Which one of these would you pick?

[LaZeR]

Okay thought this over and I'm probably not going to be ready to spend enough just yet to build a new system + other than the lack of running some of the newer games and upgrading the OS from XP to Vista or W7, I'm ok with what I have atm:

Abit IC7-G / P4 @ 3Ghz / 1Gb Ram / Antec Earthwatts 430W PS / GF3 Ti200 / SB Audigy

So with that said, it looks like for about $200, I could upgrade the bolded to:

2 more GB Ram for total of 3GB (I have 2 open slots)
&
Radeon HD 3850 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 AGP 4X/8X
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...page=2&bop=And <<---Opinions on which one of these or any alternates?

Would this be fair bang for the buck for now and give me a little more life out of this system?

Then next year I will look into a new build.

[kazna]

Originally Posted by LaZeR

Would this be fair bang for the buck for now and give me a little more life out of this system?

Not really. Your CPU would be a massive bottleneck to the graphics card, and investing in AGP these days just seems crazy.

Depending on what you can salvage from your old rig, it shouldn't cost you anymore than $500 for a new mobo, cpu, ram, and graphics card.

What is your current PSU rated at? Do you mind reusing your old case or hard drives?

[LaZeR]

I think I will just go with one of these:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814131136

Surely this would be an improvement over the GF3 Ti200 and add DX10 support, the ability to run Vista and/or W7, and give some gaming a worthwhile boost.

I would like to keep this system in tact (eventually using as a 2nd setup for web and older games) along with having the proper funds to do it right when I decide to build a new system and $59 right now vs.s $1000 seems a much better option.

[CaptNKILL]

Originally Posted by LaZeR

I think I will just go with one of these:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814131136

Surely this would be an improvement over the GF3 Ti200 and add DX10 support, the ability to run Vista and/or W7, and give some gaming a worthwhile boost.

I would like to keep this system in tact (eventually using as a 2nd setup for web and older games) along with having the proper funds to do it right when I decide to build a new system and $59 right now vs.s $1000 seems a much better option.

Yeah that should give you a pretty substantial improvement, even if it is still a low end card.

Another gig of RAM would probably help a lot too.

Then you'd at least be able to play recent games, though your CPU will still be a bottleneck by quite a bit.

BTW, if you want to get rid of that ti 200 I'd love to add one to my nvidia collection.

[LaZeR]

Originally Posted by CaptNKILL

Yeah that should give you a pretty substantial improvement, even if it is still a low end card.

Another gig of RAM would probably help a lot too.

Then you'd at least be able to play recent games, though your CPU will still be a bottleneck by quite a bit.

BTW, if you want to get rid of that ti 200 I'd love to add one to my nvidia collection.

Just ordered. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814131136 Even has a $15 rebate!

I'll let ya know eventually on the ti200 but I will likely be willing it to my son I think he's still running my old GF 2 Ultra

PS: What is a good/simple bench proggy to run now and then after the gpu upgrade to compare numbers just for kicks?

[CaptNKILL]

I don't know too much about benchmarks, though I guess 3DMark 2001SE would probably give you some interesting results. The GF3 Ti 200 would have been the minimum required card that could run the tests with pixel-shaders, so a 2400 should show a pretty significant improvement.

Anything newer probably wouldn't run on the Geforce 3 at all.

BTW, if you want to get rid of that Geforce 2 Ultra I'd love one of those too.

The only reason I ask is because I haven't added to my collection in a while and those are two cards I've always wanted.

[nekrosoft13]

do you want Geforce 4 TI4200 turbo? i can sell you mine

[CaptNKILL]

Hmm... depends how much.

I have a Gainward Geforce 4 Ti 4400 from that era, but if the price is low enough there's always room for more.

[nekrosoft13]

how much these things go for? make an offer, it a Albatron, turbo edition, i forgot the details but it is ti4200 with ti4600 memory or something like that.

[CaptNKILL]

Originally Posted by nekrosoft13

how much these things go for? make an offer, it a Albatron, turbo edition, i forgot the details but it is ti4200 with ti4600 memory or something like that.

Ti 4200s are going for $18-$20 shipped on ebay. That's more than I'd like to spend since I don't really need one.