Did I just buy something really stupid?

Archived from groups: alt.games.the-sims (More info?)

Went to staples thinking the graphics cards would be the newest available.
Purchased a DIAMOND STEALTH S120 Graphics accelerator card featuring RADEON
9550 AGP Version with graphics by ATI Radeon 9550. But now I find out their
are higher versions. What I have now and wanted to improve upon. Will the
Radeon 9550 be better than what I have or will I have to get a new one for
Nightlife. I have 14 days to return the card even though I opened it.
Note: I am graphics-card challenged. Thanks.

NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 [Display adapter]
Sony SDM-HS94P [Monitor] (19.1"

2333 megahertz Intel Pentium 4
8 kilobyte primary memory cache
512 kilobyte secondary memory cache
Board: ASUSTeK Computer INC. P4B533 REV 1.xx
Bus Clock: 133 megahertz
BIOS: Award Software, Inc. ASUS P4B533 ACPI BIOS Revision 1006 05/24/2002
Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2 (build 2600)
1024 Megabytes Installed Memory
164.27 Gigabytes Usable Hard Drive Capacity
135.93 Gigabytes Hard Drive Free Space

TEAC CD-W540E [CD-ROM drive]
TOSHIBA DVD-ROM SD-M1612 [CD-ROM drive]
3.5" format removeable media [Floppy drive]

IC35L080AVVA07-0 [Hard drive] (82.35 GB) -- drive 0
Maxtor 6 Y080L0 USB Device [Hard drive] (81.96 GB) -- drive 1
CMI8738/C3DX PCI Audio Device
Standard Game Port

Archived from groups: alt.games.the-sims (More info?)

On Sun, 07 Aug 2005 06:53:40 GMT, "Mary"
<xxxxyyosugrad97330@worldnet.att.net> wrote:

>Went to staples thinking the graphics cards would be the newest available.
>Purchased a DIAMOND STEALTH S120 Graphics accelerator card featuring RADEON
>9550 AGP Version with graphics by ATI Radeon 9550. But now I find out their
>are higher versions. What I have now and wanted to improve upon. Will the
>Radeon 9550 be better than what I have or will I have to get a new one for
>Nightlife. I have 14 days to return the card even though I opened it.
>Note: I am graphics-card challenged. Thanks.
>
>NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 [Display adapter]
>Sony SDM-HS94P [Monitor] (19.1"
>
>2333 megahertz Intel Pentium 4

Your new card is certainly better than your old, but... how much did
you pay for it? And there certainly are better ones... my Radeon 9800
(which is what? 6 times faster?) is 2 years old now...
--


I'm going to corner Miami attorney Jack Thompson in a dark alley and beat him to death with my pink lawn flamingo

Archived from groups: alt.games.the-sims (More info?)

"Guardian Pegasus" <nobody@nowhere.xxx> wrote in message
news:5uhbf1pkf2nom8gv4hd82c81dh1paflk6r@4ax.com...
> On Sun, 07 Aug 2005 06:53:40 GMT, "Mary"
> <xxxxyyosugrad97330@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>
>>Went to staples thinking the graphics cards would be the newest available.
>>Purchased a DIAMOND STEALTH S120 Graphics accelerator card featuring
>>RADEON
>>9550 AGP Version with graphics by ATI Radeon 9550. But now I find out
>>their
>>are higher versions. What I have now and wanted to improve upon. Will
>>the
>>Radeon 9550 be better than what I have or will I have to get a new one for
>>Nightlife. I have 14 days to return the card even though I opened it.
>>Note: I am graphics-card challenged. Thanks.
>>
>>NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 [Display adapter]
>>Sony SDM-HS94P [Monitor] (19.1"
>>
>>2333 megahertz Intel Pentium 4
>
> Your new card is certainly better than your old, but... how much did
> you pay for it? And there certainly are better ones... my Radeon 9800
> (which is what? 6 times faster?) is 2 years old now...

I paid $129.00. I'd go up to $200-250.00.

