Looking for a new video card for my birthday

My birthday is coming up next month and i love playing Guild wars on my downstairs PC the only problem is i have limited usage of that computer so i decided id buy a new video card for my upstairs pc.

I like to play MMOs seriously so im not a frugal gamer.

I have a budget of about 50-100 dollars.









And im not sure of what my power level is but theres a switch underneath where you plug in the tower which is switched to 115 so im guessing 115watts?


Im also from the united states.


I was thinkin of getting this card
http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=8154257
Would it be compatible?

I checked my device manager for the current video card that i have in and it says its in a PCI bus, i was guessing that this is important for you all to know.

Ah Im hesitant to take the case off because im afraid of damaging anything but ill get on that and post after i do, My computer has these weird like switches you pullback to pull the case off

Ok well i googled the model of the computer i have (Compaq 5000 series) and got the basic stats for it and found out that it comes with an an APG slot
(Video Output Interface: AGP)
but the power level i still don't know and theres no sticker on my computer other than the one that was one the side which tells what it came with

So do i want something like this?http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=4087780
It says 300watts but i don't know the power i have

Ok i opened up my PC, which for me was sliding off a side panel, and found that i have three of the white slots and a brown slot, so i have 3 PCI slots and an APG slot if im correct
Also inside of my PC was the power rating....It said "Max output 250W"

The card you posted =Host Interface AGP 8x

you motherboard max supported AGP 4x

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814136022

notice how it says 4x/8x

Oh i thought it ment 4x or 8x
The one you posted looks good but it doesn't say about how much power it requires

All the newer video cards require at least 450 watt power supply.

At this point I'm going to say stick with the downstairs PC. Your budget against your need for a new video card capable of handling a MMORG and a new quality power source don't add up.

But if you want to save $138.00 then you may like what you get

Video Card $75.00
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131070

Power Supply $63.00
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817104954

Or for $184.00 you'll probably like what you get

Video Card $121.00
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102718

Power Supply $63.00
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817104954

Yeah ill prolly save

For now what card do you recomend that i can use to run it at its minimum at a semi-lag free state

I'd recommend this video card paired with this PSU. They're both good quality products and with them you will be able to run all the MMOs you play quite easily with most\all of the effects turned up to maximum.

You have an old computer. Back in the day it was a pretty good computer but now all it's really any good for is web browsing. Even with a very expensive (very fast) video card your computer may not be strong enough to play recent games at medium screen resolutions and medium quality settings with greater than 30 frames per second which can quickly become boring/old if you already own an XBox or a PS2.

There are much better video cards then have been presented in this thread. The problems are three fold.

1) You don't have the budget for an expensive card and even if you did your computer may not (probably will not) be fast enough to power the card to it's full potential.

2) Under powered video cards don't produce frame rates like they would when powered by a newer computer. Low frame rates produce video lag.

3) Any video card you buy for your current computer will not work in any new computer you build/buy in the future because the AGP connector your new video card must have to work with your old computer isn't compatible with the PCI-E slot a new computer will have.

Thanks for the help

I guess Ill just have to save up cash and get a new computer

Yeah, your PC is ancient. Your CPU was replaced by Athlon 64 in 2004, and Athlon 64s have now been replaced by Phenom. I believe Athlon XPs went out of production in... 2005?

Now ive been out lookin at other cards and ive found one that i can run with my Power supply but i don't know if its compatible with my AGP slot which is 4X And the card says 4x 8X
Take a look: http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3001066
I don't mind being able to play at the lowest qualities just as long as i can play it better than i can now

Yeah that'd do, but I'd recommend getting a 6200 instead. Much better performance and it'd still work with your current PSU.

Ill buy and use that for now but overall im going to save for this
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16883227028
Tell me what you think

That item's deactivated but I don't reckon it's more than $500. For that much, you could customize this system at iBuyPower and just add in an 8600GT. You could also save a few bucks on the keyboard and mouse if you already have them. All in all, it'd be a much better system than the one you posted about.

Ive been lookin at other cards to see whats out there
And i found these cards
http://www.arsenalpc.com/details.asp?ItemID=2254&Res=4

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3001066

Im pretty sure the first will work for my computer but i do not know if i have the Pc! compatible slot for the second card

If you can, stay away from the FX line of cards. They were hot and noisy. A much better card would a ATI Radeon 9600Pro.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102410

Cinder whats the required power supply for that card?
Sadly i only have a 250watt supply rightnow.

I just looked through some of the reveiws and found out it requires atleast a 350watt power supply

Any other suggestions?
The system req for the game is

Required System Specs:
Windows XP/2000/ME/98
800 MHz Pentium III or equivalent
256 MB RAM
ATI Radeon 8500 or GeForce 3 or 4 MX with 32MB of video memory
500 MB hard drive space
Internet connection
DirectX 8.0

Recommended System Specs:
Windows XP/2000/ME/98
Pentium III 1GHz or equivalent
512 MB RAM
ATI Radeon 9000 or GeForce 4 Ti Series with 64MB of video memory
500 MB free hard drive space
Internet connection

For anyone still looking at this thread I went with an Geforce FX 5500.
Its on order from a site and should be here in about 3-4 days.
One thing im concerned about though is the AGP slot i have.
It seems kind of small...Do they make them in diffrent sizes?

They're sized differently for different voltages. Most AGP cards today are also keyed so they can fit in different types of slots.