What graphics card is best for gaming on the Windows Vista Home premium?

caylani

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Aug 5, 2013
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So I'm not technology savvy by any means, and I have no idea what graphics card would be best for my computer. I have a windows vista home premium, it's your basic computer, and I want to buy a new graphics card soley for the only purpose to play sims 3 and all it's expansion packs but I have no idea how to go about doing it or what the best graphic card would be. I have a Nvidia Geforce 6150 Le that can only run the sims 3 on the lowest graphics but still lags and black screens every few minutes. I'm looking to get a graphics card that will be able to run the sims 3 smoothly on high graphics and not black screen. My budget is up to 200-250 dollars, what Kind of graphics card would be best? Like I said I'm not technology savvy and I literally have no idea what I'm doing. Any information I failed to include please just ask. Thanks for your time!

(thought I'd include that the minimum requirements for a graphics card for sims 3 is 128 MB Video Card, with support for Pixel Shader 2.0 and I want a graphics card that will be able to play this with all the graphics and settings set on high)
 
Solution
I am assuming that thing has a 300w psu. Either way anything would be an upgrade from the nvidia 6150 discrete graphics.

I am recommending a hd6570 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102994

only $40 after rebate.
This should play the sims without any problems.

But if you want to get a slightly better card http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102950

Around $80
getting anything more powerful would be waste of money since your system would bottleneck it and your psu may not be able to keep up and you'd have to go through the hassle of getting and installing a new psu

caylani

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Aug 5, 2013
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I literally have no idea how to find this information, all the information I can find is this:

Operating System: Windows vista home premium
System manufacturer: Dell
System model: Dimension e521
Processor: AMD Athlon(tm) 64x2 Dual core processor 4000 +(2 CPUs) - 2.1GHz
Memory: 2.0 GB
System type: 32-bit
and this is all I could find, I have no idea how to find the power supply, or anything else I missed :/ I'm so sorry I have no idea how to do all this technology stuff!
 

shamsmu

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May 30, 2012
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I am assuming that thing has a 300w psu. Either way anything would be an upgrade from the nvidia 6150 discrete graphics.

I am recommending a hd6570 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102994

only $40 after rebate.
This should play the sims without any problems.

But if you want to get a slightly better card http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102950

Around $80
getting anything more powerful would be waste of money since your system would bottleneck it and your psu may not be able to keep up and you'd have to go through the hassle of getting and installing a new psu
 
Solution

caylani

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Aug 5, 2013
3
0
10,510


Thank you so much! thought I'd include that the minimum requirements for a graphics card for sims 3 is 128 MB Video Card, with support for Pixel Shader 2.0 and I want a graphics card that will be able to play this with all the graphics and settings set on high
 

shamsmu

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May 30, 2012
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thats not necessary. We used to look at those type of system requirements about 5-6 years ago. Now even the cheapest ($20) graphic card comes with 1gb memory. The hd6570 is pretty much all you need for sims 3