Suggest a graphics card

[abhi007]

Hi,

Can anyone suggest me a graphics card, here are my pc specs.

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AMD Athlon 64 (2.7 Ghz LE-1640)
2 GB DDR2 RAM
Motherboard: ECS
Model: Iris 8
Current GPU is onboard nVidia GeForce 6150SE nForce 430
Windows XP SP3 and Windows 7 32-Bit Dual Boot
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Its a HP PC, i have not built it myself.
Is GeForce 8400 good enough for this PC? my budget is $70, and it is selling for $40.

im not into serious gaming, i only sometimes play games. mostly NFS, GTA, COD types. i mostly use pc for programming. im looking to increase the performance of PC, would upgrading to 4GB Ram a better idea along with GPU. Windows XP compatibility of card is must since it is my main OS.


Thanks,
abhi

 

[Lokalaskurar]

A very suiting card for your mainstream gaming habits, as well as for your budget, is the ATi/AMD HD4550. It is very mainstream, but still packs a neat bang-per-buck ratio. Possibly even at a higher quality than the Ge. 8400. From looking at some pictures on Google, it seems like your MB supports PCIe x16, so you should be golden with a mainstream xx50-model from ATi/AMD.

Still, the 8400 is not a bad card, and getting it would definitely put some beauty into gaming.

Upgrading to 4GbB is a VERY BAD idea - both your XP OS and your Win7 OS is 32-bit based = you cannot run (utilize) more than 3GbB at any given moment. Save your money, do not upgrade to 4GbB. Perhaps 3, that would be neat - but 4 will not work due to limitations within the 32-bit architecture. Period.

Also:
Unless I'm mistaken, the nForce 430 is an integrated GPU? Well, in that case: upgrading to a separate graphics card will definitely increase your game graphics and performance. The upgrade, even to the Ge. 8400, will take a huge load of work of the CPU and the RAM = better gaming graphics and performance.

XP is compatible with every graphics card that supports 800x600 resolution (aka. SVGA) - and that's been around since 1995, so don't you worry about XP incompability

 

[abhi007]

Thanks for replying,

yes. my MB supports PCIe x16 this is the MB i have

the forum is not allowing me to post link here is the link without http
h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c01237538&tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&product=3801536

i was looking for Geforce since i have not used ATI before and the MB is based on nVidia chip so putting a ATI card may cause some compatibility problems. here ATI Radeon HD4350 1GB is selling for $55, and Geforce 8400 512 MB for $45

yes, MB is based on nForce 430 chipset, currently i dont have any GPU, using the onboard one.

forgot to ask, does the GPU RAM 512 vs 1GB. makes any major difference when it comes to performance?

 

[hellokitty[hk]]

8400 1GB is not worth extra money...if they are the same price 1GB would be better, otherwise the difference is fairly negliable.

 

[abhi007]

i found another value card, GeForce 210 but its performance seems to be similar as 8400, but it has HDMI and selling for $20 extra.

any comments on GeForce 210 vs GeForce 8400?

 

[reph05]

Don't worry. ATI GPU can work with nforce chipset.