Upgrade to Radeon 9250 or Geforce FX 5200 or 5500?

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crazy_comp_dude

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Hello I have an Intel 845GLVA motherboard with 2.4GHz 512 Ram and a Diamond Stealth S80 Radeon 9200se 128mb video card. I can run half life 2 on Medium texture with soft shadows and high Modles detail (No AA)and I have enjoyed every minute of it. I was Wondering if i should upgrade to a GeForce FX 5200 128mb or FX 5500 128mb or a Radeon 9250 128mb? Note: I only have PCI slots sorry, and also my parents hate me spending money :mad:
 
Thanks For That but I live in Canada and Newegg does not ship here. So If you could find a place that ships to canada than that would be awsome. But the only place I really trust is TigerDirect.ca and it does not have the FX5700LE it has those three oh and the 9250 has 256MB not 128MB sorry for that.
 
Fx5200 Pci

Hi,

I've just bought a geforce fx 5200 PCI card, but i went for the 256MB version. For a PCI card, the graphics it produces are amazing - I use it to play high detailed, fast games like Unreal Tournament 2004. The best place to look for PCI cards is probably eBay, I got mine brand new from eBay.co.uk cheaper than any other internet shop. Basically waht i'm trying to say is that i recommend the fx5200 and if you can afford it, the 256MB version. How much were you looking to spend?

Andy
 
I am Planning on paying around $200 (Canadian dollars) And the FX5200 and 5500 have 128mb it is the 9250 that has the 256MB. I'll try Ebay, but I guess it is the customer that you have to worry about.
 
I would go for the FX5700LE or a Radeon 9600. The 5200 and 9200 series cards are underpowered and the 5500 is just a warmed over version of the 5200. And get a 256mb card if you can. You need all the memory you can get with newer games like HL2 and Doom 3. You'll be amazed by HL2 when you can turn up all the visual details and resolution. Deffinately check Ebay. How about this one
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=40161&item=5166472435&rd=1
 
I'm Sorry, but none of these sites ship to canada, so this is no help. But out of these three cards, FX5500 128 or FX5200 128 or Radeon 9250 256mb which one would you pick. ONLY THESE THREE!!!! WITH THIS SET UP! NOTHING ELSE! WHICH WOULD YOU PICK!!! Thank You. puke:
 
I would buy the FX 5500 card if I were you becuase I think nvidia makes much better card. :bounce:
 
Thanks Finally somone with a straight answer. :D That is what I've always been looking for in the whole start of this thread good job :bounce:
 
video

Sorry, I didn't know you wanted only one of those three. Out of the three, get the 5500, it's the best.
 
I've got a question about these three cards. Just for my own knowledge, wouldn't a 256 mb card be better than a 128, even though you like nVidia? Just wondering.
 
i agree with olefarte, go with the 256mb card. PCI technology isn't as good as agp or pci express by a long way, Therefore get a 256 rather than a 128 or you'll find that the 128 soon won't be able to handle new games that come out. A 256mb card will last longer before becoming outdated
 
andygibbs said:
i agree with olefarte, go with the 256mb card. PCI technology isn't as good as agp or pci express by a long way, Therefore get a 256 rather than a 128 or you'll find that the 128 soon won't be able to handle new games that come out. A 256mb card will last longer before becoming outdated
My point exactly. And now that I've read all of this thread, I see Vegasgmc has already mentioned this also.
 
I definitely agree with getting a 256mb card. As you can only get a PCI card, instead of an AGP or PCI-E, then the added memory will greatly help with gaming. On my old PC, I went from a GF4 MX440 128mb card to an GF FX5500 256mb card and saw a considerable increase in performance.
 
