How do i know what type of card i have?

NeVeR · 28-05-2006 12:23PM #1

I'm looking to get a new graphics card but i've no idea what kind of Card i have at the moment.... Can i add any type of card?

I think it's a geforce 5200.

the new card i want will be for gaming.. So i'm looking for something powerful.. can anyone recommend a good one. Looking to spend about €300- €400 in total for the card and the RAM.

Also while i'm here i need RAM aswell and again i've no idea what ram i have now. I know it's 512 but no idea what kind of ram it is. I want to upgrade to about 2 gig.

If i do upgrade to 2 gig.. is there anything else i would need to upgrade?

Looking to spend about €300- €400 in total for the card and the RAM.

Jammer · 28-05-2006 12:28PM

What kind of CPU / Motherboard do you have?

To see what card you have;

Right click on desktop
Select Properties
Hit the settings tab

It will say something like "Plug and Play monitor on Nvidia Geforce XXXXX"

NeVeR · 28-05-2006 12:34PM

Dont know what motherboard i have... If you mean the processor it's a P4 3.06Gz.. if not how do i check what motherboard i have?

Yea it's a Nvidia Geforce FX5200

conzy · 28-05-2006 01:15PM

Get CPUZ aned run it to see what RAM and mainbaord you have.......

The FX5200 is AGP only, so you have an agp mainboard.......

This limits your choice of GFX to very high end or very crap....

There isnt a lot of midrange AGP cards around now.........

A 3ghz P4 isnt going to cut the mustard in new games, especially if its an older one using DDR266 ram..........

Post the specs that you get with CPUz and well see what the best choice is........

NeVeR · 28-05-2006 01:27PM

here

http://www.davidstokes.com/cpuzss.htm

8T8 · 28-05-2006 02:00PM

From the information you provided your motherboard has an AGP slot which means your choices are a tad limited as the GPU manufacturers don't really cater that much to AGP all that more but there are some that are still pretty good choices to be found.

The very best AGP card you can acquire for under €400 is the Gainward BLISS GeForce 7800 GS SILENT 512MB at roughly £258/€375. The GPU it uses despite the title (a 7800GT) is different from the normal AGP 7800GS cards as the 7800GS is essentialy a crippled 7800GT you cannot normally get a 7800GT in AGP form & these are special edition cards.

If that eats too much into your budget than a 7800GS is the next best option you should be able to find them at around €320 or less. See this AGP 7800GS for €315 and a 1GB RAM kit for €94 which should just fall into your budget although you could save some cash if you if you only have a single 512MB stick so buy another.

conzy · 28-05-2006 10:08PM

His P4 has a 533mhz and 512kb cache........

Its fairly old and if it was my money, I wouldnt spend it on an AGP card for a system that is already a bit long in the tooth.......

I would start fresh.......

If you sell your current PC and put your budget towards the new PC, you could get a very respectable gaming machine, that will be very upgradable.......

Kintarō Hattori · 02-06-2006 11:10PM

I agree with Conzy!!!

uberpixie · 03-06-2006 12:05PM

conzymaher wrote:

His P4 has a 533mhz and 512kb cache........

Its fairly old and if it was my money, I wouldnt spend it on an AGP card for a system that is already a bit long in the tooth.......

I would start fresh.......

If you sell your current PC and put your budget towards the new PC, you could get a very respectable gaming machine, that will be very upgradable.......

A p4 3ghz and 1 gig of ram and a half deacent card will still play a lot of games.

To the OP: You can still game quite comfortably on rig like this with a half dacent AGP card.

You wont be playing at the highest settings, but will play games well at 1024x768 at mid to high settings.

285 euro gets you a 6800GS and 512mb of ram on komplett ex shipping.

(rough price guide: get the ram off shop4memory.com, use the memory config tool they have on the site to match up compat ram with your system)

This is more than enough to tie you over the next year in gaming.

Your rig wont be the fastest: but again once you are sensible about the settings you run games at you will get a lot of bang for your buck for a 300 euro upgrade.

Again what do you want?

