Curse

xxreaper008 · Jan 03, 2006, 12:20 AM // 00:20

Does anyone know if this is a good or great graphics card?

128MB PCI Express™ x16 (DVI/VGA/TV-out) ATI Radeon X300 SE HyperMemory

I'm buying a pc soon, and im stuck on picking the grapics card.
What do you think is he better, I want to play games at 1280x1024x32

Intel® Graphics Media Accelerator 950 [Included in Price]

128MB PCI Express™ x16 (DVI/VGA/TV-out) ATI Radeon X300 SE HyperMemory [add $50 or $2/month2]

256MB PCI Express™ x16 (DVI/VGA/TV-out) ATI Radeon X600 SE HyperMemory [add $90 or $3/month2]

Which is the best buy and or the best type?

~Thanks in Advance~

Loviatar · Jan 03, 2006, 12:23 AM // 00:23

SPECIAL NOTE

any card from ati that has SE,LE in the name are crippled budget cards that are best to avoid.

what budget are we talking?

xxreaper008 · Jan 03, 2006, 12:30 AM // 00:30

Quote:

Originally Posted by Loviatar

SPECIAL NOTE

any card from ati that has SE,LE in the name are crippled budget cards that are best to avoid.

what budget are we talking?

About a 100$ budget... The thing is I'm buying a dell, and that was the only option for custimaization. Any pci express graphics card out there tahts about 100$ ot less?

chris_nin00 · Jan 03, 2006, 12:47 AM // 00:47

Don't get an SE,LE

A normal X300 is fine.

xxreaper008 · Jan 03, 2006, 01:07 AM // 01:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by chris_nin00

Don't get an SE,LE

A normal X300 is fine.

Will i be able to play GW fine, maybe with antilashing

Lambentviper · Jan 03, 2006, 01:13 AM // 01:13

i got a new dell 3 months ago. I wish i would have realized i could choose my own graphics card though...playing with a 64MB integrated kinda sucks...

the only slots i know of on my motherboard are PCI, so im thinking of getting this one:
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....0934680 42109

its a ATI-Radeon 9250 DDR PCI. 256MB.

xxreaper008 · Jan 03, 2006, 01:16 AM // 01:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lambentviper

i got a new dell 3 months ago. I wish i would have realized i could choose my own graphics card though...playing with a 64MB integrated kinda sucks...

the only slots i know of on my motherboard are PCI, so im thinking of getting this one:
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....0934680 42109

its a ATI-Radeon 9250 DDR PCI. 256MB.

Same thing happened to me when i got my first dell. the good graphics cards usually over heat for me.

Loviatar · Jan 03, 2006, 01:44 AM // 01:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by xxreaper008

Same thing happened to me when i got my first dell. the good graphics cards usually over heat for me.

here is what i have which is listed by all the reviewers as the most video/dollar.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814122201

3 year warrenty from a good company.

newegg.com is a top rated reseller.

you can use this to check for other cards simply changing from best rating to lowest price etc and i have filtered the list for PCI-EXPRESS already

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...x&Order=rating

the prices are all over the place so you might find a good price on page 5 when filtered by best rating

Lambentviper · Jan 03, 2006, 02:29 AM // 02:29

the one you posted the link to is a PCI-E card....

not only does it state it, but i can tell from the bus arrangement

DeepFyre · Jan 03, 2006, 02:42 AM // 02:42

you know im planning on buying a new video card, and Im pretty sure that I have a PCI slot, but I'm not sure if its express or not, how do I figure out?
edit: are there any pros/cons to express pci?

Lambentviper · Jan 03, 2006, 03:05 AM // 03:05

as far as i know PCI-E is the best/most recent slot out there.

PCI slots are often plain white. Ahh, heres a little pic:

http://www.viaarena.com/images/articles/pcie%20002.jpg

LiQuId StEeL · Jan 03, 2006, 03:54 AM // 03:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by DeepFyre

edit: are there any pros/cons to express pci?

Express is the platform/slot that all ATI/nVIDIA (the major chipset manufacturers) are producing the new stuff for.

@OP: Is there a specific reason you are looking at a dell? If you are actually looking for decent performance, I'd suggest going to www.ibuypower.com and looking around. I have seen nothing but satisfaction coming from that site, and it is usually cheaper for a better system (gaming-wise) than a dell.

If you have a decent technical understanding, and some decently evolved google skills, you can also consider building your own system and saving even more money.

@DF: Start - Control Panel - System - Hardware tab - Device manager... somewhere in there should be a listing of the hookups... look for AGP or PCI-E (pci express might be there also). If you see one of them, it is more than likely the format you have. All? computers should have a PCI card, but frankly... ther performance of those sucks.

@Lambent: I'd stick away from the 256mb version of the 9250(?). The chipset won't use the ram efficiently, and the 125mb version actually runs faster than the 256. A friend of mine found that out the hard way.

Dex · Jan 03, 2006, 06:35 AM // 06:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by xxreaper008

About a 100$ budget... The thing is I'm buying a dell, and that was the only option for custimaization. Any pci express graphics card out there tahts about 100$ ot less?

If you're set on getting a Dell, call them and insist on a system with an open PCI-E or AGP slot. A friend of mine was in the same situation. I got on the phone with Dell with him and we worked out getting him a system with some upgrade options. Take the integrated video option and get someone on the phone that can guarantee you that your system will have an open PCI-E or AGP slot. If they're offering those cards as upgrade options there's probably an open slot, but make sure. Some big OEM companies have several versions of the mainboards for certain systems and will sometimes try to give you a 'stripped down' version if you don't specify what upgrade options you want.

There are plenty of decent video cards out there for ~$100 that you could just add yourself.

xxreaper008 · Jan 05, 2006, 03:39 AM // 03:39

Whats the the disadvantages of SE graphic cards?

awesome sauce · Jan 05, 2006, 05:46 AM // 05:46

Usually faster core and memory speeds

ange1 · Jan 05, 2006, 06:09 AM // 06:09

i thought the x300 is worst than the new integrated video cards from mother board

sorry x300 is faster than the newer nvidia and ati integrated. but still, the new boards with nvidia6150 or atixpress200s can do pretty well with guildwars already, they beat my ati 9250 from my research.

oh 9250 runs guildwars fine...

awesome sauce · Jan 05, 2006, 06:13 AM // 06:13

there are many different kinds of integrated cards. I doubt that anythin could be worse than the integrated intels. But, some AMD based motherboards now come with ati radeons built in.

Dex · Jan 05, 2006, 06:49 PM // 18:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by awesome sauce

Usually faster core and memory speeds

Actually, I think the SE and LE versions of most video cards have slower core clockspeeds and less/slower memory. It's the XT/Pro/Ultra/GT/GTX versions that are faster.

Lambentviper · Jan 05, 2006, 08:59 PM // 20:59

I have an integrated intel and i can confidently say they suck.