recommendations please

[chriswhitelaw]

Hello ladies and gents I have a question about my hp pavillion a210n.

system specs that are needed for a answer

2.5ghz intel celeron
400mhz FSB
256mb ddr sdram
3 pci slots
no agp
64mb oboard video shared


What type of video card would you recommend me buying?under $100!

[rsfnatik]

No AGP... this is why I don't recommend boxed/branded systems.

What exactly is the purpose of this upgrade? Are you looking to play games? Without an AGP slot you're looking at a PCI card... and buying a PCI card for gaming may not be worth the money (hard to find benchmarks for PCI cards). Anyway, you could find a Radeon 7500 or nVidia FX 5200 for in/around $100. If this is just a workstation a Radeon 7000/MX-440 should do the trick for only half the money.

Do a category search www.newegg.com for PCI cards available in that price range.

[chriswhitelaw]

yeah games would be nice to play

battlefield 1942
doom 3
half-life 2

When I bought the system I thought it would have a AGP slot should have researched a little more I guess.

anything but onboard video with 64mb shared.

[BuildItYourself]

Originally posted by rsfnatik
No AGP... this is why I don't recommend boxed/branded systems.

I have an HP Pavilion753n, It has AGP




You might want to try newegg.com , they usualy have good prices.

[chriswhitelaw]

Yeah I figured before I'd buy I'd get some expert opinions though

[FrnchDp]

You should have posted this in the "Video Cards & Monitors" forum, this would probably get more attention in there.. Maybe a Mod will move this for you...

Otherwise, I know very little about vido cards, so no recommendations from me..

Good Luck

[chriswhitelaw]

true I was kinda tossed up as to where to place this but anywhere is fine to me as long as I get some help.

[Ol'Tunzafun]

Nothing that you put in that rig is going to be better than what you have because the onboard video in the a210n is AGP (64MB Intel Extreme 845 integrated AGP). A PCI card will run at half the speed. Doubling the amount of memory will not offset that.

[lptech]

They are correct to point out that the options you seek won't be possible due to the lack of an AGP slot on that motherboard! What I think would help is a faster CPU and not a PCI videocard with more memory. You should have researched it further before buying the system since now you're wanting to upgrade the video and only to find out that you can't!

LPTECH

[BuildItYourself]

Originally posted by chriswhitelaw

anything but onboard video with 64mb shared.

How 'bout onboard video with 32mb shared

sorry, just couldn't resist

[chriswhitelaw]

I think I'll go with a 128mb PCI nvidia video card, but which one?

[scoob19]

hate to say it, but with a card like the nvidia fx 5200 you arent going to be able to run HL2/Doom3 very well...especially a pci version.

[d94]

what i'd do is buy a new micro atx mobo and then buy a video card...

[chriswhitelaw]

yeah but how would that fly with a warranty?

[scoob19]

I dont know much about the warranties on pre-built systems, but i would guess its possible would void the warranty if you replace the mboard. But replacing the mboard is probably the best way to improve your graphics card situation.