Gaming at the highest settings possible = new rig (1500 - 2000 euro)

Gaming at mid range settings for the next year to year and a half = 300 euro upgrade.

gamer · 25-06-2006 03:03PM

Yeah, in a years time, maybe vista, and dx10 video cards will be out,get agp card around 150euro, theres always agp cards for sale on boards,look up doom 3, farcry benchmarks be4 you buy,any card, a good card,will give at least 50 fps at 1024x768 resolution.You have a years gaming at least left with that pc, for halflife2 doom3,you,ll need dx9 card .The 5200 card is VERY slow,replace it be4 you buy any more games.The 9800PRO card is 95euro AT MARXPCS ,SEE www.marxcomputers.ie That is directx 9 ,and opengl version 2.0 ,which you,will need to play the latest games, it has 256meg ddr video ram. .

5uspect · 25-06-2006 07:58PM

ah the 9800 is two generations beind the current gen. You should look at cards from the geforce 6 to 7 series or the ati X series. These cards support the new fancy special effects like shader modle 3 and HDR lighting. I cheaped out and bought a XFX 6600gt. My machine is a miserable Dell box with a 2.66P4 1gig RAM and said gpu. I can run HL2 maxed out except for anti-alaising and at 1024x780 which doesn't bother me. It also eats Doom3, quake4, CoD2 etc at similar settings, Lots of folks seem to worry about every pixel. if you just and to have fun playing the latest games rather than enter a willy waving competition then go for the cheaper upgrade options. i.e. a good nvidia AGP 7 series card and extra RAM.
Good luck

christophicus · 25-06-2006 08:54PM

Yaeah i agree with you 5uspect thats the outlook people should have nowadays but all they care about is having the very fastest pc they can get ,even when it doesnt make Finacial sense. Its the nerds version of measuring the manlihood,when everyone knows its not about how big its is ,but how you use it ;)by the way ,im just beeing a bit fussy here but th Radeon X series doesnt support shader module 3 (as far as i know).

5uspect · 25-06-2006 09:10PM

christophicus wrote:

Yaeah i agree with you 5uspect thats the outlook people should have nowadays but all they care about is having the very fastest pc they can get ,even when it doesnt make Finacial sense. Its the nerds version of measuring the manlihood,when everyone knows its not about how big its is ,but how you use it ;)by the way ,im just beeing a bit fussy here but th Radeon X series doesnt support shader module 3 (as far as i know).

Yeah I think you're right about SM3.0, oops
nvidia so!

gamer · 27-06-2006 01:38PM

theres no point in spending more than, 130 for a graphics card for that pc,get 1 that is dx9 OPENGL version 2.0 compatible.

TerrorFirmer · 27-06-2006 05:24PM

gamer wrote:

Yeah, in a years time, maybe vista, and dx10 video cards will be out,get agp card around 150euro, theres always agp cards for sale on boards,look up doom 3, farcry benchmarks be4 you buy,any card, a good card,will give at least 50 fps at 1024x768 resolution.You have a years gaming at least left with that pc, for halflife2 doom3,you,ll need dx9 card .The 5200 card is VERY slow,replace it be4 you buy any more games.The 9800PRO card is 95euro AT MARXPCS ,SEE www.marxcomputers.ie That is directx 9 ,and opengl version 2.0 ,which you,will need to play the latest games, it has 256meg ddr video ram. .

You can play Half Life on any piece of crap card, doesn't have to be DX9. Joys of the source engine, it runs on virtually anything....I've seen it running on an Intel integrated GMA900 and a Celeron processor, it wasn't pretty but it is truely remarkable that it even works.

It really depends on what sort of games you plan to play - alot of it these days seems to be about waving your e-penis more then anything. (There is another thread in this forum, for example, with a guy wanting to change from a 7800 to a 1900 already)

I'm still using an X800 - a card that costs about 130 new at this stage. I can still play my games on relatively high settings - Call of Duty 2, Battlefield 2, Half Life 2, Doom 3 - all at 1024x768 or higher, options on high, no problems. It might not be the best in future proofing, but with dx10 so close, and a price that cheap, its a perfect example of how you can budget and still get performance out of current games.