Archived from groups: alt.games.the-sims (More info?)

"Mary" <xxxxyyosugrad97330@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:QRjJe.561450$cg1.18487@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
>
> "Guardian Pegasus" <nobody@nowhere.xxx> wrote in message
> news:5uhbf1pkf2nom8gv4hd82c81dh1paflk6r@4ax.com...
>> On Sun, 07 Aug 2005 06:53:40 GMT, "Mary"
>> <xxxxyyosugrad97330@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>>
>>>Went to staples thinking the graphics cards would be the newest
>>>available.
>>>Purchased a DIAMOND STEALTH S120 Graphics accelerator card featuring
>>>RADEON
>>>9550 AGP Version with graphics by ATI Radeon 9550. But now I find out
>>>their
>>>are higher versions. What I have now and wanted to improve upon. Will
>>>the
>>>Radeon 9550 be better than what I have or will I have to get a new one
>>>for
>>>Nightlife. I have 14 days to return the card even though I opened it.
>>>Note: I am graphics-card challenged. Thanks.
>>>
>>>NVIDIA GeForce4 MX 440 [Display adapter]
>>>Sony SDM-HS94P [Monitor] (19.1"
>>>
>>>2333 megahertz Intel Pentium 4
>>
>> Your new card is certainly better than your old, but... how much did
>> you pay for it? And there certainly are better ones... my Radeon 9800
>> (which is what? 6 times faster?) is 2 years old now...
>
> I paid $129.00. I'd go up to $200-250.00.



I paid almost $80 for my Radeon 9550 256mg, with shipping. Got it in January
off ebay (new, not refurb) and absolutely love it. On my older system I was
running a Radeon 8550 128mb (got that one free from an online gaming
company). I put that one in the kids computer to replace their GeForce (like
yours) and saw a big difference in the graphics on some of their games.

I hate nVidia....
noname

Archived from groups: alt.games.the-sims (More info?)

On Sun, 07 Aug 2005 08:44:32 GMT, "Mary"
<xxxxyyosugrad97330@worldnet.att.net> wrote:

>I paid $129.00. I'd go up to $200-250.00.

Ouchies... if those are the best deals they have I'd go elsewhere. I'm
assuming by your dns that you live in the US. You can safely order
stuff online. Newegg.com for instance is a good US webshop.

For 200-250$ you should be able to pick up a 6800GT, X800 PRO/XL.
Remember to pick one with an AGP slot if that's what you have. Also
remember that the numbers and letters on the card are CRITICAL, and
ammount of memory is complete nonsense. The TYPE and SPEED of memory
is much more important. DDR3 is better than 2, is better than 1. But
128 or 256 megabytes makes virtually no difference because no software
exists to exploit it and the hardware chips can't use that much
onboard anyway.
--


I'm going to corner Miami attorney Jack Thompson in a dark alley and beat him to death with my pink lawn flamingo

Archived from groups: alt.games.the-sims (More info?)

On Tue, 09 Aug 2005 00:01:21 GMT, "Mary"
<xxxxyyosugrad97330@worldnet.att.net> wrote:

>Thanks to all for helping me. I took it back. I picked up a 6800GT and
>some extra memory which will finally max it out while I was there.

Excellent... I think you'll find your game will run oh so much
smoother :-) Turn on "edge smoothing" and run the highest resolution
you're comfortable with.
--


I'm going to corner Miami attorney Jack Thompson in a dark alley and beat him to death with my pink lawn flamingo

Archived from groups: alt.games.the-sims (More info?)

On Thu, 11 Aug 2005 16:03:48 GMT, "Mary"
<xxxxyyosugrad97330@worldnet.att.net> wrote:

>It does run much smoother and....................those lakes I build are now
>actually blue (and I'm not talking about flashing blue (LOL). Thanks.

LOL... make sure you max out 'edge smoothing' too, it makes a HUGE
difference!
--


I'm going to corner Miami attorney Jack Thompson in a dark alley and beat him to death with my pink lawn flamingo