Cheap, but usefull?

[Ranekore]

Hello, Im looking for a video card for my mothers computer. To be honest im looking for a video card for around 50-65$. The card needs to be 8x agp preferably, unless you think 4x will play games like Everquest, Guild Wars, and Rollercoaster Tycoon 3 at playable frame rates and quality. I was looking at the Geforce 4 ti 4200 128mb 128bit on ebay in this price range. As well as the Radeon 9500 pro on an occasion. Any assistance or imput on this will be much very much appreciated, thank you.

 

[xwebb69x]

Either of those choices would work just fine for those games. Having 4x instead of 8x wont make much of a difference either.

Love life, and live love.

 

[cleeve]

Go for the 9500 PRO if you can, they are as good as a 9600XT, better in some instances.

Great cards, and ahead of their time.

________________
<b>Radeon <font color=red>9700 PRO</b></font color=red> <i>(o/c 332/345)</i>
<b>AthlonXP <font color=red>3200+</b></font color=red> <i>(Barton 2500+ o/c 400 FSB)</i>
<b>3dMark03: <font color=red>5,354</b>

 

[lik]

there is abselutly no diference between agp 4x and 8x. its just marketing (in that card gen of course)

P4-2800->FSB800, Asus P4P800, 512DDR-400, Creative GeForce DDR (the first one lol)

 

[Ranekore]

Ok, thx guys. I went with a Geforce 4 ti 4600 128bit/128mb DDR, I think this card is 4x agp but im not sure as it has not arrived yet. I payed 70$ for this used card off ebay btw. I noticed in some benchmarks, mainly the Charts IV on the farcry test that this card out preformed the Radeon 9500 pro as well as the 9600 xt by a few frame rates. Also how does double the bandwidth of the agp bus not make a difference in gaming? I noticed you said it was marketing, well its a good job because it sounds like a big deal to me lol. I would like your freedback please. On how this card will do on Direct X 9 games, eq 2 maybe. Also on weather or not this was a good choice as well as deal. thank you very much

 

[tenaciousleydead]

Well it'll do better in DX9 because its not DX9 compatible you know what im sayin. Good buy thought just not the newest in technology. dont forget ot overclock.

Asus A7V880 (Via KT 880 chipset)
AMD Athlon 2200 at 2.2 Ghz
MSI Radeon 9550-->9600 PRO bios
2x 256 megs Pc-3200 CAS 2 Corsair Ram (dual channel)

 

[lik]

Even the new gen cards don't use the full bandwich of 8x Agp. And lots of them don't even use the 4x AGp to its max. Only in the top you will se diference. For example, My 9800Pro, wich was, in its time, the second best card available, didn't use the full Agp4x. I've tested with 4x and 8x and it was exactly the same!

P4-2800->FSB800, Asus P4P800, 512DDR-400, Creative GeForce DDR (the first one lol)

 

[cleeve]

It doesn't make a difference because the data is bottlenecked by the rest of the system.

You can have 4x lanes merging into the 1-lane toll booth, or 8x lanes merging into the 1-lane toll booth... but the same amount of traffic is going to travel through that toll booth, regardless.

________________
<b>Radeon <font color=red>9700 PRO</b></font color=red> <i>(o/c 332/345)</i>
<b>AthlonXP <font color=red>3200+</b></font color=red> <i>(Barton 2500+ o/c 400 FSB)</i>
<b>3dMark03: <font color=red>5,354</b>