Just a thought....A faster/newer card is great and very tempting but sometimes you really have to stop and think..."Do I really need that over x or y for what I want to use it for?"

Tchocky · 27-06-2006 05:33PM

HavoK wrote:

You can play Half Life on any piece of crap card, doesn't have to be DX9. Joys of the source engine, it runs on virtually anything....I've seen it running on an Intel integrated GMA900 and a Celeron

I completed HL2 on a setup like that. Indeed it wasnt pretty, but I didnt care. It was my roommates computer, mine hasnt even got a *sigh* AGP slot.

OP, unless you're set on getting new RAM & GPU, save the cash and pick up a new system, more upgrade potential.

5uspect · 27-06-2006 05:41PM

HavoK wrote:

You can play Half Life on any piece of crap card, doesn't have to be DX9. Joys of the source engine, it runs on virtually anything....I've seen it running on an Intel integrated GMA900 and a Celeron processor, it wasn't pretty but it is truely remarkable that it even works.

It really depends on what sort of games you plan to play - alot of it these days seems to be about waving your e-penis more then anything. (There is another thread in this forum, for example, with a guy wanting to change from a 7800 to a 1900 already)

I'm still using an X800 - a card that costs about 130 new at this stage. I can still play my games on relatively high settings - Call of Duty 2, Battlefield 2, Half Life 2, Doom 3 - all at 1024x768 or higher, options on high, no problems. It might not be the best in future proofing, but with dx10 so close, and a price that cheap, its a perfect example of how you can budget and still get performance out of current games.

Just a thought....A faster/newer card is great and very tempting but sometimes you really have to stop and think..."Do I really need that over x or y for what I want to use it for?"

Definately. If I wanted a games PC hung like a horse I would buy a completely new machine in a year or two. Now is not really a good time for upgrading to a new machine as there are too many generation changes happening around now. New intel chips, new graphics cards, new Windows OS, new optical drive format bah bah bah. The best option for now is to get a decent dx9 card (maybe secondhand from some willy waver who is looking to off load) and maybe in a years time or so consider possibly getting a new machine with vista, a snazzy 64bit quarduple core processor

, the winner of the HD-DVD/Blu ray war drive and the best current RAM HDD etc.

gamer · 28-06-2006 02:37PM

just get rid of the 5200,the 9800 is 5times faster than that,5200 is really slow,gives about 10fps in call of duty 2,its no good re games like hl2 etc.if you get x800 or 9800 card,you can play any game doom3 etc,1024x768 at high detail settings,i play cod2 on an athlon 2600, 512meg ram, and it looks great.its kind of pointless buying games ,when u have a very slow 5200 card.

Kintarō Hattori · 30-06-2006 03:20AM

christophicus wrote:

by the way ,im just beeing a bit fussy here but th Radeon X series doesnt support shader module 3 (as far as i know).

If I'm not mistaken the X1800 and X1900 series support Shader Model 3.0

TerrorFirmer · 30-06-2006 08:15AM

When the FX series was first announced, one of the games used to showcase the card was STALKER screenshots, running beautifully on the card.

That's amusing as when STALKER finally does arrive, it'll probably run at 5 frames a second on the 5200, if it'd run at all.

5uspect · 30-06-2006 08:49AM

HavoK wrote:

When the FX series was first announced, one of the games used to showcase the card was STALKER screenshots, running beautifully on the card.

That's amusing as when STALKER finally does arrive, it'll probably run at 5 frames a second on the 5200, if it'd run at all.

STALKER is going to arrive? :eek:
When?!
How?!
I thought it was going to be held in continous development for at least another 10 years.

christophicus · 30-06-2006 03:09PM

eo980 wrote:

If I'm not mistaken the X1800 and X1900 series support Shader Model 3.0

lol. Yes i should have put x800 there not just x.

TerrorFirmer · 30-06-2006 09:34PM

5uspect wrote:

STALKER is going to arrive? :eek:
When?!
How?!
I thought it was going to be held in continous development for at least another 10 years.

Actually, has anyone run the alpha version of stalker on any of the fx series cards? would love to hear how it ran

How do i know what type of card i have?

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