What is the best PCI card please??

[Baracade980]

Actually, I'm having the same issue guys. I'd also like to know what graphics card for pci would be good. I'm planning on getting some higher end games (HL2) and which one would you say can run the new stuff the best. Thanks.

[tristancarton]

Just grab the card xanderf put up in his post. It is most likely the fastest out nowadays.

[anzak]

Originally Posted by Baracade980

Actually, I'm having the same issue guys. I'd also like to know what graphics card for pci would be good. I'm planning on getting some higher end games (HL2) and which one would you say can run the new stuff the best. Thanks.

No PCI card can handle todays games such as Half Life 2 and Doom 3. The PCI bus is just to slow. I would recommend buying a cheap motherboard and an AGP card like he Radeon 9600 pro.

[tristancarton]

Originally Posted by anzak

No PCI card can handle todays games such as Half Life 2 and Doom 3. The PCI bus is just to slow. I would recommend buying a cheap motherboard and an AGP card like he Radeon 9600 pro.

while I totally agree with your assessment of buying a cheap agp motherboard and an agp card, your statement is not entirely true. i ran benchmarks with my athlon 2600 and 64mb pci radeon 9100 for bklevan(other guy in pci thread wanting to know about pci cards) to let him know it ran games.

benchmarks from my session:

cs source (engine hl2 runs on) test benchmark: 800x600 everything on high 16x anistropic filtering, 48 fps

far cry island demo (runs very well)
1024x768 everything on low runs 36-48 fps. Still looks decent. Running everything on medium causes texture swapping and cuts frame rates down to 5fps at times.

doom3 timedemo(barely playable, pretty sure due to texture swapping all of the time)
640x480 everything on as low i get 33 fps

so yes games are playable. just not at high res/detail. in addition i would guess having a 256mb 5700le card may also help with some of the texture swapping I was seeing which cut down my 9100s fps.

link to rage3d forum from a month ago where i originally posted the testing i did for bklevan
http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?t=33785711

[Baracade980]

Unfortunately, switching out the motherboard is not an option... I already looked into it. And don't say buy a new machine either.

However, if it'll run that stuff decently like you guys say, I'll be happy with it. In any case, I think it'll be better than the integrated intel graphics I currently have (and if thats not true, whats up with that?) Also, I read somewhere that the GeForce FX5700 series is the cheepest bare for the recomended requirements of HL2... course that could be false, but it wont stop me from playing it

BTW- thanks for the link.