Upgrading Graphics Card

[newtopc]

Ello all :wave:
Only me was just thinking about Upgrading Graphics Card, Whats the diff in APG and PCI anyone help me on this please ? This is what i have at mo if it helps

NVIDA GeForce FX 5500 256mb,
ASUSTex Computer INC P4S800
1024 of ram
Maxtor 160gb hard drive
Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU 2.40GHz current speed at 3200MHz

 

[Spike]

the AGP bus has a higher bandwidth than the PCI bus, and so allows more data to be transferred per second, resulting in better performance and better graphics.

If I recall correctly, the AGP bus also, unlike the PCI bus, has a direct line to the memory for texture mapping, thus avoiding the CPU and lowering resource usage. If the wiki is correct though, I may be wrong about this, or perhaps it's missing/I've missed it in the article. Not that it matters The main point is that AGP is better and faster.

Now, PCI-E is faster again than AGP, but it doesn't appear that you have a mainboard that supports it.

From wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerated_Graphics_Port (easier than looking it up in my textbooks of old.... lol)

AGP 1x, using a 32-bit channel operating at 66 MHz resulting in a maximum data rate of 266 megabytes per second (MB/s), doubled from the 133 MB/s transfer rate of PCI bus 33 MHz / 32-bit; 3.3 V signaling.
AGP 2x, using a 32-bit channel operating at 66 MHz double pumped to an effective 133 MHz resulting in a maximum data rate of 533 MB/s; signaling voltages the same as AGP 1x;
AGP 4x, using a 32-bit channel operating at 66 MHz quad pumped to an effective 266 MHz resulting in a maximum data rate of 1066 MB/s (1 GB/s); 1.5 V signaling;
AGP 8x, using a 32-bit channel operating at 66 MHz, strobing eight times per clock, delivering an effective 533 MHz resulting in a maximum data rate of 2133 MB/s (2 GB/s); 0.8 V signaling.

Again, from wiki,

As computers became increasingly graphically-oriented, the graphics card became far more important than other PCI devices, and, thus, the AGP slot was developed. AGP slots are superior to PCI for graphics cards because they provide a dedicated pathway between the slot and the processor, allowing for faster communication between the two. In addition, AGP uses sideband addressing, meaning that addressing for packets is carried outside of the packet, meaning that the entire packet does not need to be read to get addressing information. In addition, to load a texture, a PCI graphics card must copy it from the system's RAM into the card's framebuffer. An AGP card is capable of reading textures directly from system RAM using the Graphics Address Remapping Table (GART). GART reapportions main memory for texture storage, allowing the graphics card to access them directly.

And finally, what wiki has to say aboput the speed of the PCI bus...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI_bus#Conventional_PCI_bus_specifications

Conventional, 133MB/sec peak transfer rate
PCI 2.2, 533 MB/s peak transfer rate


Essentiall, what's important is that AGP is far superior for graphics than PCI, unless you are considering PCI-Express.
BTW... Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU 2.40GHz current speed at 3200MHz - that's an impressive overclock. Did you do it yourself?

 

[newtopc]

Ello Spike,

Thanks for the info it help a lot, as to you asking

BTW... Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU 2.40GHz current speed at 3200MHz - that's an impressive overclock. Did you do it yourself?

No i didnt it was done at the shop i got pc from, would like to know how to overclook have so many mates that would like there pc's runnig a bit faster,

 

[MetalX]

You won't get a much faster overclock than that if you tried. I have a P4 2.26 GHZ with a NORTHWOOD core (a good core for overclocking) and mine won't go any higher that 2.72 GHZ. As for Graphics Card, from what I see on you're motherboard, you have an AGP slot. I would go with a 6600GT if you are going to do some minor to moderate gaming, 6800GS for moderate to heavy gaming, and 7800GS for extreme gaming.