Curse

Messiah O F Light · Apr 23, 2007, 01:56 AM // 01:56

is there a physical difference between AGP cards and PCI cards? oh yeah, and what do they stand for? my current video card is AGP i think, but will PCI cards work in the same slot? is either one better than the other? currently, what are the best AGP and PCI cards under $150? lol that's a lot of questions, but thanks!

oh yeah, if i open up my pc, will it say how strong my power supply is? or can i find out w/o opening everything?

Loviatar · Apr 23, 2007, 02:18 AM // 02:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by Messiah O F Light

is there a physical difference between AGP cards and PCI cards? oh yeah, and what do they stand for? my current video card is AGP i think, but will PCI cards work in the same slot? is either one better than the other? currently, what are the best AGP and PCI cards under $150? lol that's a lot of questions, but thanks!

oh yeah, if i open up my pc, will it say how strong my power supply is? or can i find out w/o opening everything?

an AGP card will not fit into either a PCI slot (phased out now) nor a PCI-E card slot whch is the new standard which replaced standard PCI.

PCI-E IS PCI-EXPRESS and none will interchange physically or electronically (different pin pattern/voltages) in the different slots.

the power supply has all that information on its side waiting for you to look at it

chexk here for the card you want with a huge choice to look at from a completely reliable company.

http://www.newegg.com/

AGP is much better than PCI if you have an AGP slot otherwise you have only a very limited choice of STANDARD PCI NOT PCI-E CARDS

Eldin · Apr 23, 2007, 03:12 AM // 03:12

PCI-E is slowly phasing out AGP. PCI-E and AGP are both fairly good, it's just that not that many companies develop high-end AGP cards now. Everyone will have to switch to PCI-E eventually just to keep up with future graphics cards that may be PCI-E specific.

Don't get PCI-E mixed up with PCI, a REALLY old GFX bus (it was replaced by AGP).

Replicant · Apr 23, 2007, 03:17 AM // 03:17

From best to worst..
1. PCI-E http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pci_express
2. AGP http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AGP
3. PCI http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Periphe...t_Interconnect
4. On Mainboard Video

PCI-Express is the fastest video technology currently public, and is deticated to pure video, much like AGP is to video.

AGP is the second fastest, and is faster then PCI because it comes directly out of the northbridge, rather then going through the southbridge. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northbr...28computing%29 ). This allows for Data to be sent to the graphics card faster.

PCI is normally used only for Modems, Sound Cards, and extra internal peripheral. And among techs is usually not recommended for video.

On Mainboard Video, while not having much knowledge on why this is the slowest, my experience has shown that in most cases the video of on mainboard videocards usually sucks.. This is usually all thats needed for Word Processing, non-intensive Games (like solitare, minesweeper, etc..), Web Surfing, E-mail, and so forth.

If you have PCI-E on your mainboard, i'd advise getting a card that supports it. If you only have AGP don't feel bad. Theres plenty of good Video Cards that still run on AGP. (hell, i'm still running a GeForce4 64mb AGP4X card without much lag lol.)

Messiah O F Light · Apr 23, 2007, 03:26 AM // 03:26

thanks for the info/help

lightblade · Apr 23, 2007, 07:14 AM // 07:14

AGP = Accelerated Graphic Port
PCI = Peripheral Component Interconnect

AGP 8x and PCI-E 16x is pretty much even in term of transfer speed, but for some reason the manufaturers stopped making graphic cards that go with AGP so it's a dead technology now.

Aecum · Apr 23, 2007, 09:38 AM // 09:38

the thing is that AGP was limited at 35-40 watt worth of power, and PCI-E could give 65-70 watt, so you dont need to hook up your graphics card to the PSU, but since graphics cards advance so fast today, that was over run immidiatly, and now they again require a direct to psu connection