So are you saying I should go for the 9250 with the 256MB of memory? becuase I do have a 9200se 128MB right now and I can have Half-Life 2 with high Modles and Medium details, a little choppiness in a few places but still... So that is how she works out then out of these three cards I should get the 9250 with 256MB?
 
crazy_comp_dude said:
Hello I have an Intel 845GLVA motherboard with 2.4GHz 512 Ram and a Diamond Stealth S80 Radeon 9200se 128mb video card. I can run half life 2 on Medium texture with soft shadows and high Modles detail (No AA)and I have enjoyed every minute of it. I was Wondering if i should upgrade to a GeForce FX 5200 128mb or FX 5500 128mb or a Radeon 9250 128mb? Note: I only have PCI slots sorry, and also my parents hate me spending money :mad:
You are better to look for a n vidia 5700 card since the core speed is much better than cards mentioned,also you look for a asus v9570 card same chip set with excellent speeds

olefarte said:
I've got a question about these three cards. Just for my own knowledge, wouldn't a 256 mb card be better than a 128, even though you like nVidia? Just wondering.
a 256 card is not better than a 128 if you are looking at cards,most high end 128 cards have much faster core speed and memory.If you want your game to boot faster you buy a 256mb card but you lack the actual speed of the card when you play your games.every one can wait a few seconds for their game to boot but i rather have the speed in the game.
 
BAH!!!! Im so confused so go with the GeForce FX5500 with 128mb or the 9250 with 256mb? Both PCI! I can run hal-life 2 on my 9200se right now if i upgrade to these two would i still be able to play?

Wait does this matter? The Geforce FX5500 has a RAMDAC of Dual 350MHz while the 9250 has a RAMDAC of dual 400Mhz what does that mean is the 9250 faster then?
 
graphics

When the RAMDAC speed is given as a parameter of a graphics card, this is the maximum speed which the RAMDAC may achieve. This parameter is not a measure of the card's performance - it simlpy reflects the maximum monitor refresh rate which may be achieved by the card. Actually the RAMDAC works near to its speed limit only in very high resolution modes. The table below contains the RAMDAC frequencies at different resolutions and refresh rates.
from http://grafi.ii.pw.edu.pl/gbm/matrox/ramdac.html
So the ramdac speed isn't as important as core or memory speeds. a 9200se is 200mhz core and 400mhz memory. A 9250 256mb is 240mhz core, 400mhz memory. A 5500 is 270mhz core, 400mhz memory. These may vary some between manufacturers though. Another thing to check it the memory interface. Is it 64bit or 128bit. 128 bit is much better.

The memory interface is just the amount of data that the card can move at a time, 64bits, 128bits, 256bits, etc. The 5500 can come in 64 or 128 as seen in my two links.
http://www.geeks.com/details.asp?invtid=FX5500-128MTV
http://www.gen-x-pc.com/vg_ALFX5500.htm
They're both agp (not pci), but that's just to show that they can be the same chipset (5500), but have different performance levels. Typically if a card doesn't specify which it is(64 or 128), then it is probably 64 and they are hoping you don't notice. Some websites don't list whether a card is 64 or 128 bit though, so look around and find what the cards you're looking at are.
 
graphics

Ok, they both are 128bit, that's good. They both have the same memory speeds. The 9250 has 240mhz core and the 5500 has a 270mhz core, but the 9250 has 256mb of memory and the 5500 has 128mb.

9250 240mhz core 256mb memory
5500 270mhz core 128mb memory

The 5500 will be a little faster because of its faster core speed. The 9250 will be faster loading because of more memory. For most games 128 is enough.

I think the powercolor 9250 256mb is 64 bit

GPU/VPU RADEON 9250

Maximum Resolution 2048 x 1536 @ 85Hz

Video Memory 256MB

Memory Type DDR SDRAM

Memory Bandwidth *64bit*

Interface Type PCI

Connector(s) DVI
TV/S-Video
VGA

The 5500 doesn't say which it is.
 
gpu

I did some more checking, and I don't know if the 9250 is 128 or 64 bit. Tigerdirect.ca says 64 bit, but on powercolor's site it says 128 bit.
http://www.tul.com.tw/global/productVM.aspx?folderid=1&cat2=143
I couldn't find anything about the 5500 memory interface except that it has 6.4gb/sec bandwidth which should mean that it's 128 bit.(64bit should be around 3.2) Then I saw that the 5200 and 5500 are close to equal. Now I'm confused.

Or you could get this. It's better than 9250, 5500, and 5200. Shipping says worldwide. $109us
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5163122581&category=40161
 
If you're still confused...there's always the Canadian quarter just waiting
to be flipped... :giddy:

peace.. :cool:
 
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