Video Card Question

[Cypres0099]

I don't know a whole lot about computers but I need a new video card. Could someone tell me if this is a good card and a good price?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...tem=2029199472

Or could someone please suggest another card in that price range? It will mostly be used for dvd playback.

Thanks

[virus]

well.... before we can start throwing vid card names out there.... what are the specs on your computer..... pretty much motherboard make and model, type of slots in your comp and their compatibilty... etc..........

[Cypres0099]

All I really know is that it's an AMD 750 processor It was built by a local computer store. It has an ATI card in it right now, it's just a little old. Tell me how I can find that stuff out and I'll tell you what I have. Thanks for the reply.

[ThePatriot]

Well...open it up to find out the motherboard make and model...also find out if you have an AGP slot, im sure you do but check.

Http://www.newegg.com go to catalog, then video cards, i searched for a Radeon 7500 there and they were 56 bucks, or 64, but there was 2 for 150 dollars. You might be able to get a better deal new.

[personman]

There was a place I found the radeon 8500 for only 150 bucks
I just got a Gainward GEforce 2 Ti 400 for 100 bucks. You probally need something a little better, but I'm not sure.
More importantally, what card to you have now?

[FactsOfLife]

I have to say that I'm very happy with my ATI8500 Radeon for DVD playback. it's friggin sweet.

and it ain't too shabby fraggin jabronis in Q3...

[Cypres0099]

It says it's a biostar mainboard... I can use them but I can't put them together.

My card right now is a rage 128 that's all I know. 32...64... I don't know. It has a tv out.

I'm feeling pretty dumb right now.

[71 LS6]

my new radeon 8500 (big step up from 7500) works great, you can find them for pretty good prices at pricewatch.com

infact, newegg.com has it for $107 shipped

[virus]

well... when the comp boots up it should do a ram count.... pause it here........ on the bottom of your screen thre should be a long line of numbers and letters should be about 3 inches long on the bottom left of the screen.....

now i just need to remember what site it was that you can type that into and it would tell you everything about your mobo.....

of course if you have the manuel for the mobo it should list all your specs there also......

[Cypres0099]

In the manual it says it's a M7MKA system board. It has 2 16 bit ISA bus slots, 5 pci bus slots and one AGP.

I also found a manual for TNT2 series video cards so my card might be a NVIDIA RIVA TNT2. Although I did pull it out and it said powered by ATI RAGE.

[ThePatriot]

Well, you can get pretty much any higher end video card.....you have an AGP slot, lucky son of a gun. I dont, i just found out my little brother's computer does. Oh well, did you know IBM told my mom that the IBM computer(my brother's) would only take some special IBM ram. I knew that wasnt right so when I was installing an ethernet card for him i got one of my 128mb sticks and tried it. It fit fine and booted fine, since he only had 64b of Ram and i had 382, i donated it being the nice person i am.

[virus]

ok.... look in the book for the mobo and see which type of AGP slot you have and what wil work with it..... ie plain old AGP or APG 2x/4x

if its only a 1x then that kinda limits your choices if it is a 2x/4x then pretty much anything should work

[Cypres0099]

I looked through the manual, it didn't really say much about the agp slot. Is there any way I can tell just by looking at it?

[virus]

not really.... with out knowing, one sure fire way of finding out is getting a card and tring it out.... best bet is to find a store that will let you return it if it dont work....

[Hamster Huey]

One easy way to check your board's AGP settings is to get into the BIOS. When you boot, you should see a text message saying "Press DEL to enter setup" or something similar. It usually only appears for a couple seconds. If hit the right key during the right interval, you'll get thrown into the BIOS setup, where you'll be able to see what AGP settings your board/BIOS supports.

Another easy way to check your settings is to go to the homepage of your motherboard's manufacturer and look up your specific motherboard model. It should list the AGP specs along with the rest of the board's specs.

That being said, I highly recommend ATI's boards for DVD playback. The newest GeForce4's from Nvidia have more power, but nobody has been able to top ATI's display quality. And I need to also give a plug for newegg.com's $99 Radeon 8500 LE. Fully DirectX 8.1 compliant, overclocks like a charm, and an unbelievable value.