't have a better cooling solution right now to overclock it further). Just waiting on the video card prices to come down some before I construct a new computer.

Good information on video cards though - I'm keeping my eye out for what to purchase late 2005.

I downloaded 3DMark03, clicked on the icon is said "couldn't load D3D!". I read the readme it said I needed DX. 9.0. I have it. So.. I install directX again like it said. I restart like it says and an error now comes up "Error! loader couldn't initialize loader" :wtf:
The main screen wouldn't load or anything. Somehow I have got it all to work.

My guess is this all has to do with the 3Dmark or directX, I'm more then happy to give you a 3Dmark score as soon as it works and not fucks my computer up. :)

There's a 3dmark05. Try that.

3dmark05 isn't free.. Ever since I downloaded 3dmark my computer runs like shit. I think I might have a virus cause I still get the error, once I get this worked out and 3dmark working i'll post my results.

go here:

http://www.futuremark.com/download/

you can download both 05 and 03 there. 05 is so purrty. its free there.

i cant wait to see ATI's card. there is rumor they will ahve a dual core card to counter SLI. They are also supposed to have something to rival SLI.

I still get the "Error D3D!" when I reinstalled 3dmark03 and still have the loader thing (no idea what the fuck this is) when I start windows. I've done numorous virus scans and they've returned nothing. Theres no unidentified running processes running either. I'm thinking of just burning everything to a cd-rw and reformatting.