Hey guys I play a lot of games on and off when I get the chance and it seems that lowering the in-game video settings isn't going to cut it anymore.
when i run dxdiag it says: NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 - 128MB
Dell Dimension 8300, Pentium 4 3.20 GHz, 1022MB on XP Home Edition
To be honest i probably shouldn't be touching or opening up my computer with my limited knowledge, but i was hoping i could get some help here.
What I want is really just to be able to play all of the new and upcoming games. It doesn't have to be the best quality or anything really. This is just one of my systems I hook up to the LAN when I have friends over and i just need it to be functional. So really I need something that is compatible with most games, with my system, and relatively easy to install.
With this 5200 I've gotten Company of Heroes, HL2, Lego Star Wars II the original trilogy, dreamfall:the longest journey, the new sam & max episodes, swat 4, civilization iv, dawn of war: dark crusade, COD2, the settlers ii: 10th anniversary edition all working. But the more demanding ones like CoH and Dreamfall TLJ, i've had to lower the in-game settings to get it running smoothly, and I couldn't get a bunch of other games working like most of the tom clancy games that need pixel shader 3.0 support (don't know what this is), the swat 4 exp pack, and also I tried Europa Universalis III today and that won't really run at a playable rate (they specifically tell GeForce 5000 users that they need to upgrade to at least the 6000 series to be able to play). In the future i plan to get games like LOTR battle for middle earth, tom clancy's chaos theory, rainbow six vegas, double agent, etc., galactic civilizations ii: dark avatar... basically any new strategy games, or any FPS games with co-op.
So could someone recommend me a few cards? I found this forum through this thread where someone with a dimension 8300 and MX 420 card was recommended these only like a month ago:
The first link doesn't work though. And another newbie question - i've been looking around... how come so many different companies manufacture geforce cards? Are they all making stuff for nvidia or are they imitations? I would probably pay at most $100-150 but cheaper is better hehe. Thanks for the input guys. It's very much appreciated... sorry it's such a long post.
when i run dxdiag it says: NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 - 128MB
Dell Dimension 8300, Pentium 4 3.20 GHz, 1022MB on XP Home Edition
To be honest i probably shouldn't be touching or opening up my computer with my limited knowledge, but i was hoping i could get some help here.
What I want is really just to be able to play all of the new and upcoming games. It doesn't have to be the best quality or anything really. This is just one of my systems I hook up to the LAN when I have friends over and i just need it to be functional. So really I need something that is compatible with most games, with my system, and relatively easy to install.
With this 5200 I've gotten Company of Heroes, HL2, Lego Star Wars II the original trilogy, dreamfall:the longest journey, the new sam & max episodes, swat 4, civilization iv, dawn of war: dark crusade, COD2, the settlers ii: 10th anniversary edition all working. But the more demanding ones like CoH and Dreamfall TLJ, i've had to lower the in-game settings to get it running smoothly, and I couldn't get a bunch of other games working like most of the tom clancy games that need pixel shader 3.0 support (don't know what this is), the swat 4 exp pack, and also I tried Europa Universalis III today and that won't really run at a playable rate (they specifically tell GeForce 5000 users that they need to upgrade to at least the 6000 series to be able to play). In the future i plan to get games like LOTR battle for middle earth, tom clancy's chaos theory, rainbow six vegas, double agent, etc., galactic civilizations ii: dark avatar... basically any new strategy games, or any FPS games with co-op.
So could someone recommend me a few cards? I found this forum through this thread where someone with a dimension 8300 and MX 420 card was recommended these only like a month ago:
vnf4ultra said:For a value card this 7300gt should be a nice fit(it has a double keyed agp connector so it has a high likelyhood of working with your computer).
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814145139
This card should also work(7600gs).
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814122011
The first link doesn't work though. And another newbie question - i've been looking around... how come so many different companies manufacture geforce cards? Are they all making stuff for nvidia or are they imitations? I would probably pay at most $100-150 but cheaper is better hehe. Thanks for the input guys. It's very much appreciated... sorry it's such a long post.