Video Card Upgrade Suggestions..

[cokepinz]

I have an HP Pavilion 8860 with an AMD Athlon T-Bird 1.0 GHz processor, that's running WinMe with 640MB RAM. My video card went South yesterday morning and I'm looking to replace it. I really don't know anything about current video cards, but I do know that I'd like to get a card that's better than the Nvidia Vanta 16 MB AGP 2X card that came installed in my pc. I'm prepared to spend up to $180 or so and would just like to get the best card that I can get for what I'm willing to spend. For what it's worth, I do a little bit of gaming, but have never been able to get SimCity 3000 Unlimited to work correctly with my current card, and a whole lot of working with images (mainly scans). If anyone has any suggestions or opinions, as to what card you'd buy, I'd greatly appreciate hearing them.

Thanks,
Jennifer

[killercow]

Welcome to http://pcguide.com/ubb/pcgubb.gif

Do you by chance know the mobo maker and/or specs. Like what it can handle?

[cokepinz]

I know the mobo manufacturer is ASUS, but I'm not too sure what it can handle. I have a link to HP's site, that lists my pc's specs and "what ships in the box", found here: Pavilion 8860 Specs (http://h20015.www2.hp.com/en/document.jhtml?reg=&lc=en&cc=us&prodId=hppavillio28316&docName=bph06301). Does that help?

Thanks,
Jennifer

[killercow]

You'll have to hear from some of the wiser men and women on this. Your mobo I think can only handle 2x - 4x. You can look at this but again wait for more responses. Im not too sure.here (http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduct.asp?description=14-156-007)

[pave_spectre]

Well the first thing I might say is that according to the link you posted you seem to have 128MB RAM more than the system officially can handle so well done :) .

Without knowing the actual model of the motherboard it is impossible to say with any certainty what graphics cards it would support, though 4x would have to be the maximum given the apparent age of the sytem. To be sure you woulds need find out the motherboard model number, probably by opening the case and looking for the number printed somewhere on the board ittself.

[Deagle]

WoW <b>Jen</b> uh I mean cokepinz...:D your HP specs is almost the same as my compcrap PC:rolleyes: Mine's one can support up to 4x so I'm guessing that yours can too.:p Hmm up to $180 eh? Well since you only do moderate gaming, an ATI Radeon9100 will suits you nicely.;) Oh and don't worry, it won't cost you an arm or a leg...:D <a href="http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduct.asp?catalog=48&DEPA=1&submit=property&mfrcode=0&propertycode=&propertycodevalue=4530,3677">Here's<a><br> the link to it.
PEACE:cool:

[cokepinz]

Wow, thanks for the great responses and information about my pc and what video card it can handle! At least now I don't have to worry about buying a card that won't even work :)

I have a few more questions though, about the difference between the 2 cards that were suggested. As far as I can tell, the only difference between the Transcend ATI Radeon 7500 and the Transcend ATI Radeon 9100, is that the 9100 supports ATI TRUFORM, SMARTSHADER, SMOOTHVISION, PIXEL TAPESTRY II, VIDEO IMMERSION II, and HYPER Z II technologies, versus the 7500 supporting HYDRAVISION and PIXEL TAPESTRY technologies. Forgive me for sounding stupid, but what exactly is all that :confused: My main concern, going back to my crashing SimCity game, is that the card be able to support DirectDraw. I'm not entirely too sure what DirectDraw is, and I'm thinking it just might possibly have something to do with DirectX, but do all video cards now-a-days support it or do I need to make sure the card I get specifically states it does?

As for my pc having 128MB more RAM than it can handle, I'd have to thank the guy at work who gave it to me for free. He has a system very similar to mine, except his HP has a Pentium processor, and he tried to put 2 512MB sticks in it. After installing both sticks, and his pc going crazy on him, he took 1 stick out and gave it to me. I'm not sure if he stuck with the 128/512MB combo like mine, or if he eventually went with a 256/512MB combo, but I haven't had any problems with there being more RAM than allows in mine. Besides, who can pass up a free 512MB RAM module :D

Thanks,
Jenn

[killercow]

As far as I can tell, the only difference between the Transcend ATI Radeon 7500 and the Transcend ATI Radeon 9100, is that the 9100 supports ATI TRUFORM, SMARTSHADER, SMOOTHVISION, PIXEL TAPESTRY II, VIDEO IMMERSION II, and HYPER Z II technologies, versus the 7500 supporting HYDRAVISION and PIXEL TAPESTRY technologies. Forgive me for sounding stupid, but what exactly is all that
Well basicly it all makes the Readon 9100 better.

[killercow]

Here are sone links for more reference
Ati TRUFORM - remember this was written in 2001 s.o when it says recent you know it's not that recent (http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.html?i=1476&p=2)
SMARTSHADER (http://www.gamersdepot.com/hardware/video_cards/ati/smartshader/002.htm) REmember this too was in 2001
Smooth Vision (http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=1562)
This helps a lot (http://mirror.ati.com/companyinfo/glossary/includes/list.html#pixel2)
Video Emmersion II (http://www.ati.com/products/cs/vimmersion.html)
Remember when I say old I dont mean it wrong or bad for you it's in reference to the card you want. Which unfortunately is kinda old in computer hardware upgrade time.
Hope that helps.